How browsers work.

Web browsers are some of the most widely used Software. It is interesting to know how they work and what exactly is going on behind the scenes. Below is a concise and brief description of how they work.

• User Interface.

This is everything that the end user interacts with. This includes the save buttons, the address bar, and the back/forward buttons.

• Browser Engine.

This is a bridge between the user interface and the rendering engine.

• Rendering Engine.

This is responsible for displaying the content asked for. For example, if the requested content is HTML, the rendering engine parses HTML and CSS and shows the parsed content on the screen.

• Networking.

This supports the network calls such as HTTP requests, using different versions for each platform behind an interface that works on all of them

• UI Backend.

This draws simple items like combo boxes and windows. This backend gives access to a standard interface that works on any computer. It uses methods from the user interface of the operating system.

• Javascript Interpreter.

This reads and runs the JavaScript code.

• Data Storage.

This is the layer to persist data. Browsers must keep a lot of data locally, like cookies, and use of different storage methods like FileSystem, IndexedDB, localStorage, and WebSQL.

The rendering engine is the core component of a browser. There are many different types of rendering engine, and some browsers use more than one version of the rendering engine, one for each tab. That's why each tab has it's own process.

For indepth understanding, please read this article by @pdster

Thank you for your time and see in the next.