PC Magazine Reviews Firefox, Opera 700
prostoalex writes "PC Magazine reviews Mozilla Firefox 0.9.1 and Opera 7.51, noting: 'Security concerns aren't the only reason to seek an alternative [to Internet Explorer]. IE's slow rendering engine and dearth of privacy features may plant the thought in some iconoclastic minds that it may not be the best browser for everyone.' 4 stars for Firefox and 3.5 for Opera, so looks like a Firefox win, although the editors do point out FF's troubles with DHTML as well as Opera issues with JavaScript."
Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
...that I should stop running Internet Explorer using wine, and try Firefox?
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=824973 [microsoft.com]
Re:Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Are you running Wine on Longhorn with SFU? If so, no. Otherwise, yes.
Re:Does this mean... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Does this mean... (Score:5, Funny)
Yes. It comes with a nice steaming cup of it.
IE User (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:IE User (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:IE User (Score:5, Insightful)
You have just spoke for a billion people.
Grow Up (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure every single 3D artist out there uses a web browser, but how many web browser users are 3D artists? Your analogy is crap. It's more like driving a car and not knowing that there are a number of models out there to choose from. I admit my ignorance in the realm of 3D modeling, but I'm also not insulted by this in the slightest.
Re:IE User (Score:3, Funny)
A week later I realize that Mozilla and Firefox are different... I go "D'OH!" but I'm too lazy to download, uninstall mozilla, and install firefox, import my links, etc.
So I guess I'll be using Mozilla until years after people point out I should upgrade to whatever...
Proof is in the Pudding (Score:5, Funny)
Sad but true. The review page has been loading for almost a minute now
Re:Proof is in the Pudding (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Proof is in the Pudding (Score:4, Interesting)
For me it's far slower than Firefox. And every modern browser has gone backwards in my opinion from the original browsers which had progressive table rendering. I'm sick of waiting for ages for a page to render just because the designer put the whole page in one large table. It's not too difficult, even 10 years ago I've seen complex deeply nested tables rendering progressively in real-time... and this is on 10 year old hardware.
Phillip.
How to make Firefox render pages faster than IE (Score:5, Informative)
The initialpaint.delay is the length of time (in milliseconds) after the server response before the browser begins to paint the page. By default it is 250 milliseconds, and even though by setting it to 0 (like Internet Explorer) makes it _seem_ to display pages faster, it ends up taking more overall time than with the default value.
You can also make Firefox faster by:
1.) Setting network.http.pipelining to true
2.) Setting network.http.proxy.pipelining to true
3.) Setting network.http.pipelining.maxrequests to a number between 1 and 8
Enabling the pipelining features allows the browser to make multiple requests to the server at the same time. The "maxrequests" is the maximum number of requests it will send at once. 8 is the maximum Firefox allows it to be, but it may bog down yours, or the server, connection, so it is best to leave these options on their default values.
More information about these and other tweaks are available at the MozillaZine's Firefox Tuning Thread [mozillazine.org].
Re:Proof is in the Pudding (Score:4, Informative)
There's always a trade-off between rendering speed and quality. Do you start to lay-out the page before all content has been fetched, thus incurring unsighltly redraws and reflows as new content invalidates the current best-guess display? Or do you hold off on painting somewhat to allow more content to arrive, and thus a better initial layout?
Gecko-based browsers give you full control over this, so you can tune it to your network performance. By default, it always waits 250msec (or is it less now?) before displaying anything. Of course, it ain't twiddling its thumbs during this -- it's building the page, but not showing it to avoid ugly reflows. Jump into the prefs (type about:config and find initialpaintdelay) and set it to 0 to make it render immediately.
It's psychological. That inital pause where nothing appears to be going on may make you think Gecko's slower than IE. But the time from initiating the load to a mostly-complete layout may well actually be smaller than IE.
If you really want to learn about this stuff from a guy who's as close to being a guru as you're gonna get on this subject, check out this post [mozillazine.org] on Dave Hyatt's (Moziila/Apple developer) weblog.
Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:4, Informative)
Baz
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:5, Insightful)
I've heard that Moz loads too slow all the time... Waaaaa.. It's not as fast as IE.
Why don't people just realize that once you open your web browser you should just leave it open?! Why are you even on your computer?
Anyways.. back to my point. People will keep using IE simply because it's there, and the convience of being one of the fastest loading applications in Windows (oh wait.. I forgot about Calc.exe).
Oh.. And most people can't wrap their heads around tabbed browsing (or see the point of it). But tell them it blocks popups then they get excited.
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:5, Informative)
1. IE is a set of components that provide HTML rendering support for the OS. It is not loaded with Windows.
2. Setting Firefox/Opera to realtime will cause other system functions to slow to a crawl and/or possibly crash.
3. Mozilla and Firefox can be loaded exceptionally fast on Windows. It's very simple. DO NOT install QuickLaunch, but allow the Mozilla build process to correctly bind and rebase its DLLs. When it's done, you'll have a version of Mozilla which loads AS FAST AS Internet Explorer.
If the dll binding procedure did not make it into the Mozilla installer, that explains why people are still seeing it launch slowly.
This crap about "IE runs faster because it's part of the OS" is a myth propounded by people who really just don't know anything about how Windows loads processes and DLLs. Any time you have an app that loads slower than its competitors, consider this:
1) Is it loading ALL of its DLLs into memory at startup? Or does it dynamically load them as needed? (The latter is faster).
2) Is it loading a lot of potentially unnecessary COM components at startup instead of as needed? (As needed is faster).
3) Are its DLLs rebased correctly so that they don't need to be fixedup by the Application Launcher when they load? Does it have a clean memory map? (Most non-Microsoft apps do NOT take this step - which is fully documented in MSDN - which means that their load times will be 10 to 20 times longer than apps which DO rebase their DLLs).
4) Are its DLLs bound at install-time? Binding DLLs reduces the time necessary to load and patch the import/export table of processes and DLLs, by pre-patching the import/export table and attaching a signature to it to catch if the external DLLs change. (Most non-Microsoft apps Do NOT take this step - which again is fully documented in MSDN - which means that their load times will be another 4 to 7 times longer than apps which DO bind their DLLs).
Sloppy development practices lead to sloppy performance.
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:4, Informative)
Firefox (the quickest-launching of the Mozilla line) has to load up gecko, the rendering engine, each time a process starts. It's browser chrome is just some JavaScript, CSS and the data to be displayed (XUL), which is displayed using gecko. If your shell were to run on top of the GRE, and Firefox were allowed to share that GRE, it would load up almost instantly -- seconds before an IE that wasn't halfway loaded into memory.
Who would load up faster, Firefox or IE when both were forced to load everything from scratch? I don't know. It doesn't matter though. Fx loads fast enough for me now.
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:5, Insightful)
"According to Microsoft, IE 4 contains nine components that interoperate for full functionality (see Figure 2). These components include five DLLs--Wininet.dll, Urlmon.dll, Mshtml.dll, Shdocvw.dll, and Comctl32.dll--along with two executable files, Explorer.exe and Iexplore.exe, and a security and a Java virtual machine component. Both IE 3 and IE 4 require these DLLs to function and without them could not offer the displays we expect and the features we expect, nor access the Internet at all. Wininet.dll offers Internet services and capabilities, including HTTP and FTP access, modem dialing, and browser caching. Urlmon.dll lets developers treat URLs as if they were programmable objects and thus build them into their applications (Microsoft's own Office 97 does this). Mshtml.dll is the component that lets you view your folders as Web pages: Choose a disk drive from My Computer, for example, and what you see is Dynamic HTML, Microsoft-style, relying on this particular DLL. Shdocvw.dll (Shell Document View) lets developers build browser capabilities into software, while Comctl32.dll (Common Controls) provides low-level support for menus, toolbars, progress bars, and many other controls used across Windows applications." (emphasis mine)
Source. [wbaudisch.de]
As you can see, at least 2 of the 5 DLLs IE needs are in use by windows. Sure, this is IE4, but it was the first in-depth analysis I found.
Firefox's chrome is very thin layer on top of gecko, so that doesn't take long. Loading up the static GRE is what takes it the longest time. MSHTML.DLL (as well as comctl32.dll) is already in use by the windows shell before anyone double-clicks on "The Internet".
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm not entirely sure what you're saying here.
Mozilla, Opera and Firefox ... seem to load web pages quicker than IE.
I can either get to the web quickly with IE, or wait a while with firefox for a minute page load time diffrence.
Pages load faster in M/O/Ff, but they're a minute slower in M/O/Ff? I think what you're getting at is this...
but what really bothers me is how slow the mozilla opera and firefox load times are
If you're talking about clicking on the IE icon vs. clicking the M/O/Ff icon, and having the application pop up ready to roll, then keep in mind that IE loads on boot. That way, it gives you the impression of loading faster.
Re:Mozilla, Opera and Firefox... (Score:3, Informative)
Mozilla, Opera and Firefox
I can either get to the web quickly with IE, or wait a while with firefox for a minute page load time diffrence.
Pages load faster in M/O/Ff, but they're a minute slower in M/O/Ff? I think what you're getting at is this...
I believe he meant minute[minoot](as in small amout of time). Not minute(as in 60 seconds).
Mozilla, Opera and Firefox
I can eit
User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not to mention Sun's Java plugin complains to no end that Firefox initialized it but the User Agent is set to IE... that reminder keeps me honest as well.
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Informative)
Well, when I linked to a little-viewed page on my site [littlecutie.net] (during a discussion of poker, really!), the stats showed a surprising number of non-IE visitors. It seemed to be about half IE, half Opera, Mozilla, and the like. An awful lot of visitors weren't using Windows, either.
That means either 1) Slashdot visitors use alternate browsers and OS's, or 2) Slashdot visitors like to modify their browsers' User-Agent strings. With this crowd, I'd think both are equally likely.
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:User-Agent stats? (Score:5, Informative)
I work for a newspaper.. we don't do technology news so the people visiting our site are strictly Joe Blow. (Same dudes who read our paper).
Here are our top browsers for July:
68% IE 6.0
6.2% AOL (IE)
4.3% Mozilla/Firefox
4% IE 5.5
4% Netscape 7
2% Safari
all the others are webtv, opera, konq, etc
I don't know why they count Gecko based browsers separate from Netscape 7.. it's just something Omniture does.
Work computers (Score:5, Interesting)
PS - I'm posting this from work
Ingrained attitudes (Score:5, Informative)
CONS: Default installation doesn't include many functions; you have to download additional features via the Extensions Manager. Will not load ActiveX and VBScript; this prevents certain kinds of attacks, but also disables the normal functions of some sites.
Those are PROs if I ever saw one. Drive-by software installs and buggy Active-X is the reason I spend ten hours a month cleaning up computers of friends and family. WHo subseqently receive Mozilla and are forbidden to run IE except for Windows Update forevermore, on pain of no more free computer work.
Re:Ingrained attitudes (Score:5, Insightful)
For reference, I highly recommend the following extensions: Adblock, Flashblock, Googlebar, Context Search, Mycroft (pick and choose these though), All-in-one Gestures, and Tabbrowser Extensions. Wonderful stuff.
Re:Ingrained attitudes (Score:4, Insightful)
That said, I would never recommend that anyone use that plugin. That's like being rescued from a burning building and setting fire to the ambulance on your way to the hospital.
Interesting perspective. (Score:5, Insightful)
Emphasis mine.
Now explain this? It's got boatloads more functionality (find as you type, tabbed browsing, popup blocker, livemarks [0.9+], etc etc.)... but it 'doesn't include many functions'.
Now how does IE rank? Please don't tell me feature rich. That's like calling is secure.
Re:Interesting perspective. (Score:3, Insightful)
PC Magazine is really just a Windows mouthpiece. They have to pull their punches. You didn't think they'd put all that Microsoft ad revenue at risk did you?
Last Straw (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, I have a lot of "non-techie" friends. You should see the amount of adware/spyware littered on these computers. It makes me sick, and it's all IE's fault (pop-up > get scared > *click* > install > forget > go back to "pop-up"... go to site > install under users' radar > repeat... I'm sick of it). IE sucks.
Re:Last Straw (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Last Straw (Score:3, Interesting)
OTOH, if an unbiased review of IE can produce comparable results, then at the very least, it gives the Mozilla and Opera folks a good idea of where to go next in developing the Uber-browsers. However, I have a hard time believing
Install it for people (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure some of you already do this, but for those that don't, next time you're running ad-aware for your non-techie friends, install Firefox, show them the desktop shortcut, and tell them to click on that one for their Internet. They'll thank you for it when they stop getting pop ups and strange home pages and toolbars.
Unimplemented feature (Score:5, Funny)
Go Firefox Go (Score:5, Interesting)
Now that the Mozilla Foundation is a 501(c)3 organization I think I may have to insist that the family/friends make a little donation.
Re:Go Firefox Go (Score:3, Funny)
PC magazine seems to be getting less funding by MS (Score:3, Insightful)
Does MS really care anymore? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Does MS really care anymore? (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft did put the IE features team back together last month as a response to the growing threat of Mozilla - I think they made a critical error in judgement and are now going to have to play catch up to Mozilla until Longhorn comes out. More than that, Microsoft has already started to reevaluate the selling power XAML will have because whether Mozilla beats IE in the next two-three years or vice versa, more sites will capitalize on new browser technology to deliver richer UIs that reduce the need for technologies like XAML.
Now if Mozilla just gets its act together and gets a strong managed framework backend for XUL....
Re:Does MS really care anymore? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Does MS really care anymore? (Score:3, Interesting)
2) Microsoft doesn't want to appear to copy or compete with an open sour
Best Quote (Score:5, Funny)
Well, good for them!
Durrrr!
Re:Best Quote (Score:3, Interesting)
This isn't the only one, either. Backslashes in URLs (bug 93197) is another one that comes to mind where M
Faster and More secure (Score:5, Interesting)
Linux might not be ready for general public acceptance on their desktop, but using Open Source software such as Firefox, Open Office etc is the first step towards that acceptance. If you don't NEED Windows to run a program, it becomes alot easier to switch the underlying OS.
my only problems with firefox (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:my only problems with firefox (Score:3, Insightful)
...so install a User Agent switching tool (Score:3, Informative)
--Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; Actually Mozilla Firefox - try it now!)
The beauty of the FireFox design IS the plugins - you can do this kind of thing.
Oh, and by the way, there are many other ways to do this, and you can also do it
There is no such thing as DHTML! (Score:5, Insightful)
The browser isn't perfect, however. Firefox does not render nonstandard DHTML properly, (emphasis mine).
Hello!! You said it yourselves! NONSTANDARD. Its websites that aren't perfect, not the browser. *head explodes*
And from the BBC (Score:4, Informative)
The BBC [bbc.co.uk] are running a similar story too:
Firefox and DHTML (Score:5, Insightful)
"Firefox does not render nonstandard DHTML properly, nor does the Mozilla Organization have any intention of releasing a browser that does."
Non-standard DHTML isn't really DHTML is it?
It's only a matter of time... (Score:4, Interesting)
Say what?! (Score:5, Insightful)
So it is bad that the browser does not render bad source correctly?
Granted, the article does go on to mention that this is not Firefox's fault, but they way it is cast as a problem really rubs the wrong way.
Re:Say what?! (Score:3, Insightful)
In other news, Sun's Java SDK isn't perfect, because it doesn't compile J# code properly. But we're not going to fault Internet Explorer for not rendering CSS1 and PNG files properly; nobody uses those anyway.
Recently played with Firefox... (Score:3, Interesting)
As for Firefox, I still like plain old Mozilla better but looking forward to version 1.0.
For me, as things stand right now. I like Mozilla the best with Konqueror coming in second.
To Really Speed FireFox/Mozilla Up (Score:5, Informative)
To speed up the load times of all sites add the following to your user.js file (if it doesnt exist - for Windows users, go to the run menu and type: %AppData% and then browse through the Mozilla folder and any sub folders until you get to your profile folder - inside of this create a new text document and call it user.js):
user_pref("nglayout.initialpaint.delay", 0);
user_pref("keyword.URL", "http://www.google.com/search?btnG=Google+Search&
user_pref("browser.xul.error_pages.enabled", true);
The other two changes are ones i've found useful as well - the second one changes the browser to do a normal Google search from the location bar instead of doing an "I'm Lucky" Google search (this is more useful in Mozilla than FireFox since FireFox comes w/ the Google search bar built in).
The third change makes Mozilla and FireFox display error pages like IE instead of annoying dialog boxes when an error occurs (such as page not found). This helps a TON when doing tabbed browsing.
Hope those tips are helpful for everyone else as much as they were for me. For more of them go to http://texturizer.net/firefox/tips.html
Re:To Really Speed FireFox/Mozilla Up (Score:5, Informative)
You can type about:config in Firefox's URL bar to change these preferences while the browser is running.
Re:To Really Speed FireFox/Mozilla Up (Score:4, Informative)
Now that you have changed your browser... (Score:4, Informative)
Instead of using the default Windows software, as you have seen, other applications runs well under windows: Firefox and Opera are cool for browsing, but now that you are on the way to change your mind, give thunderfox a try, it is far better than outlook (or outlook express).
Then, forget your included windows media player, and try alternatives like BSplayer and others. When you want to edit a picture, use Gimp for windows or replace your illegal copy of Word by OpenOffice.
And if you enjoy what you are getting, and this new perspective of choices, jump in and join the GNU/Linux community.
Out of the frying pan... (Score:3, Insightful)
We've already seen significant security holes in Firefox, and this is with a negligible market share. Once it gets targetted directly, exploits may be just as common as they currently are with Internet Explorer.
And if that happens, where is the security update infrastructure to ensure everyone gets patched? Microsoft won't integrate Firefox into Automatic Updates. Sure, mailing lists and /. will carry the news of new Firefox security flaws, but will the average user see those announcements?
The problem with telling users to switch to Firefox for security reasons is that it's usually sold as a permanent fix to the problem, when in all honesty it never will be.
But the user, having been told that "Firefox is secure", probably won't bother checking the Mozilla site on a regular basis, if ever. Automatic update notification is supposed to be coming in the future, but that does little for anyone who's installed Firefox in the past couple of weeks and doesn't plan to touch it again.
Re:Out of the frying pan... (Score:4, Informative)
As of 0.9, firefox has an automatic update checker thing to let the user know when new versions are availible. It seill has a few kinks to be worked out, but they're going in the right direction.
On Opera's ad... (Score:5, Informative)
Mozilla and Hotmail (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it possible to castrate this annoyance?
Re:Mozilla and Hotmail (Score:4, Informative)
One happy Firefox user! (Score:3, Interesting)
I can't recommend Firefox highly enough. If you enable Automatic Updates in Windows, there's really no reason to use IE. I've only come across a site or two that required IE in order to display correctly and when it happened I fired off a note to the webmaster.
If you haven't tried Firefox and are using IE what in the world are you waiting for? The worst that can happen is that you decided you don't like it and uninstall it. When you compare that to just some of the annoying things that can and do happen when running IE (spyware, malware, constant pop-ups, constant security issues, etc) trying Firefox becomes a no brainer.
the last non-IE browser i used was netscape 4.7 (Score:5, Informative)
CONS
1.) you can't just press enter like in IE after entering information eg login/password, searches anything you have to press tab THEN enter.
2.) it doesn't pass off most wmv files to mplayer2 like it should and does with everything else fine
3.) why can't i run exes? must it not only second guess me but lock me into a forced download/install/delete cycle when IE lets me just execute after the download is complete trusting me to make the right choice?
PROS
1.) easily installed (ctrl-d, i like hte mimiced funcationality as it makes migrating easier for me and i'm lazy) highly functional bookmark toolbar buttons which even show the related website graphic with the associated website such as the green
2.) multiple browser tabs easily opened (ctrl-t), i had heard about these before but i grossly underestimated just how useful these really are until i started using them, never again will i go hunt and peck for the right IE window at the bottom my ever cramped taskbar.
3.) beautiful and extremely functional themes with details only someone who made it with love would think to include like red/yellow/green status lights for if a tabbed page is loading and separate forward and back list box histories (i'm using nautipolis from the site i found simply by clicking on "get themes")
4.) extension plug-ins available that flawlessly install, notable examples include a tiny java vm compared to the huge sun download and resource hog, easily done macromedia flash without any bullshit of registering or clicking through 400 pages to install associated with a similar typical IE 3rd party install, these are all seamlessly integrated and the installs are smooth. My personal favorite and most important extension is the adblock extension, which allows me to block source sites for ads with a simple right click and a wildcard.
5.) built in search and popup blocking, you take these things for granted if you have the google toolbar installed as i did but this takes up less realestate (almost none, a tiny google search thumb in the right corner) and is more functional and the google news button is easily emulated as per the buttons mentioned above.
Overall Firefox is extremely impressive and I'm rarely impressed and not only is it a lesson to microsoft not to sit on their laurels, in regards to adding actual functionality instead of endless security patches but its really a testament to how free software should be, polished, easy to use, portable and easily added on to by others. It's software products like these that will undermine monopolies and I'm sure htey're not unaware of the threat.
It's a pity there isn't a few billion dollars to market Firefox with or they would dominate. Even so word of mouth is powerful and it generates a momentum that is difficult to turn back.
Re:What about IE? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:3, Interesting)
Seriously, I'd be interested to see how they'd rate IE is against them, head-to-head-to-head...
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's a funny snippet of their Firefox review:
Con: Will not load ActiveX and VBScript
This should be under Pros, ActiveX is good for one purpose -- Windows Update. And I've never even heard of an real web site that used VBScript. Shall we detract points for not supporting every asinine scripting language ever invented?
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Interesting)
It's great when you need to quickly scan a customer machine without installing anything or running updates on whatever happens to be there already.
I don't think 2 useful sites justify that travasty of a feature though.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:3, Informative)
All the recent stories concerning IE's horrible security have been demonstrably true.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Informative)
1) The information ("IE is insecure" etc) is verifyably true and reported by many different people and organizations.
2) The people behind Mozilla and Opera are not the one generating the reports about their competitor's (Microsoft's) products.
3) The people involved with 1 and 2 (The ones finding and reporting the security issues, and the ones championing Moz/Opera) have no (apparent) vested interest in seeing IE lose it's market share.
So I'm not convinced this article coutns as FUD in that respect.
=Smidge=
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:3, Funny)
I don't know. Ask Michael Moore.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:4, Insightful)
Anything that would keep them from calling me frantically wondering why their web browser now goes to some variation of cool web search sounds great.
Microsoft has dug IE this shithole by making the browser too much a part of the operating system, trying to get as much lock in as possible. Now they get to reap the fruits of their labors and lay face down in it.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Funny)
I fear that I will have my personal information stolen.
I am uncertain that the IE Developers are competent programmers.
I doubt that I will switch back to IE in the near future.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll bite, I can guarantee that some number of Mozilla developers are not competent programmers given the number of possible contributors to the project.
That said, I think MS realizes it has a problem now and is dealing with it, unfortunately it will take a year or two for it to really be dealt with. Mozilla knew (I hope and assume here) there was a problem right from the start and took steps to mitigate a lot of the problems that IE is plagued with (and netscape would probably have been plauged with before the complete rewrite of code). Its a new style vs old style mentality. Many applications (OSS as well as proprietary commercial) from the early to mid 90's are plauged with the type of problems that IE has. The problem is that MS rested on its laurels instead of continuing to push IE forward and improve it. They also were under the highly misguided impression that people didn't really care about security and weren't willing to pay for it. Hopefully the truth has come home to roost and we will see better products out of redmond.
Re:Alright Mozilla (Score:3, Insightful)
It had better come shipped secure and in the case it's not I had better get a free fix for it.
Software vendors who fail to comply with those requirements are relegated to as few tasks as possible at my customer sites.
Re:Legitimate Browser Questions (Score:5, Insightful)
In the days of 256+ MB RAM and 40+ GB HD space, having an extra 10 MB app doesn't hurt you. I have both Firefox (0.8 because I can't get TabBrowser Extensions to work on 0.9) and IE on my work computer, for the increasingly rare site that requires IE to work.
Re:Legitimate Browser Questions (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, get your head out of your ass. Would you remove the seatbelts from your car to have "less confusion", or "a little extra space" ??
It's 2004, not 1994. A few megs isn't even worth thinking about on a desktop computer. IE trojans and exploits are real. Deal with it.
Re:Legitimate Browser Questions (Score:3, Insightful)
As far as #1 -- you've probably gotten lots of answers on that.
-Charles
Re:Opera... (Score:5, Informative)
I give it 4.5 stars as well. I've been using Opera since version 3. My favorite features are the very simple things that let you browse painlessly even on poorly designed sites. For example, there is a button on the toolbar that lets you toggle images on and off without the need for changing your preferences. There is another button that lets you instantly override the color and font setting of a page with your own defaults. You can also turn off all plugins with a single checkbox. I tend to browse primarily for information, and nothing annoys me so much as poorly chosen backgrounds, graphics, and fonts that get in the way of reading the text. Opera lets me get straight to the content. It's a good browser, even though it is a bit flaky on javascript.
Re:Opera... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Opera... (Score:4, Insightful)
My favorite Opera feature is the page view zoom, especially for printing. Unlike Mozilla's zoom feature, which only scales the text, Opera scales the whole page including the images, so the layout and placement look very much the same, only bigger/smaller as requested. It wouldn't surprise me if Opera's zoom violates a few standards here and there, but I wish every browser did it like that. Very handy, indeed.
Opera is the fastest and smallest (Score:3, Insightful)
Opera is speedy, it renders Slashdot correctly (something Mozilla and Firefox still can't do), and it doesn't suck up all my memory just because some people wanted to reinvent the wheel. And all of Opera's best featurs have been ripped off and hailed as Mozilla innovations. Tabbed browsing? Mouse gestures? Pop-up blocking? It was all Opera f
Re:Opera... No Gmail for Opera. (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't read my Gmail with Opera, My online banking doesnt' work with Opera. I use add suported because if I need a second browser I am not paying for the first.
Fix that (or ignore that) and it is by far the best browser IMO. This is from someone typing on Firefox right now.
Opera even with all features integrated is leaner and faster. None of the f
Re:Opera... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:"IE's slow rendering engine" WTF? (Score:4, Interesting)
CSS is nearly non-existant.
PNG, whats that? Alpha colors, we dont do em!
And then there's just plain rendering inconsistencies. What you see is NOT what you get!!
Mozila hopes to implement the STANDARDS, not be super-fast. After all, computers will just get faster as time goes on. Why not do it correct and not as fast. Its the Unix Way.
Re:Article Text (site seems slow) (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.maxthon.com
It's like SUPER CrazyBrowser