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Mozilla The Internet Businesses OS X Operating Systems Apple

Help Make Firefox On Mac Suck Less 375

Posted by kdawson from the native-fox dept.
bluephone writes "Colin Barrett, one of the new Mac geniuses, and an Adium developer, has posted an entry on his blog offering an open call to all Mac users of Firefox asking them, 'What sucks about Firefox on the Mac?' He says he already knows about and is trying to solve such things as: 'Native Form Widgets (currently scheduled for Firefox 3), Keychain Integration, Firefox should have a Unified toolbar (not completely hopeless, it turns out), Performance...', but he wants to hear what else Mac users want from Firefox. So please, if you're a user of Macs and the interwebs, then RTFA, unclog your tubes, and send him your ideas."
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Help Make Firefox On Mac Suck Less More

Help Make Firefox On Mac Suck Less

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  • Camino (Score:5, Insightful)

    by daveschroeder ( 516195 ) * on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @07:47AM (#18868373)
    Isn't this what Camino [caminobrowser.org] is for? Like, the very reason [caminobrowser.org] for its existence?

    I.e., taking the Mozilla/Gecko codebase, and making a lean, fast browser with Mac widgets, tight Mac OS X integration, Keychain support, and so on?

    I understand the goal of trying to get more Mac-specific functionality into Firefox, but with a fundamentally cross-platform browser, inasmuch as it goes, it's been harder to integrate platform-specific features and functionality into Firefox proper. That's the reason Camino was born: to be a more agile project that is focused on making such a browser for Mac OS X using Mozilla/Gecko. For folks who don't need specific Firefox functionality or Firefox extensions, Camino is already the answer.

    • Re:Camino (Score:5, Insightful)

      by kadat ( 1092425 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @07:51AM (#18868401) Homepage
      Although I'm not a Mac user myself and can't say anything in the matter of usability on Mac OS, I use Firefox on both Windows and Linux mainly because of its extensions as they provide great functionality. Firefox without the plugins is not Firefox anymore, they're one of its most significant features.

      • Re:Camino (Score:5, Insightful)

        by GundamFan ( 848341 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:01AM (#18868491)
        This is exactly why I love Firefox, no mater what OS I am currently using on a box, I have access to a browser I know how to use. In this way projects like Firefox and OO.org may contribute to the end of desktop OS monopolies.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by encoderer ( 1060616 )
          Ok... have you ever actually ran into a browser that you DON'T know how to use? Aren't they basically all the same?

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Phisbut ( 761268 )

            Ok... have you ever actually ran into a browser that you DON'T know how to use? Aren't they basically all the same?

            They're all the same, except for what differentiate them. When you're used to keyboard shortcuts and added features that increase your productivity, using a browser that doesn't have them, even though it's still a browser and can still display web pages, will be a much slower and more frustrating experience.

            I use Firefox constantly. I love the Ctrl+L shortcut that gives focus to the address

            • Re:Camino (Score:4, Informative)

              by fangorious ( 1024903 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @09:36AM (#18869453)
              ctrl+k puts the cursor in the search bar, ctrl+up/ctrl+down cycles between search engines

            • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

              by zeath ( 624023 )
              I love the Ctrl+L shortcut that gives focus to the address bar.

              I have yet to see a browser for which F6 does not provide the same functionality. Mozilla's Firefox Keyboard Shortcut [mozilla.org] page doesn't even mention it. Granted you won't find the 'gg' or 'wiki' pseudo-commands in, say, IE, but F6 still does its job. As for the search bar, I'm not sure if there is a shortcut to get into there directly, but I do know you can tab into it once you have the focus in the address bar. This assumes, probably, that you do

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by zeath ( 624023 )
                As my sibling posts indicated, it is indeed Ctrl-K for the web search. Apparently I decided to ignore that last line on the keyboard shortcuts page.

            • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

              by chanrobi ( 944359 )

              I love how I can simply type "slashdot" then hit Ctrl+Shift+Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org".
              I love how I can simply type "slashdot" then hit Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org" in opera.

              • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

                by Phisbut ( 761268 )

                I love how I can simply type "slashdot" then hit Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org" in opera.

                I haven't used Opera in a while. Tell me, is that because www.slashdot.org is in your bookmarks and it automatically adds the right tld for single-word URLs, or is it because Opera appends ".com" every time, and slashdot.com redirects to slashdot.org? If slashdot.com was a different site than slashdot.org, would you still get to the right page every time? Does Opera have some sort of magical I-

              • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

                by sconest ( 188729 )

                I love how I can simply type "slashdot" then hit Ctrl+Shift+Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org".
                I love how I can simply type "slashdot" then hit Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org" in opera.
                I love how I can simply type "/." then hit Enter to have it turned into "http://www.slashdot.org" in opera. :)

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Nimey ( 114278 )
            w3m. lynx at first. That horrible line-mode browser, "www" or somesuch.

          • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

            by vertinox ( 846076 )
            Ok... have you ever actually ran into a browser that you DON'T know how to use? Aren't they basically all the same?

            Take Ad block plug for Firefox. It works on OS X, Windows, and Linux.

            Off the top of my head I don't know how you would acheive the same thing in IE, Safari, or Camino.

            I'm sure it could be done, but I don't want to have to spend anymore time than I have to when I'm working cross platform. If I learn it once on Firefox on any OS then I know exactly where to find the menu on another.

          • Re:Camino (Score:4, Insightful)

            by Oktober Sunset ( 838224 ) <sdpage103@ y a h o o . c o.uk> on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:31AM (#18870273)
            It's not so much being able to use a browser, it's more to do with using a browser without being consumed by an all encompassing rage, which causes you to scream curses upon the soul of whoever designed the interface.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by mike2R ( 721965 )
        Yeah, I use Camino on the Mac because Firefox is just too clunky, but I do miss the extensions - and have to keep Firefox for occasional use of those extensions I can't live without (Webdeveloper toolbar principly).

        • Cocoa Gestures (Score:3, Insightful)

          by mike2R ( 721965 )
          Just to add that the one thing that lets me function in Camino (or Safari) at all, is Cocoa Gestures [versiontracker.com], although if anyone can tell how to tie this into "top of page" and "bottom of page" actions I'd be a happy man.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by zentex ( 176409 )
      Isn't this what Camino is for? Like, the very reason for its existence?

      yes, it is. When I first got my MAC, I didn't like Safari so I *tolerated* Firefox. After much complaining to a group of friends they suggested Camino, and I was instantly sold.

      Sure, the releases are slow to hit market, but it's integration and functionality (not to mention it's clean look) out-weighs all else.
    • I don't have foxmarks from within camino. Foxmarks [foxcloud.com] are awesome - I can have the same set of bookmarks on my Mac at home, in my RHEL box at work and my windows work laptop!

      And Camino doesn't support that. It's a deal-breaker for me.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by daveschroeder ( 516195 ) *
        Probably why I said:

        For folks who don't need specific Firefox functionality or Firefox extensions, Camino is already the answer.

        I understand that for many, the lack of Firefox extensions is a killer. But, for other groups of people, it's not.
      • Google's browser sync does the same thing with the added ability to sync browser history and cookies using encryption and your Google account.
      • I have my bookmarks available in every browser, and can sort them in multiple ways, and search them [del.icio.us].

        I use Firefox when using Linux or Windows, and I mainly use Safari on my iBook because it feels faster. I do have Firefox installed though, purely for the Firebug extension.

      • Re:Camino lacks foxmarks! (Score:4, Informative)

        by Blakey Rat ( 99501 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @02:06PM (#18873179)
        Speaking of integration with OS X...

        Being able to sync with bookmarks stored on DotMac would be a nice feature that Firefox currently lacks but Safari has. That, and the Safari using the OS-standard spelling dictionary are the reason I prefer it right now.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Sniper ( 113827 )
      Camino sucks because it doesn't do firefox extensions, and CMD+[1-9] doesn't switch tabs.

      There are probably others, but the lack of extensions had me running back to firefox within 10 minutes of trying Camino. Oh, and because I use Firefox on other platforms and I'd rather it acted similarly on all of them.

      Firefox however sucks due to the lack of keychain integration, and because it doesn't read the system proxy settings. Form widgets doens't bother me at all - in fact, I prefer the current setup.

      Cheers.

      -t

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by jZnat ( 793348 ) *
        If it makes you feel any better, Firefox doesn't integrate with anything on any of its platforms. On Windows, it does its own thing usually (although it follows the UI guidelines for Windows pretty well). On Mac OS X, it doesn't integrate at all with the dozens of services that would be very useful for a web browser. On Linux/BSD/etc., it hardly integrates with GNOME (similar to how it "integrates" with Windows, just using the graphical toolkit and UI guidelines doesn't count as integration), and when it

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by ncc74656 ( 45571 ) *

          On Linux/BSD/etc., it hardly integrates with GNOME (similar to how it "integrates" with Windows, just using the graphical toolkit and UI guidelines doesn't count as integration), and when it comes to KDE, you might as well use Konqueror because Firefox is Peter Griffin in the Million Man March.

          There is a way to get Firefox to use its own file dialogs [ubuntuforums.org] instead of the sucky GNOME dialogs. It's still not KDE, but at least it's more usable than GNOME.

          (The necessary files may be in a slightly different loca

    • Yes, but maintaining Firefox for OSX and Camino isn't necessarily ideal. It's probably a little bit of a duplication of effort for developers, and it might confuse users a little regarding which browser they should be using.

      One of the major features of Firefox is its extensions. Camino can't use Firefox extensions, but Firefox doesn't quite integrate into the OS. It'd be nice if they could somehow close the gap.

    • Re:Camino (Score:4, Insightful)

      by constantnormal ( 512494 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @09:37AM (#18869473)
      mod the parent posting up!

      Mr Schroeder is EXACTLY correct -- Camino uses the same Gecko core as Firefox, but eschews the Firefox plugin madness in favor of OS X integration, supporting the OS X Services menu, Keychain, and all the other things that tie an OS X application into the body of OS X.

      If a person wants to use the same browser across Windows, OS X, and Linux -- or has the desire to customize the hell out of it via plugins, then Firefox is the way to go. If a person wants a lean browser that takes advantage of the feature-rich environment of OS X, then Camino is the right answer.

      But if a person wants a lean, fully-integrated-with-OSX browser that looks and behaves like Firefox and supports a zoo of customizing plugins, they're in a world of hurt, as they are looking for the same thing as those seeking a rich, sugary, calorie-laden diet that they can lose weight with.

      The whole notion of Firefox is to make the best cross-platform browser possible. By definition, this means not tying it to the feature set of any particular platform. However, to permit users to tailor their own favorite features into Firefox, they have an excellent plugin system of extensions.

      The idea of Camino is to take the excellent Gecko core from Firefox, and tie it into a particular feature-rich environment (i.e., OS X), making it as fast and powerful as possible. You don't do that by allowing the user to load it down with a bunch of plugins.

      The problem posed by the topic has already been solved. If the Firefox developers want to make it better for OS X users, they should ask the Camino developers (metaphorically across the aisle) what they would like to see changed in Firefox to make Camino development better. Camino IS the end result of optimizing Firefox for OS X.

      • Re:Camino (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Clock Nova ( 549733 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:09AM (#18869917)
        Why don't the just add in the plugin architecture to Camino and let the users decide whether or not they want to "load it down" with extensions. Seriously. There's no logic in their decision at all.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Jeff DeMaagd ( 2015 )
      I just want FF to not crash so much in OS X. I'm multiplatform, keeping functionality and extensions is important. Camino seems to be most relevant if you never want to move your profile between platforms. I can do that in a few minutes, and have done that several times. The extension compatibility is important because there are very few good extensions for Mac-only browsers, the genetic "depth" of the available extensions is very shallow, I've come across too many circumstances where FF has a few alter
      • I couldn't agree more. I use FF exclusively on both my Windows and Mac comps. The amount of times FF on Mac crashes is simply unacceptable.
    • I think that MoCo tolerates Camino since they know FF isn't up to snuff on the Mac platform. But there's no question that having 1 browser for Macs and another for everything else isn't a situation they want to be in. Some of the folks around Camino already feel like they get the cold shoulder from MoCo; once FF gets a reasonable level of integration with OS X, I think MoCo will all but disown the project.
    • I liked Camino. . . until they inexplicably removed the bookmark sidebar. For whatever reason they seemed to want to emulate Safari, which lacks such an obviously useful feature. And I also like extensions, so there.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Blakey Rat ( 99501 )
      Isn't this post off-topic?

      The topic is how to improve Firefox on OS X, not "hey let's talk about Camino, which is not Firefox!" Not that moderators ever mod anything off-topic around here...

      In any case, the biggest problem with Firefox is that the spell-checker doesn't integrate with the OS X spell-checker. I'm sick of every damned application using its own spell-checker on an OS with one built-in. Use the built-in one! Duh! I can't count the number of dictionaries I've had to add my last name to, on the sa

  • Well... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Megane ( 129182 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @07:52AM (#18868409)
    I can think of one tiny thing that sucks on Mozilla on Mac... when ever I copy a bunch of text from a window, it puts bleeping CR line breaks in instead of LF line breaks. Unless I fix it first, it makes text editing act a bit wonky.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jesser ( 77961 )
      What app are you copying from and what app are you copying to? How will I be able to tell that something is wrong -- what do I do in the receiving app that will feel buggy?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by DurendalMac ( 736637 )
      In addition to that, less beachballing, please. Firefox hangs more often than Safari, which is one of the reasons that I don't use it very often.

  • Nice idea... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Rufty ( 37223 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:01AM (#18868495) Homepage
    Any chance of something like this for Thunderbird?
    • Any chance of something like this for Thunderbird?

      Well said. I've sat here for a few minutes, and I can't think of much for Firefox, but the Thunderbird list might as well be a mile long. Thunderbird needs Mail.app import and Spotlight integration for starters.

  • Looks like he's already got (Score:4, Interesting)

    by wiredog ( 43288 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:02AM (#18868501) Journal
    all the suggestions I would make. Primarily, fix the borken bookmarks. It'd be nice to be able to order them by hand rather than having the app decide for me which order they should be in.

    Other than that, I prefer FireFox to the built-in Mac browser.

  • [ducks and runs away to dodge rotten tomatoes nay rotten apples being thrown]
    • Well, as long as you don't mind the version of IE in question being ridicoulsy outdated, discontinued, and not able to run native on the new Macs, then go ahead.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by chrish ( 4714 )
      Actually, you're not as trolly as you might have thought.

      An IE Tab style add-on that would load the page with WebKit instead of the Firefox renderer would actually be helpful sometimes; I've hit a few websites in the last month that wouldn't work with Firefox 2.* on OS X but would work with Safari.

      Yes, the solution is to bitch at the idiots who made the site check for specific browser/OS combos instead of just writing up standard XHTML and CSS, but in the mean time, I need to get things done...

  • Its kinda funny. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jellomizer ( 103300 ) * on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:08AM (#18868545)
    I usually use Safari but I don't know why. I have firefox in my dock right next to it. I also tend to get slightly better compatibility with Fire Fox. But... I still use Safari. I think the main reason is probably the bookmarks work better in safari. But I don't really use bookmarks that much. I guess the only feature that I really prefer over Safari that I use over Firefox is RSS I just like Safari RSS Support better then Firefox. If I bookmark an RSS Feed it automatically subscribes me. And there is a search bar right there for me to find info in it. It is not that firefox is bad and there isn't a work around it is not that hard to do a cmd-F (though having the search on the bottom of the window is annoying) It is usually easy to make an app that looks and works good for both Linux and Windows. But for Mac there is a slightly different set of standards. Firefox isn't horrible but if still feels out of place.

  • Huh? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by wandazulu ( 265281 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:13AM (#18868581)
    I use FF exclusively on both the Mac and Windows, and I think the Mac version works *better* than on Windows...the Mac version doesn't get sluggish after opening and closing a lot of tabs, doesn't gobble up half a gig of ram, and I have never had it just up and quit on me like it does on Windows.

    I find FF on the Mac is also more tolerant of some of the more ... baroque addons; I admit to being an addon junkie and addons that claim to be fully cross-platform crash on Windows while I've never had an addon crash FF on the Mac.

    So, hey, if they want to make FF better, that's awesome, but to me, it's enhancement, not fixing.
    • Me too! There is nothing sucky about Firefox. If anything, I wish that Apple would drop Safari and just use Firefox, and use their energies elsewhere.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Jeff DeMaagd ( 2015 )
      I see Firefox crash on my Mac a lot. Sometimes it just stalls and won't do any thing for a minute. For a long time, toggling FlashBlock on a site would crash the Mac. Firefox on the Mac doesn't allow me to rearrange bookmarks in folders on the bookmarks bar like the Windows version. I have to go to "manage bookmarks", which is a clumsy little program.

      I like using Firefox and Thunderbird simply because I can just transfer my profile to another platform and back. I just did that last week when I moved my

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by mike2R ( 721965 )
      My dislike of FF on the Mac (I use it exclusively on Windows - I spend my time about 50/50 Mac/Windows) comes down more to look and feel than functionality.

      It feels odd not to have normal Mac widgets - I'm not usually fussed by things like that, but for some reason it bothers me in FF.

      The more important thing is that it just feels clunky - I'm using an old eMac G4 700 which may not be helping - but, compared to Safari or Camino, Firefox feels slow. Little things, like I can't select a bookmark from while
  • In Firefox when i for example press and hold over a link or image, it doesn't bring up the menu you get by right-clicking on Windows? On Windows I do a lot of right-clicking and don't have to touch the keyboard at all - with mac I have to either use keyboard to 'right-click' or find the function among a maze of menus. And buying a two button mouse isn't the solution you insensitive clod! since I'm using the trackpad on the macbook.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by cypherz ( 155664 ) *
      So why not just use the built-in right-click functionality of your MacBook trackpad? It's under Trackpad Gestures on the Trackpad tab of the mouse prefs pane.

      HTH

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by yabos ( 719499 )
        That would work for the Macbook but older Macs aren't able to do this without 3rd party software.
    • In the Keyboard & Mouse system pref there is an option called:
      "Tap trackpad with two fingers for secondary click".
      At least on my MB Pro.

      Moving two fingers = scroll.
      Taping two fingers = right click

      I rarely use the trackpad button in fact.

    • Yeah, that ctrl button is WAY THE HELL over there.

      Of course, if you have a Macbook, you could try clicking with two fingers for a right click. So, unless I'm an insensitive clod and you only have one finger... of course, then a two button mouse wouldn't work anyway.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Fred_A ( 10934 )

        So, unless I'm an insensitive clod and you only have one finger... of course, then a two button mouse wouldn't work anyway.
        That's what your nose [catb.org] is for. ;)

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by wnknisely ( 51017 )
      Goto "about:config"

      Set ui.click_hold_context_menus to "true"

      Enjoy!
  • Can anyone comment on how Opera behaves on the Mac?
    • Pretty well actually. Now, I'm not a regular Opera user, so take that for what its worth. I just use it for web development testing. The widgets are native, though one of the annoying things about web dev on a Mac is how differently the native widgets deal with new CSS directives in Camino, Safari and Opera. Safari ignores just about everything (except height and width on textareas and width on text), the sizing always seems wrong in Camino and Opera buttons inherit * { padding: 0; margin: 0 }

      The speed is g
  • one thing I hate with FF OSX is the fact you can't right click on a bookmark in a folder on the personal tool bar and open it in a new tab it was marked in bugzilla as won't fix, and there's at least 6 duplicates, the bug is 300710 it used to work, "It was removed because right click in mac menus fires the menu item command"
  • I don't know if this is cross platform or not, but when I pull down my bookmarks from the menu, typing the first letter of the bookmark doesn't cycle me through the bookmarks starting with that letter. Rather it takes me to either a subset of that group or, in the case of U on my mac, to the first bookmark starting with W. I really wish that would work better.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jesser ( 77961 )
      in the case of U on my mac, to the first bookmark starting with W

      That is... impressive. Do you know whether there's a bug filed?
  • Fix all the damn memory leaks. I have to restart Firefox about once a week because it chews up a gigabyte of RAM. I have to say, that's way better than back in the Firefox 1.1 days when I had to restart it several times a day, but still.
  • the most useful thing would be to have an AppleScriptable DOM, like Safari. But that's only because I've got a Firefox only site that I use that I'd like to copy data into programmatically.

  • to be fair to mozilla... (Score:5, Informative)

    by owlnation ( 858981 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @08:34AM (#18868755)
    They have significantly improved Firefox on the Mac as time goes on.

    I found I had to be very dedicated to use Firefox 1.5 - that release just plain sucked, especially with regard to stability, favicon use, bookmarks, and I found the search bar crashed the app more often than not.

    However, since v2.0 things have got better, it seems to be overall more stable and they have addressed the favicon issue up to a point. Bookmark control still leaves a lot to be desired. (Though that has room for improvement in the Windows version too - and I know that's being addressed for v3.0).

    I seem to remember reading that for v2.0 they had a deliberate policy of a "Firefox look" across platforms, thus moved away from an OS X looking application. I'm not sure if that is the right decision. Firefox does look odd on a Mac. (And for the inevitable reply that says "but you can use a theme to make it look like OS X" - I'd rather not even try, themes can be very unstable and hog resources.)

    It's a tough market - Safari is a great browser, the only real reason to use Firefox is the extensions (which is a great reason, and the one that keeps me loyal to the Fox. You'll only prise Flashblock and Adblock from my cold dead mouse hand)
  • Allow the browser to actually take over the whole screen instead of just removing the buttons at the top.
  • given the mac's strength in graphic applications, how about making firefox respect and support icc profiles?

  • Sure, I've got one (Score:4, Insightful)

    by pongo000 ( 97357 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @09:07AM (#18869085)
    Fix the damn file associations dialog so that you can not only add file associations and actions from the GUI (rather than digging down into an .rdf file), but that files of the same type open consistently without constantly having to deal with the "open with" dialog.

    Oh, wait...same problem on Linux too! Never mind...

  • popup menu problem with multiple screens (Score:3, Informative)

    by cyfer2000 ( 548592 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @09:18AM (#18869201) Journal
    I have two screen attached to my mac, and if I put a firefox window in the second screen and type things in address bar or search bar, the popup menu appears in the first screen. Safari doesn't have this problem.
    • I see this a lot too. It's inconsistent, sometimes a drop-down menu shows up where it's supposed to be, sometimes it shows up on the other screen. Does this mean that the FF Mac developers aren't enlightened on the use of dual monitors? It sure seems like it.
  • I like to open multiple windows at once, and drag links from one window to the other, so that I can see both the source window contents and destination window contents at the same time.

    Problem is, if I try to drag one of the windows by its title bar, it will often, as soon as I let go, JUMP to the position of the other window.

    It happens if I don't first click before dragging the window. Even though dragging brings it to the top, somehow firefox is confused and screws up.

    To reproduce, open two FF wind
  • My main complaint seems like it's already mentioned: ugly form widgets. The first thing i do when I install Firefox on a Mac is to run it through Firefox [amake.us], which pretties-up the form widgets.

  • Native form widgets (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Trevin ( 570491 )
    Funny, this was one of my big complaints about Mozilla on Linux several years ago. At the time I was overruled by the developers who proclaimed XBL widgets were the right way to go. I agree that CSS styles should be allowed to override the default widget look, but I still think the default look should be taken from the native OS, not MS Windows 3.1. Even at that, some of the widgets -- or at least parts of them -- still can't be fully styled by CSS in Firefox.

  • Network Settings (Score:3, Interesting)

    by donutello ( 88309 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:13AM (#18869983) Homepage
    Firefox completely ignores all system network and proxy settings. Instead, you have to go in and configure your own for Firefox. The most annoying part of this is that Firefox's settings do not have the option to ignore simple hostnames. This makes it virtually useless for browsing intranet sites since you have to manually add each intranet site you want to visit to the exceptions list.

  • PDF integration anyone? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by cbc1920 ( 730236 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:44AM (#18870437)
    I can't believe this hasn't been harped on before. Why can't I open a PDF in my browser window? I'm on a Intel Mac and as far as I know there is no way to do this. Macs have so much built in that already uses the pdf format- why is this so difficult?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by 200_success ( 623160 )
      Hear, hear! Integration with PDF Kit [apple.com] would be awesome. Viewing PDFs in Safari is so quick and easy, since it's natively supported, with no need to launch any plugins or external applications. Not only do PDFs render in the browser window, File -> Save and File -> Print work too! Firefox should have the same native support for PDFs on Macs.

  • Camino NOT a Firefox replacement (Score:3, Insightful)

    by HomerJ ( 11142 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:48AM (#18870509)
    There's a ton of people complaining "Yeah, all this is already done, It's Camino!"

    Listen, Camino isn't a Firefox replacement. The reason I, and probably the majority of others, use Firefox is the large amount of great extensions. Ad Black, Flashblock, Cookiesafe, etc. Camino by rule will never support these. That's why Camino will never be a replacement for Firefox.

    I'm not saying Camino SHOULD change to support them. They have a project going, and what they are setting out to do, they do well. But it's never going to replace Firefox on OSX.

  • UNO makes Firefox look a lot prettier on OS X (Score:4, Informative)

    by spam38 ( 680467 ) on Wednesday April 25, 2007 @10:49AM (#18870531)
    The way Firefox looked in OS X always kinda bugged me, and in my search for a more OSXish theme, I've found UNO. I'd try to explain what it is, but you'd be better off checking the website: http://gui.interacto.net/ [interacto.net]. There's also a Firefox theme that pretty much completes the package at http://www.takebacktheweb.org/ [takebacktheweb.org]. Its called "GrApple (UNO)".

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