Safari Beta Updated

LenE writes "Safari has been updated to Beta 6, and is available via Software Update. New in this version is XML support, more speed, and many bug fixes. The download is 2.4 MB and doesn't require a restart." From the notes: "The Safari Update 2-12-03 improves the compatibility with popular web sites based on Safari user feedback, further improves the performance of loading web pages and Flash content, adds support for XML, increases standards conformance and delivers improved application stability. The update also enables access to web sites that offer self-signed security certificates."

Comments

We're Still Here

[justzisguy]

I've been browsing for about an hour now using the new version without a crash! Wahoo!!!!

Many bugs were fixed, and CSS improved *a lot*

[King Babar]

Yes, you can run the w3c.org CSS1 tests now. But more importantly from my perspective (:-)) is that Eric Meyer's css / edge stuff now almost completely works. The only abject failure there is the second "ragged float" demo, and even that one is pretty close.

As far as styling XML goes, your XML apparently does have to have the DOCTYPE stuff set up correctly. This means you get no joy with the stuff on the w3c Styling XML site; safari won't display the xml files there at all.

Oh yeah: it's a bit faster...not that you're likely to notice.

Re:Many bugs were fixed, and CSS improved *a lot*

[WatertonMan]

It also fixes that annoying bug with pulldown buttons for bookmarks. It the prior versions you could sometimes click on one button and have the button beside it come down.

Sadly there still is spotty support for context menus, especially in the bookmark panes.

Re:Many bugs were fixed, and CSS improved *a lot*

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, well lets see a bit of software that keeps topics together with hundreds of submissions and allows admins to choose the earliest one, so that when one does decide to post the earliest submission gets it.

Impossible to do, really. You could group on url but we all know how flawed that is.

This beta

[fault0]

also seems to launch faster, at least on my ibook 600. Working good so far!

Re:This beta

[fault0]

oh yeah, there are still no tabs /me prays that apple will include them in the 1.0 release :)

File size decreases

[wcbrown]

As noted by Bill Bumgartner, file size of the package has gone from 7.2MB to 6.9MB.

I haven't seen file size increase with upgrades. The Safari developers should be proud.

Mostly good, some bad

[backlonthethird]

It seems to do exactly what it claims to, though I'm finding the last beta handles my page refreshes better. This version seems to just keep reloading them over and over, which means it isn't loading at all.

I would hold off on this download.

Re:Getting repetitive...

[ivan256]

Actually, I think these storys are auto posted based on when the software update window pops up on his mac. Invariably when I'm at work and see the software update window pop up there's a corresponding slashdot story 20 minutes later.

You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[3-State Bit]

As in, the lack of them.
I am now using Chimeron, which CRASHES on me, closing ALL MY WINDOWS, about once every thirty hours of surfing.

I use it because I can open new tabs in it, and bookmark groups of tabs.

There is NO other reason.
I severely dislike chimeron because:
1. It's painfully slow with many windows open.
2. It's a memory hog.
3. As I mentioned, it CRASHES from time to time, losing my contexts, which sometimes include a great deal of surfing, which I then must painfully reconstruct using the history.

But I need tabs. I cannot work without tabs.

You don't need to allow all users to use tabs. Just hide them, as chimeron (navigator) does until you open them explicitly. Heck, you could have an 'advanced' preferences option "present option of opening new tab upon command-clicking (right clicking) link".

But I CANNOT use Safari while it doesn't have tabs.
It has features I love. It's small and robust. But it doesn't have a feature that I cannot surf efficiently without.

If you saw my tab-group bookmarks, you'd understand.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Green Light]

Um, isn't it named "Chimera"?

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Llywelyn]

Why on earth would you *need* tabs.

Most of the world gets along fine without them, myself included (albeit, I transfered to Safari from OmniWeb and never liked them when I had them available when using Mozilla...).

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Anonymous Coward]

But I CANNOT use Safari while it doesn't have tabs.

It must be so hard being you.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[trouser]

Nobody *needs* tabs. But once I got into the habit of using them I found them invaluable and wouldn't want to return to tab free browsing.

Tabs allow me to group related pages in one window. eg. When I read Slashdot I often open interesting looking linked articles in the background, intending to read them once I'm finished with Slashdot. Sometimes I'd find these windows hours later, minimised or hidden, and wonder why I'd opened them and how I got there. Now they are all tabs in a window whose first tab is Slashdot. This makes the context obvious.

The same applies to use of search engines. Search for the thing that interests you, open each lead in a new tab in the current window. All search results end up opened in the same window and are therefore linked by context.

very useful memory aid. I'm not getting any younger.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[psavo]

Why on earth would you *need* tabs.

How on earth do you change to another window with one key then (opera - '1' & '2' / mouse-right+wheel)?

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[daeley]

Maybe it's chimeron/chimera as in criterion/criteria. ;)

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Tumbleweed]

> But I need tabs. I cannot work without tabs.

Gosh, you didn't use the Web until browsers had tabs?! Amazing...

Please to note there is already at least one person/group making a program to extend tab functionality to Safari, so stop yer bitchin'.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[X_Caffeine]

At any given time, I have six-eight web pages open, plus BBEdit. With Chimera, I can have two simple windows open and dash through all of my pertinent documents. With Safari... fuggedaboutit.

Maybe if I had a Cinema display I could juggle nine windows, but at 1024x768??

I don't mind if Apple wants to leave tabs off for simplicity and consistency's sake, but there should be a hidden tabs feature that "power users" can turn on for their own benefit.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Anonymous Coward]

17" Studio display is 1280x1024
20" Cinema display is 1680x1050
23" Cinema display is 1920x1200

Plus you could combine up to two of these with a PowerMac desktop. Makes me wish there was a second AGP slot so I could have 4 with an almost wrap around view!

Also you can get Virtual Desktop and have a heck of a lot of virtual desktops to switch around. If you are running dual diaplay then each virtual desktop is two displays.

If you have a PowerBook, connect a regular VGA monitor or a Studio/Cinema display and run Virtual Desktop to expand further.

Under what rock have you been living thinking 1024x768?

Oh, and I like tabbed browsing and want Safari to support it.

It's just you bitched without backing it up properly! You asked if you could have a Cinema display and then you munged it by stating 1024x768 resolution! Perhaps you were thinking of the 15" studio display which you can't even buy from Apple anymore (might be able to get one from a reseller until stocks dry up).

Apple, I am sure, would rather have you buy a Cinema display. Tabbed browsing will probably come in the next several releases. If I was Apple, I would be more concerned with fixing bugs and improving render problems before I added new features on a beta release. Better, yet; they could always come out with something totally new that is better than tabbed browsing.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[jsmith38]

if you have to have tabs browsing, check out Pith

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Woody]

Have you ever heard of the "iMac?" It's a long forgotton computer that apple built many moons ago. The CRT version as well as the first LCD versions both had built in displays capable of only 1024x768. I know it might be hard to believe, but some of us don't like to play the upgrade game - my CRT iMac still works fine, and I'm not going to buy a new machine until it absolutely dies (knock on wood). Tabs are a nice feature to have. I still use Chimera with multiple tabs on my 1600x1200 monitor at work...

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[burns210]

no, we don't need them. But for me, going from IE to Moz, tabs made me stay. It made me stay through crashes and bugs that Mozilla has had because tabs were that friggin cool. Need them? No. want them? Heck ya!

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Llywelyn]

I've got you beat on the number of windows I generally keep open at once (BBEdit, TeX Shop, a terminal, Safari, Mail, and I'm just getting warmed up), I just click on the Safari Icon and select the window that I want, or use Command-` to shift between open windows, or any number of other of things.

This is all on my iBook.

I consider tabs to be fundamentally broken from numerous standpoints and they would overcomplicate both the code and the way that things integrate for a web browser such as Safari.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[drsmithy]

Why on earth would you *need* tabs.

To efficiently manage lots (20+) of different browser windows. OS X's GUI is really not oriented towards concurrently using lots of running applications with numerous open windows (something it has inherited from Classic). Tabs help to alleviate this.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[illerd]

HOLY SHIT PITH IS GREAT

You've made my day. Thanks, poster.

This is even better than tabs. I always thought tabs were kinda half-ass. You can open new windows in tab, but as soon as you hit a link that has target="new" (fark.com, dailyrotten.com) then you've got another window to deal with. And that option in mozilla to force all new windows into a tab never seemed to work.

Yeah, people like to group tabs together in windows based on context. I never get _that_ into web-browsing though. To me having an all-windows-in-one-list-no-exceptions function is much more usefull.

Are there other such utilities out there?

And does anyone know of quick way to make pith open when safari does? I would write a script or whatever but I'm supposed to be studying.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[dalamcd]

And does anyone know of quick way to make pith open when safari does? I would write a script or whatever but I'm supposed to be studying.

...

On second thought, I'm not even going to touch this.

dalamcd

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[illerd]

haha smartass. very funny. Yes, I did figure it out about a second after i posted.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Ponty]

Juggle nine windows? Geez, you're not using your Mac right. I regularly have more than 100 windows open and the Dock is all I need to handle tihngs with aplomb. I did that with my Pismo (1024x768 LCD), my desktop Mac (1280x1024 LCD) and my new PB G4 (1280x854). The Dock is very powerful if you let yourself like it.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Lynn Benfield]

You can use Command-Tilde to select your way through the application window list.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[psavo]

what happens when you hit cmd-tilde next time? you come back to window you just left. with '1'&'2' in opera you continue in the direction you were going to..

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Lynn Benfield]

Cmd-Tilde will walk you through the entire window list (A, B, C, D, A, B, C, D, etc). Cmd-Shift-Tilde will take you backwards if you do actually want to go back to the window you just left.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Gropo]

my CRT iMac still works fine, and I'm not going to buy a new machine until it absolutely dies (knock on wood).

Poor criteria to base your Mac upgrade cycle on... I booted my G/F's father's 1987 Mac SE last month - a little effort could have gotten me on the internet...

The things just.... don't... DIE...

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[Woody]

I managed to get NetBSD run on my old SE/30 awhile back. Well, I guess I don't know about run... more like... limp? Anywho, I found some old 16MB SIMMS and a network card for the machine; I might actually get around to installing them one day when I don't have anything better to do.

Low End Mac has tons of information on maintaining Macs going all the way back to the original SE, Plus, etc. These older little devils might not look like much and the newer machines might look like "dalmations" or "flower power" throwbacks, but they're built like tanks.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[psavo]

so the further the window is, the more you have to press them.

Re:You forgot to mention tabs, so I will.

[MoneyT]

True fun is nursing an SE into running i think OS 8 was what we finaly got on there. Lot's and lots of mini add ons, but we got it, it was cool. It also was unusable, but that's another story.

Define "restart"

[Anonymous Coward]

"The download is 2.4 MB and doesn't require a restart." Does this mean restarting MacOS X or Safari?

Actually, are there OS X programs that need a reboot to install?

Re:Define "restart"

[kyrre]

iTunes, Quicktime, certain securty updates. Probably more.

Re:Define "restart"

[faeryman]

Quicktime needs a restart.

iTunes needs a restart because of some CD burning capibilities

Re:Define "restart"

[Alex Thorpe]

Some utilities, major or minor. USB Overdrive, a universal USB driver for mice, joysticks, and gamepads; the updated version of Virex from .Mac; the new Xpressions icon theme changer, which also requires a restart every time you change the theme. Web browsers never require a restart.

I've been using the new version of Safari for a couple of hours, and haven't noticed much different, though I had very few complaints in the first place. Most site that locked me out at first seemed to change their minds a few days later, either on their own or due to pressure from Apple, I don't know which.

Re:Define "restart"

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Essentially anything that messes with the kernel or kernel extensions is going to require you to reboot, or at least to strongly suggest that you reboot. It's possible to unload and reload kernel extensions without rebooting, of course, but dicey. For example, what would happen if you were in the middle of burning a CD and the installer decided to try to unload your CD-RW driver? It's just safer to reboot.

Re:Define "restart"

[Ponty]

Yea, basically the things that deal with the OS. iTunes does because it also includes the whole CD-R system. Half of the darned OS is based on QuickTime. Etc.

so far so good.

[agentmouthwash]

YAY Flash now works!! So what is the deal with tabs? I keep hearing about them but I have no clue what they are.. Prior to Safari I was using Mozilla. Does that have tab browsing?

Re:so far so good.

[Arf4]

Flash worked in the previous beta...

Re:so far so good.

[ollie_ob]

Just to note this is not a User-Interface update, it is more focused to fixing bugs in and extending the Webcore rendering engine used at Safari's heart. This is a beta browser, so it should be feature complete, and there should only be bug-fixes between here and a 1.0 final release. Wait for 1.1 if you want tabs ;-)

Answering your question, tabs allow multiple webpages to be viewed in a single window - a little like how Safari's preferences box works - click on an icon to get a different 'page' of options, but all in the same window.

Mozilla does do tabbed browsing, Command-T opens tabs instead of windows.

In my opinion (and we all have strong opinions- this is Slashdot after all!) I found tabs useful only because there was a 5 pause when switching between windows (not tabs) in Mozilla. But Safari's so damn fast I'm quite happy Command-~ -ing between 10 or so windows, without any noticeable pause - and that's on a 600MHz iBook.

Re:so far so good.

[drive]

i don't know if that counts. frame rates in flash were so slow in the previous release that navigating a flash site was almost impossible. i've done a lot of flash work lately and the craptastic performance in Safari was the main reason i wasn't using it. now i can. i am happy.

Tabbed Browsing

[Cokelee]

I'm not sure if anyone realizes this, but Apple typically does NOT like Multiple Document Interfaces -- essentially what tabbed browsing is. For this reason I do NOT see them adopting tabs, ever. Even if every other KHTML browser has them. I may be wrong, but I believe using tabs would be a design flaw to Apple.

I'm still reading through their HIG to see if they warn against it.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[WatertonMan]

[i][b]Apple typically does NOT like Multiple Document Interfaces[/b][/i] Although it has something unnervingly like the MDI with Project Builder. Project Builder has all sorts of odd interface features, such as close buttons that are "flat" representing a MDI document. It also misses many important UI features for a compiler/debugger, although that's a different issue. Anyway my point is that "panes" in Project Builder are an obvious exception to this.

I do wish Apple would improve Project Builder. Why the most essential application for the system - its development environment - is as weak as it is remains a mystery to me.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[Twirlip of the Mists]

I don't know what your standard for comparison is, but Project Builder is an excellent IDE in my opinion. Yes, the tabbed-window, paned-window, multi-document editor thing is hard to use and confusing, but you can change the way PB handles its windows in the preferences.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[SewersOfRivendell]

Metrowerks CodeWarrior is the standard of excellence in IDE's (or was as of about 1997 -- later versions are bloated cross-platform junk written by people who obviously couldn't care less about the Mac).

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[WatertonMan]

I actually don't mind the MDI in Project Builder. My main complaints with Project Builder are limited debugging features. For instance try having persistant watch variables between trips to the debugger. There is no "search" pane but instead you have a modal window.

Compare this to Visual Studio where you have tabbed persistent watch/expression panes. You have a nice toolbar with a search field that can search either the current document or all files in your document.

There really is no comparison between Visual Studio and Project Builder. I suppose a lot of this depends upon what kind of code you are using. Still I honestly wonder how people can stand tracking bugs down with Project Builder. I wanted to go full time with OSX for my development but ended up sticking with XP just because of this.

Codewarrior is better in some ways - its debugger is better for instance. But it still doesn't hold a candle to Visual Studio. It is also amazingly slow unless you can use precompiled headers extensively.

I'd made numerous suggestions to Apple and was excited when the last version of Project Builder came out. Sadly the actual debugging IDE had few changes. Perhaps some don't mind. Undoubtedly these folks don't mind printfs or using gdb. But it just isn't worth the hassle.

This is a rant slightly off topic though. So my apologies for conflating the MDI issue with Project Builder's other flaws. My original point was just that Project Builder does use MDI so the original person's point was demonstrably wrong. You are right though that Apple has made it so many aspects of the MDI are optional.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[code shady]

While I haven't seen any explicit warnings against using tabs with the brushed metal interface (but then, I haven't read all of the HIG), i also believe that apple will NOT implement tabbed browsing in safari.

The textured windows where "designed specifically for use by--and is therefore best suited to--applications that provide an interface for a digital peripheral, such as a camera, or an interface for managing data shared with digital peripherals, such as the Address Book application" or "... appropriate for applications that strive to re-create a familiar physical device". I think its the second one that is the most important here, but both uses play a role.

Take a look at iTunes. Its got one main window, an that window is the main focus of the app. In this case, the window is supposed to mimic the features and feel of, say, a CD player or the equivilant. Same with the calculator. Each of these one main windows contains all the controls you need, in one place where they can be easily accessed. In this context, the brushed window is approriate, because you only need one simple window for your interface.

Now, if this is the case, then why is it used in the Address book app or Safari? Well, its pretty simple. While you are not trying to mimic an actual peripheral, you ARE focusing soley on one particular type of data. Be it addresses, or a web page, each single window has a specific single focus.

Basically, each metallic window needs only focus on one thing. That one thing could be a web page, an address card, or a playlist. Putting tabs in safari would break that metaphor, which is something that apple would most likely not do.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[Fwonkas]

This really is unfortunate. Sticking to standards/guidelines/whatever is great where it makes sense. Safari is a great browser (using it to post this message), but I do most of my browsing with Chimera, simply for the tabs.

Anyway, why are they being consistent on this issue? It's not like they are in other places. Their website has tabs. Their i* apps (and Safari) don't stick to the Aqua look.

I don't see why they can't make it an option that is off by default.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

Neither does Final Cut Pro which looks like it was ported directly from a Unix platform like SGI. It looks a heck of a lot like Blender or other video/animation tools on Unix platforms.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[godglike]

Actually Apple use tabs a lot in OS X. In particular many Prefenrce Panes have Tabs. The diffenrence though is that these tabs are hardcoded subpanels. Apple doesn't use user created windows in the same way. You are right in the similarity tabs and an MDI. However this an MDI that actually makes sense. It even extends the file/folder metaphor in an appropriate way.

I hated microsofts MDI for years but Tabbed browsing is the best UI innovation I've seen in years.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[sg3000]

> Basically, each metallic window needs only focus
> on one thing.

I think this is correct. Additionally I think the metallic interface is used when the application isn't document-centric. So Word, Excel, and PowerPoint are document-centric and should use the regular pin stripes. Dantz Retrospect and Virex are not document-centric, and should therefore use the metallic appearance.

The only problem I have is I like the pin stripe look better than the metallic interface. So I'd hate to see too many applications using the metallic look.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[jonjohnson]

Aren't tabs considered making it a single-document interface? MDI simply means you have more than one document open at a time, which usually each document has a window. Tabs are an interface nightmare, in the way they're being used today. Having more than one document in a window, and not necessarily having them be related other than by a common link somewhere... that's just chaos. I still prefer having a few windows open than having tabs.

Re:Tabbed Browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

apart from on there website

dingleberry.

Re:Getting repetitive...

[djupedal]

Safari, at least so far, does not prompt a software update window...

Tabs, Maybe.

[Cokelee]

Some applications are not document-based. Such applications typically still have at least one main window, which can use the standard Aqua document window appearance and features.

Apple HIG

Re:Tabs, Maybe.

[NaugaHunter]

It isn't spelled out directly there, but from previous times I worked on MacOS apps the guideline summaries have pretty much said "One document, one window". It is consistent with their original desktop theme - each window was a document and sort of appeared as a sheet of paper.

And before someone else points them out, iTunes is more like an appliance - i.e. your CD player. iPhoto is an electronic photo album. iDVD and iMovie are film editors. Essentially the distinction is they don't work with single documents. Safari, however, deals with would could be called active newspapers or magazines. If you want to read a different article, it's in a different magazine, and either replaces your current document or is another document altogether.

I'm not trying to over-defend their choices. I just wanted to point out they are fairly consistent. Sometimes the distinctions are vague (e.g. what would Mail be?), but in the case of Safari I thinking they are going to stick with the document line of thought, and in this case it makes sense to me.

Re:Tabs, Maybe.

[Tumbleweed]

> Apple HIG

What did you call me?! :)

Shortcuts

[slenver]

Apple+arrows now work for back and forward pages..... I just hate having to reach for the mouse when browsing 'with one hand'.....

Re:Shortcuts

[Graymalkin]

Command+[ and Command+] have always worked for forward and back. You sir are no professional.

Re:Shortcuts

[hexdcml]

why what you doin with you other hand?

Re:Shortcuts

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, they didn't seem to work in frames with the first Safari beta. Hopefully this one fixes that.

Re:Shortcuts

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple+arrows now work for back and forward pages

That already works for me, right now, using Safari 1.0 Beta v0.51 from January.

Re:Shortcuts

[wrenkin]

Why is this rated Informative? If anything, it's Too Much Informative.

Re:Shortcuts

[Rouxfus]

Here's a URL that will show you a comprehensive list of all of Safari's keyboard shortcuts:

file:///Applications/Safari.app/Contents/Resources /English.lproj/Shortcuts.html

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. [H.L. Mencken]

whoops...banking gone for me

[djupedal]

My online banking worked via Safari until this new version.

For online access to secure sessions within wellsfargo.com, you must use an approved operating system and browser.

Time to enlighten WFB's tech dept. once again. I don't feel like forcing a spoof.

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[Anonymous Scowler]

For what it is worth, my bank's online system works fine with this release of Safari.

BTW, my bank is Fifth Third Bank.

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[backlonthethird]

Twin Cities Federal (www.tcfbank.com) also quit with this release.

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[coolmacdude]

Change the user agent to IE, it will work fine.

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Use one of the various available utilities or tricks to enable the Debug menu-- I think you can do it with defaults, but I forget exactly how; google it-- and you can change your browser ID string. Wells Fargo's site works just fine if you pretend to be running IE 5 for Mac, for example.

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[Huge Pi Removal]

Not always, my bank uses a javascript trick to work out if you're using IE or Netscape, and if your browser is *shock* standards-compliant, it won't let you in. No way round that :(

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[mrpuffypants]

I've had problems with Safari since a few days after it was released when I tried to access Wells Fargo. For some reason they see Safari as a "secuity risk" but right now I'm logged into WF online through Phoenix 0.5

Saying NO BETA SOFTWARE is just silly. Just makes me mad when I have to either use Chimera (which is still beta itself) or enable the debug menu and tell the server i'm on MSIE6.0 WinXP =[

Re:whoops...banking gone for me

[Anonymous Coward]

> Change the user agent to IE, it will work fine.

From the parent post:

"Time to enlighten WFB's tech dept. once again. I don't feel like forcing a spoof."

Gel

[Graymalkin]

What the hell is up with Safari and UBB? I can't seem to log onto many UBB powered sites using Safari, are there any special tricks to get this to work? I was hoping with this release I might be able to not use OW or IE to post to UBB boards but I guess I'll just have to wait a bit longer. This is pretty much the only real downside I've personally come across with Safari, everything else I've wanted to do it has worked fine and fast. Is there a actuallyWorkWithUBB flag in the plist I need to set or something?

I've tried everything available through Safari's interface including enabling popup windows, allowing cookies from everyone, and allowing every form of script and plug-in to run. So far I've had big fat zero luck. And yes I've submitted bug reports, including the page's source and any pertinent details of my particular setup.

Re:Gel

[faeryman]

I am an admin at a UBB, and am able to post with Safari. I am unable to logout though with the previous version. :( Had to delete the UBB cookies to logout.

I don't whats up with Safari and UBB, but maybe this new version will fix it.

*downloading*..

Sweet! Ok, I can log in, logout, and post with the new beta.

Click the logout link in UBB, then delete your cookies from that site. You should be able to log in and out as you please then.

Re:Gel

[bedouin]

UBB might work correctly (though I don't remember having a problem with it in the past), but I still can't properly login to PHPnuke sites.

Re:Gel

[TOCie]

It sorta depends on which UBB you're speaking of.

The login problem with UBB.threads is due to Safari setting the cookie path to the script... so you log in to /threads/start_page.php, and the cookie is only good for the page. Oops. A bug has been filed.

The login problem with UBB.classic is still being investigated, and is currently believed to be a problem with handling multiple Cookie headers.

To the best of my knowledge, Safari works fine with UBB.x using the old UI. There are some DOM bugs preventing use of the new UI. A bug has been filed.

tabs good

[djupedal]

The HIG, as I recall, doesn't mention tabs as evil. While Apple may not deploy tabs on the system level, we can look to Excel for tabbed worksheets as a long standing example, and to Airport Admin for a more recent usage. For a more public example, you only need to visit Apple.com

Safari will have tabs...sooner or later, and Cupertino will not slide into the Pacific as a result.

Re:tabs good

[Cokelee]

The HIG, as I recall, doesn't mention tabs as evil. While Apple may not deploy tabs on the system level, we can look to Excel for tabbed worksheets as a long standing example, and to Airport Admin for a more recent usage. For a more public example, you only need to visit Apple.com

Safari will have tabs...sooner or later, and Cupertino will not slide into the Pacific as a result.

Excel was NOT created by Apple, it was created by MICROSOFT.

The Airport Admin software CANNOT be document-oriented it contains NO documents

Apple's website is a SINGLE document. Every tab is not a NEW window it is a LINK to another page. Web Design and UI's are not equal.

Also, I wasn't being a sensationalist. I didn't call tabs evil, and I didn't say Apple's beloved home at Infinite Loop would slide into the Pacific Ocean. I simply said they don't implement MDIs, and ya know what, they don't.

Re:tabs good

[jeffehobbs]

Apple's website is a SINGLE document.

That's one long document.

~jeff

Re:tabs good

[Twirlip of the Mists]

The HIG, as I recall, doesn't mention tabs as evil.

There's tabs and then there's tabs. Tabs as a UI control are okay; there's a section of the HIG describing how to use them. But tabbed browsing is simply one implementation of a multiple-document interface (MDI). The HIG does specifically call out MDI as being evil.

See, the Mac got where it is today by establishing a fairly simple desktop metaphor and sticking with it. The metaphor says one document, one window. Windows on the screen are like pieces of paper on the desktop.

we can look to Excel for tabbed worksheets as a long standing example

A long-standing bad example, you mean. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anybody who would be willing to go on record as saying that tabbed worksheets are a good UI.

and to Airport Admin for a more recent usage [also the Apple web site]

I don't mean to be rude, but if we're going to have a constructive conversation about tabbed browsing you're going to have to wrap your head around the fact that tabs qua tabs and tabs as an MDI implementation are two completely different things.

Safari will have tabs...sooner or later

Safari will not have tabs. Not as the default, not as an option for power users, not at all. If somebody else wants to construct a browser that implements some kind of MDI interface, they're free to do so. Hell, they can even use WebKit to do it, once it's released. But Apple will not release a browser that so flagrantly violates the standards that got them where they are today.

(Sorry, I guess that got a little strident. I'm watching The West Wing as I write this, and Sorkin always pushes my prose over toward the purple end of the spectrum.)

Re:tabs good

[babbage]

AS TotM noted, tabs are just one way to represent a Multiple Document Interface. My personal preference for getting to this is not with tabs in the Mozilla / Excel vein, but drawers in the Mail.app / Calculator.app vein. With a hierarchical display of sections like open windows, bookmarks. history pages, etc, and (ultra wish list) with page thumbnails as icons), you could get a much richer interface than the simple row of buttons that you get in these hip modern browsers. If Safari ever moves to a MDI style (or at least, the option for such a style), my hope is that drawers end up being the way to get there.

Re:tabs good

[sg3000]

> But tabbed browsing is simply one implementation
> of a multiple-document interface (MDI). The HIG
> does specifically call out MDI as being evil.
> See, the Mac got where it is today by
> establishing a fairly simple desktop metaphor
> and sticking with it.

Where the Mac is today? You mean with ~3% market share for sales? ;-)

When you say that tabbed browsing is a form of MDI, and MDI is evil, you run the risk of sounding pedantic. People don't buy computers or software because it matches some Ivory Tower's idea of what is a good interface. They buy because it fits their needs the best.

I have been a Mac user for a while, and when I first heard about tabs in Chimera, I had no idea why anyone would want them. However, once I tried them, I learned that tabs work best for me. I like to load different sites into different browser windows, and then load sub pages for a particular site in tabs in the same window. It keeps things neater and allows me to quickly go back to my place without having to sit through a painful page reload. To me, three windows with three tabs is more organized that nine windows spanning three different web sites.

Maybe tabs aren't the only solution for this, but I'd like to see something that effectively replaces the functionality and still meets with the HIG-nazis' idea of what is good design.

Perhaps the case is in general MDI is not a good idea, but there are specific cases where it is a good idea -- like when you're browsing the web.

Safari's product managers need to realize that there are a significant number of people who will never switch to Safari full time until it has two things:

1. Tabbed browsing (or something that substitutes the functionality)
2. Support for the Mac OS keychain

Hardware dependent speed increase?

[fobside]

I have the bottom of the line G4 PowerBook (400Mhz), and while I do notice a speed increase, it doesn't seem substantial. Chimera is much snappier on initial launching of the application, initial loading of pages, and even loading of cached pages. Do individuals with faster machines, and perhaps dual processor towers, notice a greater speed increase than I do?

Re:Hardware dependent speed increase?

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Chimera is much snappier on initial launching of the application

Something is very wrong. On my dual GHz G4 (MDD), Chimera always took several seconds to launch the first time, during which I had to stare at that oh-so-1990's splash screen of theirs. Safari launches more-or-less instantly, in a second or less. (Unless my computer is swapping; it's not that hard to fill up 512 MB of RAM these days.)

Re:Hardware dependent speed increase?

[sweetooth]

I can concur. On my wifes iBook 500mhz with 256MB of RAM Chimera opens significantly slower than Safari. On my new 17" PowerBook 1Ghz 1GB of RAM Chimera opens quite fast, but Safari still seems to open faster.

Re:Hardware dependent speed increase?

[ActiveSX]

If you like Chimera and you don't to have to wait, just throw it into your Login Items and click the Hide checkbox. Works pretty well, although I need to figure out a way to turn off the splash screen.

Re:Getting repetitive...

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Safari, at least so far, does not prompt a software update window...

Yes, it does. Did on mine, at least, about 20 minutes ago. (It's now 6:00 EST.)

ouch...touchy aren't we...take a breath

[djupedal]

Green tea for the rest of the day, ok? I'm sorry, really, really sorry I mentioned it :)

Just don't yell at me (again), when Safari starts using tabs.

Re:ouch...touchy aren't we...take a breath

[Cokelee]

ok, :)

banking gone-possible fix

[ihatewinXP]

When I upgraded to beta60 my online banking also turned off. I was able to update the .plist manually on this machine and everything went back to normal. - Just send me your info (bank name, account number, etc...oh dont forget SS#) and I can fix it for you!

I turned off software update

[skinfitz]

Who needs it when /. announces all Apple updates?

Incidentally the apple /. gfx appear to be broken in safari now.

Re:I turned off software update

[Anonymous Coward]

Also learning about updates from /. gives you the added benifet of finding out about "problems" or compatibility issues *before* you update.

p.s. Posting this from my QNX box!

Re:I turned off software update

[skinfitz]

Would be nice if when you use software update on the Mac there is a link to the inevitable /. story.

Tabbed Windows solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Here you can see screenshot mock-ups of my idea for tabs:

http://home.quicknet.nl/mw/prive/dennis.scp/s/safa ri

The idea is NOT to add tabs inside a window. But to place a new window at the exact same place as your previous window and let any obscured windows pop up a tab.

So instead of indenting that new window to the lower right to reveal a clickable border as used today, I say let the windows behind the current window pop up a tab to show their name and icon. The windows stay independent and the screen has less clutter than with today's jumpy stacking system. Power-users can cycle the windows in a tab-like fashion using the [option] key.

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[jericho4.0]

Exellent work, Mr Anonymous Coward. Certainly good enough for me. I'm sticking your url in a safari bug report right now.

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[claude_juan]

none to shabby. though i must admit i like what proteus has done as far as "tabbing" your chat windows. check it out if you havent seen it. its pretty sweet.

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[Lewisham]

Nice work. Must say, I've always been an advocate not for tabs, but for tray items instead. You know, like the sidebar that Mail uses? That would be muchly Apple and muchly tabby!

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[ravenskana]

The GUI control you are thinking about is called a "drawer" by Apple.

For an example of how Safari might use a drawer, check out Apple's Preview application. If you open up multiple images in Preview at the same time, you get the first image displayed with the other images shown as thumbnails in a drawer.

In Preview's preferences a user can decide whether the thumbnails should show just the image, just the name of the file, or an image/name combination. A theoretical Safari implementation could have similar preferences, i.e. show URL/page name, show preview image of page (like you'd get by minimizing the page to the dock), or both.

Other OS X web browsers such as Chimera and OmniWeb use drawers for bookmark management, but as Safari has a different way of doing that, a drawer could be useful for window management.

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[King Babar]

The idea is NOT to add tabs inside a window. But to place a new window at the exact same place as your previous window and let any obscured windows pop up a tab.

I appreciate the effort and thought you have put into this idea, but I see at least two problems with it:

1. Windows are identified by their title bar text which can be very long; horizontal tabs always face a challenge with this.
2. I don't really see how you can easily deal with (say) 20 open windows effectively with this idea. Again, I think the insight I have on tabs is that you're primarily trying to gain the functionality of the "window list" given in the Window menu while solving its issues and allowing keyboard navigation.

Power-users can cycle the windows in a tab-like fashion using the [option] key.

I am not sure how this is any improvement over cycling through windows using cmd-~. Am I missing something?

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows are identified by their title bar text which can be very long; horizontal tabs always face a challenge with this.

But still people love it, it doesn't cost much screenspace and is visually organized.

I don't really see how you can easily deal with (say) 20 open windows effectively with this idea.

Most likely two separate windows, each with ten tabs. And 8 tab-collections in the dock if you want to have 100 windows open.

Power-users can cycle the windows in a tab-like fashion using the [option] key. I am not sure how this is any improvement over cycling through windows using cmd-~.

Predictability, you see a line of tabs, with one missing in the middle. That's the one you have active below, if you want to go to the right you press [option]+[command]+[~]. If you want to go to the tird tab you press it three times, no counting what number the tab is (perhaps [command 7]) no jumping to almost random windows like with [command]+[~].

You read along the tab and you can follow that focus without any braincalculation. That makes it very fast.

Dennis SCP

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[King Babar]

I don't really see how you can easily deal with (say) 20 open windows effectively with this idea.

Most likely two separate windows, each with ten tabs. And 8 tab-collections in the dock if you want to have 100 windows open.

OK, so I should have phrased that more simply. I notice that in Mozilla, I frequently can't get full titles on even *4* open tabs, let alone 8 or 20. I really do think that full visibility is a possible design goal here.

[concerning the fact that Power-users can cycle the windows in a tab-like fashion using the [option] key.]

I am not sure how this is any improvement over cycling through windows using cmd-~.

Predictability, you see a line of tabs, with one missing in the middle. That's the one you have active below, if you want to go to the right you press [option]+[command]+[~]. If you want to go to the tird tab you press it three times, no counting what number the tab is (perhaps [command 7]) no jumping to almost random windows like with [command]+[~].

OK, I think the problem here is that I don't want to explicitly navigate to the left or the right or anywhere spatially, I want to go to the window with the slashdot article (say) in it. The virtue of Safari's being fast is that if you have only a moderate number (less than say 7) of open windows, you can cmd-~ around all of them in a couple of seconds, tops, random or not. But what I *really* want to do is just type text that matches the window I want to go to. That way I read the "tab", i type the "tab", and I'm there; just like type-ahead highlight links in Mozilla (now there's a feature I miss a *lot* more than tabs.) I think this is actually easily achievable: just have an "open windows mode" (opt-cmd-w or something) that displays all of the open windows) and make typing at that mode highlight (if possible) one of the open windows; hit return, and you're there). No muss, no fuss, no additional widgets, and the partial precedent of "bookmark view" which we now have to solve the similar-in-spirit problem of how do you navigate between scads of bookmarks. You could put them all on the bookmark bar, or hit opt-cmd-B and browse around. Bookmark view, alas, still lacks anything like real keyboard navigation control, which is too bad.

In any case, I thought the idea was interesting (certainly novel). I'm just not sure it's the right idea for this purpose, and this is an idea that really has to be done right for a lot of reasons.

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[Anonymous Coward]

That way I read the "tab", i type the "tab", and I'm there; just like type-ahead highlight links in Mozilla (now there's a feature I miss a *lot* more than tabs.) I think this is actually easily achievable: just have an "open windows mode" (opt-cmd-w or something) that displays all of the open windows) and make typing at that mode highlight (if possible) one of the open windows; hit return, and you're there).

Do you realize that when you remember commands to type your brain blocks your senses and blocks your sense of time? That is the fundamental reason why, except for shortcuts, GUI users test faster than CLI users in the lab, and the reason why someone says 'what did you say' after contemplating.

So you want keyboard control over the Window menu. That's a cool thing to ask as this is slashdot, and should be an easy hack.

But realize that this will not make the average person get quicker or better organized. I even doubt that the average slashdotter will get quicker than with tabs as they lock their brains in a dynamic (not even a right on the money shortcut) association game 'tabs' > 'on slashdot' > 'safari beta update' 'type saf ' and 'tabs' > 'on macnn' > 'macnn' 'multiple macnn windows open' > 'type macnn tab', without them even realizing you are staring at thin air. In the mean time the tab user has hit tabsjump combo three times already and sees the window is at another location on screen and mouseclicks it ending in a tie, but would have been faster if the needed window was indeed the third or even fourth or fifth window.

Dennis SCP

Re:Tabbed Windows solution

[King Babar]

Do you realize that when you remember commands to type your brain blocks your senses and blocks your sense of time?

Why, no I didn't, and I'd *love* to see a cite for this since this is pretty closely related to what I do for a living.

In the mean time, if you read carefully (I'll admit I was rushing when I typed the original) you will see that what I am arguing for is not trying to remember any command short cut, but just typing the text you see on the title bar. This is the so-called "type ahead on links" that you have in the current Mozilla. To the extent that typing is automatic in some people anyway, this is a big win. Moreover, type ahead on links is pretty obviously a big UI win when the alternative is to use a hockey puck to move your pointer to, e.g., one of the hundreds of links on a page like "yahoo.com".

[snip]

So you want keyboard control over the Window menu. That's a cool thing to ask as this is slashdot, and should be an easy hack.

Absolutely not. The window menu, being a pull-down of limited horizontal extent, has more than just the lack of keyboard commands going against it. This is (I think) exactly why Apple ditched the concept of having a pull-down menu for bookmarks in favor of "book mark view," although that could be improved as well.

But realize that this will not make the average person get quicker or better organized.

Oh, I completely realize this. And, in fact, the whole point was not to make the average person faster or better organized, but to help out strong typists and expert users without confusing the average person. The beauty of most command shortcuts, keyboard navigation aids, and advanced features like "type ahead to links on the page" is precisely that they can be used by those who want them without forcing anybody to use them.

I even doubt that the average slashdotter will get quicker than with tabs as they lock their brains in a dynamic (not even a right on the money shortcut) association game 'tabs' > 'on slashdot' > 'safari beta update' 'type saf ' and 'tabs' > 'on macnn' > 'macnn' 'multiple macnn windows open' > 'type macnn tab', without them even realizing you are staring at thin air.

Now I have no idea what you're getting at. What I proposed was more like:

1. Type cmd-opt-W (to get to window view)
2. Type "macnn" RETURN (to select the first window with macnn in the title)

In this case, that would be one-compound plus 6 simple keystrokes. Now the nice thing is that this is essentially a constant cost if you know you have a MacNN window open, and the constant plus a short scanning time if you don't know exactly what's there beforehand. Definitely faster than hitting cmd-~ a bunch of times, and probably about as fast as tabbing through 8 tabs, but with the advantage that your choices are not limited by what is visible in a 70-pixel or so wide chunk of screen (like a tab).

Now, I appreciated (and used) Mozilla's tabs, but I recognized their shortcomings. I *really* appreciated (and used) type ahead to links in Mozilla, and for that there is really no replacement. If you want a UI buzzword to throw at this, what I propose (and prefer, to some extent) is similar to what was called the "anti-mac" interface by Jakob Nielsen. Interestingly, OS X can support to a considerable degree both the Mac and anti-Mac styles of interaction. I'm pretty happy about that, myself. :-)

Rendering engine changes in detail

[ollie_ob]

Mark Pilgrim's excellent blog Dive Into Mark has a very comprehensive list of changes to the Webcore rendering engine. The permanent link is here. I'm impressed with how quickly he's managed to list these changes seeing as it only came out today!

One change I've noticed is Safari no longer freezes for a minute when loading certain webpages. Another nice change is that stylesheet change on Dave Hyatt's weblog actually works now. Dave is ironically one of the Safari developers, so it's just as well!!!

Re:Rendering engine changes in detail

[tim1724]

Another nice change is that stylesheet change on Dave Hyatt's weblog [mozillazine.org] actually works now.

But there's still no GUI for choosing a stylesheet, though (which is why Dave Hyatt has to have JavaScript for it). A user-accessible method for choosing which stylesheet to display isrequired by the CSS 2 spec. (section 3.2, point 5)

Give me a View->Use Style menu like Mozilla!!

Re:Rendering engine changes in detail

[Gogo Dodo]

very comprehensive list of changes to the Webcore rendering engine

Only related to CSS issues that he tested. If you're looking for release notes on everything that's changed, this isn't it.

Re:Rendering engine changes in detail

[King Babar]

If you're looking for release notes on everything that's changed, this isn't it.

OK, I'll bite: where is the complete changelong? :-)

Re:Rendering engine changes in detail

[Gogo Dodo]

OK, I'll bite: where is the complete changelong? :-)

I wish I knew.

Fastest browser EVER!

[spaceport]

And I just downloaded it this morning! DOH!

Oh well, I'll be at that again, but it sure is nice how apple keeps us users up to date. I have been using Safari since the day of the keynote, and I can't see one single reason to go back.

Even without tabs, the sheer speed of it negates (my/the) need to have a page load in the background. The Weather Network used to be one of the worst pages to load on IE, it would take days just to see what's happening outside the window. It's so fast on Safari, I've even considered it as my homepage...

On a compatibility note, I have had more problems with banks, etc. with IE and mozilla than Safari. Even when I thought I would be relegated to obscurity because of a non-ms-browser, non-ms-os, Safari comes through. Not always, to be sure, but enough to have seriously surprised me for a marginal beta browser.

Safari... the next iTunes...

Timing

[Anonymous Coward]

Fair enough, that there are plenty of posts for them to wade through, but my submission was rejected long before his was accepted.

I understand that keeping up with the torrent of submissions is an involved job, but methinks sometimes they are a little overzealous with the rejection knife

Flash is much Faster

[Anonymous Coward]

Horray! Flash is finally up to snuff and working at a reasonable speed. I can finally use flash heavy sites like terminator3.com without screaming!

drag & drop and improved <OBJECT> suppor

[tim1724]

You can now drag & drop text from browser windows. (It previously only allowed dragging links and images.) Unfortunately it uses the silly Cocoa-style delay before allowing you to drag text. (When will Apple finally fix text dragging in Cocoa?!)

It also now supports embedding HTML with the <OBJECT> tag, although it will stop drawing the embedded content if you use the Back/Forward buttons. Also, if you click in the <OBJECT> and scroll it with the keyboard, then clicking on links outside of the <OBJECT> sometimes doesn't work unless you first click outside of the <OBJECT> area and scroll the main page with they keyboard. (weird, but it happens .. check out the W3 CSS1 test suite pages)

Still no command-option-w support

[mattkime]

As any long time mac user knows, command-option-w closes allthe windows in almost ANY mac app made in the past 12 years.

yet safari does not do this.

Re:Still no command-option-w support

[Twirlip of the Mists]

As any Mac OS X user knows, command-option-w no longer closes all open windows. Option-clicking the close button does, however.

Try it with TextEdit; that's the canonical Mac OS X document-based application. All other document-based application should behave like TextEdit does.

Re:Still no command-option-w support

[death or glory]

why don't you just lock the door or something?

Re:Still no command-option-w support

[mattkime]

Dammit! you're right!

The command-option-w works in the finder. But not in many other apple apps.

Is there a reason for this change? seems silly to me.

Re:Still no command-option-w support

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Is there a reason for this change? seems silly to me.

Let's ignore for the moment the fact that every single change is going to seem silly to somebody. If I had to make a guess, mostly because I'm too lazy to go looking through the documentation, I'd say that Apple maybe wanted to free up some key chords. They had a bit of a problem with Adobe over command-H (hide) and command-option-H (hide others), so I can see their point. Let's keep the key chords to a minimum. It's simply not necessary for every single OS function to be represented by a key chord.

Re:Getting repetitive...

[djupedal]

Interesting...I'm in Asia, but I'd be surprised if the beta updates are localized. Are you sure the update panel in OS X lists Safari? Mine never has. Oh well...thanks.

Saving RAM: An argument for tabbed browsing

[elliotj]

According to an off-the-cuff test I just performed, tabbed browsing can cut your RAM requirements in half and greatly speed up your system.

On my Mac I opened Chimera and filled up the window with as many tabs as it would allow (16 in a single window). All windows displayed the Slashdot mainpage. My Slashdot prefs are set to show all stories from all sections.

I checked the system usage in the Process Viewer app:

Navigator %CPU 9.00 %Memory 11.20

I then closed all the windows and did the same thing, this time opening 16 SEPARATE windows. Again with Slashdot's mainpage loaded in each.

Process Viewer showed:

Navigator %CPU 9.20 %Memory 22.40

So, according to this unscientific off-the-cuff test, you cut your RAM requirements in half by using tabs. YMMV.

I noticed this the other day when I opened over 50 different images in different windows. My Mac almost ground to a halt. I then opened the same images in tabs (in only a few windows ... again Chimera limits you to 16 tabs per window), and my performance was great.

So, to all those who think tabbed browsing is purely a matter of personal preference, I suggest that there is at least a reasonable performance based argument for it.

(the productivity arguments are even more compelling IMHO, but I won't get into those)

Re:Saving RAM: An argument for tabbed browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

this should be modded WAY up.

Re:Saving RAM: An argument for tabbed browsing

[nevershower]

Are you using Quartz Extreme? Otherwise, every window is stored as a (compressed) bitmap in main system memory (iirc). So your results make sense.

Re:Saving RAM: An argument for tabbed browsing

[Zhe Mappel]

Interesting. I'll often see CPU percentages running between 30 to 50% (on a 700mhz iBook). Which build of Chimera are you using, and do you have its cache enabled?

Re:Getting repetitive...

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Are you sure the update panel in OS X lists Safari?

Yes. Absolutely, totally, no question in my mind, 100% positive.

you're right

[djupedal]

As I said before, I'm not anxious enough to do any spoofing right now. I'll wait for it to get out of beta, and if it is still an issue, and if still WF hasn't come on board (I used to work with the network division, so if I do anything, it will be to prod the team to recognize Safari), etc. and...if I have time I'll trik it. Seems for now it may come and go and I've got other goblins to chase...like how to get my Linux box to do Firewire networking :)

Tabs

[daviddennis]

Tabs are a way of organizing multiple browser windows. Instead of having them in separate windows, there is a set of tabs on top of your screen (sort of like the top of the Apple home page).

You can open a web page in a new tab. You can then switch to another tab and read that page while the one in the tab is loading. When it's done you can switch over to it and read it.

You can flip between pages by flipping between the tabs.

For people with small monitors (say 1024x768 resolution and down), tabs are really useful because repositioning windows on a small screen is a hassle. For people using larger screens, including myself, I normally find it much more convenient to simply view multiple web pages in multiple windows, which can be easily resized and dragged around the screen so I can see more of them at once.

I think that explains why many people are so fanatical about tabs, while they leave me cold.

Hope that helps.

D

Does Hitting 2 keys at the SAME time count?

[Anonymous Coward]

Command+tilde = toggles through document windows...

Get it Command+Tab = toggles through apps
Command+the little button above it = toggles through doc windows

Re:Does Hitting 2 keys at the SAME time count?

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent up. Mod grandparent down.

Keeps my custom settings...

[EverLurking]

Hmmm...interesting. I had previously modified my mainmenu.nib file so I had custom keyboard shortcuts that were more convienent for me than the factory settings from Apple, seems like updating through Software Update preserved these changes though the mainmenu.nib file appears to have been updated during the install process. Couldn't be that Apple decided to use MY keyboard shortcuts? Naw, doubt that.

The custom control buttons that I had installed using Safari Icon and my custom plist settings were overwritten back to Safari "Factory" defaults, but don't know why it kept my manmenu.nib changes.

Funny, but good in the end as I didn't have to re-create my own shortcuts.

DaveC

NationStates

[PetWolverine]

Safari still doesn't allow me to check my issues and change my settings in my NationState. Come on, Apple, how am I supposed to keep the people of my country happy when I have to tend to them using an inferior browser?

Re:Getting repetitive...

[PetWolverine]

You may be 100% positive that it lists it on your computer, but I had to go to VersionTracker and update mine.

Re:Still no command-option-w support (OT)

[PetWolverine]

Well, I haven't been able to use command-option-w consistently since I switched to the Dvorak keyboard layout, so I hadn't even noticed that missing feature in Safari. Mac OS X's lack of support for Dvorak is pathetic when it comes to dealing with keyboard shortcuts. Some applications insist on treating all keystrokes as if I had a QWERTY keyboard, some treat the keys differently depending on the circumstances. HotApp, for instance, is a neat little preference pane for making lots of keyboard shortcuts, but it reads Dvorak keys when assigning the shortcuts and QWERTY keys when using them, which is extremely confusing (think about it for a minute or two till your head hurts).

All this means that, for instance, in the Finder, closing a window is command-, (comma is where w would be in qwerty, I have it set to use qwerty command keys to make certain apps happier), but closing all windows is command-option-w (w being, ironically, where , is in qwerty!).

If only Apple would support different keyboard layouts at a lower level in the OS, changing the characters before other applications could read them, I wouldn't have all this trouble...

Re:drag & drop and improved suppor

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately it uses the silly Cocoa-style delay before allowing you to drag text. ( When will Apple finally fix text dragging in Cocoa?!)

AAARRRGGHH!

No!

This delay is exactly the sort of little things that make the Mac experience so much smoother -- provided of course it's adhered to consistently, which it always has been. This thing is thought out.

How often is your text selection right the first time, compared to other times when you need to tweak it a little bit before dragging? The subtle delay is there to give you that chance.

I can't count the times I've struggled with non-conformant interfaces which make you click 3 times to undo and correct the selection.

I am using QE

[elliotj]

Yeah, I am using Quartz Extreme. I'm running 10.2.3 on an 800Mhxz 15" TiBook with 512megs of RAM.

I can't explain the situation except to say that I've noticed OS X behaves this way: more windows eat more resources.

Re:I am using QE

[Anonymous Coward]

Quartz Extreme still stores the bitmap textures for the windows in main memory, The main difference is that it uses open gl and the GPU to do the composition of the different bitmaps instead of the CPU.

browser tabs good

[djupedal]

Why, To'tM, you know I listen when you speak. My examples were just to show that tabs aren't new, and the various implementations (good or bad) only show we're bound to see them continue. I happen to depend on them, now, for browsing. Otherwise, I can take or leave them.

I'll give in, just cause it's you. I'd like to know whence your authority on Safari comes, tho, but only to satisfy my own curiousity. I don't doubt your feedback, thanks.

I'm now wondering how long it will be before we see HTML that opens a new tab... [target=_tab_new]

Re:browser tabs good

[Twirlip of the Mists]

My examples were just to show that tabs aren't new, and the various implementations (good or bad) only show we're bound to see them continue.

That's specious reasoning at best. One example of a bad user interface-- two if you count Mozilla/Opera/Chimera tab-based MDI-- does not a trend make.

If anything, the overall trend is away from MDI toward SDI. Microsoft Word for Windows used to be an MDI application; as of Office 2000, it wasn't. The same is true of lots of Windows applications. MDI doesn't work, so it's being abandoned.

There are no real examples of MDI on the Mac, of course, because the Mac HIG always proscribed MDI in favor of SDI.

I'd like to know whence your authority on Safari comes, tho, but only to satisfy my own curiousity.

A three-way combination of inside info, extensive knowledge of Apple's UI guidelines over the years, and a level of confidence bordering on hubris.

I'm now wondering how long it will be before we see HTML that opens a new tab

Oh, sure, let's go right back to the bad old days of browser-specific HTML. "I'm sorry, but you must use a browser with a shitty multiple-document interface implementation in order to view this site." That'd be great... ;-)

Re:browser tabs good

[King Babar]

My examples were just to show that tabs aren't new, and the various implementations (good or bad) only show we're bound to see them continue.

That's specious reasoning at best. One example of a bad user interface-- two if you count Mozilla/Opera/Chimera tab-based MDI-- does not a trend make.

I think a better way to argue about this is to decide what problem it is that needs to be solved, figure out to what extent current tabbed browsing solutions do or do not solve them, and then do the *right* thing. :-)

Personally (and surprisingly to me) I find that I miss tabs less in Safari than I would have expected. It turns out that *one* problem that tabs solve in Mozilla is the problem that raising and repainting browser windows takes just enough time to be irritating. Safari gets around this by being much faster.

That said, speed alone does not solve every problem. A general problem with any application that includes multiple windows is simply managing all of the windows, making it clear which is which, and allowing you to navigate between them conveniently. Here, the biggest problems with just using multiple windows are that when you have a non-trivial number open, they overlap so you can't immediately see all of the relevant content to raise the one you want (or even all of the titlebars). Further, while there are "nice" ways to cycle through multiple windows (cmd-~, best read here as "I command you to twiddle" :-)), you can get to scenes like that in Toy Story II where our porcine hero must go "around the horn" on the remote to locate the right channel (here window).

Now, there is a method to do this already in the interface, namely the list of open windows in the pull-down "Window" menu. This solution has its own set of problems. The "Window" menu now exposes a much wider pull-down menu surface, but it will never be wide enough to show the full title. (This is a major problem with the Mozilla tabbed browsing interface, made worse by the fact that the list is presented horizontally rather than vertically.) Another problem with the Window menu solution is that, especially for fast typists, pull-down menus are too slow.

Ironically, Apple sort of/kind of recognized some of these issues more completely when it came to the (surprisingly similar) issue of bookmarks. So I now have a dozen or so bookmarks on my "bookmark bar", and they are arranged horizontally and scroll off the screen. Not great. But then there's "Bookmark View" (option-cmd-B) which provides me with the obvious solution: a scrollable list of essentially full-width bookmark entries! And even some keyboard navigation! But then it craps out: you can use the arrow keys to highlight a bookmark entry, but then there is no way to go to that bookmark without using a mouse. The obvious answer would be "hit return", but somebody at Apple has apparently assumed that what I would usually want to do in that case is *edit* the bookmark name rather than *use* the bookmark itself. Bleah. Keyboard navigation for "bookmark view" really needs to be fixed. Then it will be heaven on earth.

And when "Bookmark Heaven" has been achieved, all that Apple has to do is give us "Windowlist Heaven" arranged along exactly the same principles. Hit (say) option-cmd-W and go to "Open Window View". Navigate to your open window, and you're there. This simultaneously solves the visibility problem, the "title space" problem, and the "fast navigation" problem.

The only problem it does not solve that Tabs could solve is the "Hierarchical Organization" problem. When I am running BLAST searches on ncbi.nlm.nih.gov, ideally I want all of that stuff separated from my more "usual" browsing. With tabs, I just have a "Blast Window" filled with tabs related to that stuff, and a "Regular window" filled with tabs related to the usual stuff. The window list solution alone does not solve this one. What could help is what amounts to making the list of windows hierarchical (I guess like bookmark folders).

In short, we need a (potentially hierarchical) "Window list" view that allows robust keyboard navigation. Everybody can benefit, nobody needs to use, and the interface is within UI guidelines and common sense.

I'm now wondering how long it will be before we see HTML that opens a new tab

Oh, sure, let's go right back to the bad old days of browser-specific HTML. "I'm sorry, but you must use a browser with a shitty multiple-document interface implementation in order to view this site." That'd be great... ;-)

Ooh--I know; we could call it "frames". Wait a minute; that's taken. Uh...let's call it "framelets" and make it twice as confusing as frames, and provide a <noframelets> tag that allows us to handle people with pathetically out-of-date browsers. :-) (Man, that *was* a pretty scary idea...)

bad old days

[djupedal]

hubris...ah yes.

As for bad html. I thought we agreed that since IE allows sloppy html, we were going to blame the singer, not the song. joke...

Re:Still no command-option-w support (OT)

[Junta]

Aside from X11, I have never experienced this issue while using the Dvorak layout, and their latest update to that is supposed to correct that. command-w works correctly in finder and all my apps. Dvorak has worked just fine and the keyboard layout facilities of OSX have been a lot more consistant than MS's model. In fact, MS operating systems have the single, most crappy keyboard layout implementation in my experience.

still isn't done

[squarefish]

Three sites I regularly visit still don't play well with safari;

my dating site
my mail reporting site
my domian registration site

Where is "send this page" or link?

[morganew]

Bad News:
There is no easy way to send a page or a link directly from the browser. And by directly I mean through a person's preferred mail client (mail.app, entourage, etc.)

Good News:
Right clicking on highlighted text gives you the option to copy!! A great day for me and plagiarists everywhere!

Morgan

Re:Where is "send this page" or link?

[ThatbookwritingWheel]

Yes it's been done and always been there.
Click Safari - Services - Mail - Send selection.

*Weeeee*

Background loading

[ZigMonty]

I don't need *tabs* but I really need some way of opening pages in the background. I don't like having to wait there watching a blank page while my shitty modem sucks it down one byte at a time. Whether this is "load in background tab", OmniWeb's "open link behind this window" or some new Apple idea, I don't care, but it has to be one of them. I'm getting really sick of opening a link in a window in front and then bringing the previous window to the foreground while I wait for the page to load. This is literally the only major thing that is bothering me about Safari. Spell checking was the only other thing tying me to OmniWeb.

Re:Background loading

[EverLurking]

Try this key combination when you click on a link:

--

Opens the selected link in a background windows and loads the page. Then you can choose all you want from your open windows from the "Window" menu item or by Right Clicking/Ctrl Clicking Safari's Dock Icon.

If you could only select the - behavior to open a window in the background, I could actually live without tabs. Maybe I'm just lazy, but the 3 key combination is a bit of a chore.

DaveC

Re:Background loading

[EverLurking]

Ooops, the key combo description got mangled despite selecting "Plain Old Text" option.

The Open in a Window behind Current Window key combi is:

(Shift)-(Command)-(Click)

DaveC

Re:Background loading

[darkgreen]

Mod parent up - I've been using this in combination with Pith, and I find i'm not missing tabs at all. This is on my Ibook, at 1024.

if you've got a mouse with extra buttons, it's great, just create an instance where for Safari, your middle mouse button (or whatever) command-shift clicks, and boom, links open and load in new windows in the background. With Pith, you can even have them load exactly behind, or hide all but the foreground window.

Drop clippings in new beta

[ihatewinXP]

I cannot believe that any apple application leaves the code factory without 'clipping' support - I have always thought the killer app for the Mac OS was the ability to drag and drop a clipping (I have seen windows users eyes gape at this simple trick). In the weeks that I have been using Safari I must have run into this at least three times a day. I would imagine for many mac users this is the same. So again how is it that Apple apps lately are running screaming from all their (wonderful if old) UI guidelines? Yes, i realize this is a beta app but iCal is a mess and Quicktime? well after this long I guess im used to it.

-Oh wait im sorry - this was supposed to be a posting about tabs

Cookie bug is still there

[inio]

The cookie code generates the incorrect default PATH if the server does not supply a path. The RFC (and w3 spec) states that the path should be the url from the end of the hostname up to (and including) the last / (before a ? if one is present). Safari just grabs the whole url up to the ?.

Bravo

[Zhe Mappel]

Fine suggestion and very nice page, too. Let us hope that Apple sees the light: tabs are, well, insanely great.

I'm running 0.6

[elliotj]

I'm using out-of-the-box Chimera 0.6 Build ID: 2002122004. (By this I mean it's not a nightly, I downloaded the 0.6 binary straight from their website).

It's running the default config: no special settings on my part, so whatever caching settings that might be I guess.

Web design & UIs

[mattbot 5000]

Web Design and UI's are not equal. Maybe not, but from a marketing perspective it's a good idea to keep the web design and UI as closely aligned as possible. Hence, the abandoning of Garamond font on apple.com and the frequent tinkering with the "candy-ness" of the tabs across the top as colored iMacs faded out and translucence became all the rage.

Re:Still no command-option-w support (OT)

[eet23]

I have never come across that. Are you sure you are not accidentally using the wrong keymap? There is one that is delierately "Dvorak-unless-command-key-held", and you might have that on by instead of the proper one.

Not Timing, presentation (perhaps)

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember the commercial where, in a business meeting, a Techie makes a proposal, which goes down in flames; immediatly followed by a business dweeb making the exact same proposal, which is recieved with praise? The Techie objects, and it is pointed out that the business dweeb had "tented" his fingers while making the suggestion and that that made the difference.

Stupid, but it makes the point that sometimes the particular way something is presented will cause a very different response; it is just human nature.

I am sure the same thing goes for story submissions, unfortunatly.

N.B. I have been in the same boat re: story rejection.

Safari already has SLOW tabs

[localman]

Well, sort of. There are such a large group of people who don't want anyone in the world to have tabs that you'd think that tabs or anything like them were abhorrent.

But as far as I can tell any criticism that can be aimed at tabs can also be aimed at Safari's bookmark bar. Across the top of the brower there are a bunch of horizontal text buttons that let me select different documents to view in the same window. Or in other words, tabs.

The big differences are that the bookmark bar doesn't have the "tab look", it doesn't keep the page in memory, and to add one from a link you have to option-click, select "add bookmark" then click "OK". So they are basically a slow and inconvenient tab system. Although they are persistent across browser sessions, which is kinda cool.

Yes, I understand that they can't really be used efficiently that way, but that's not the point. The point is that as a UI concept Safari's current bookmark bar and the proposed (and much maligned) tabs are cousins anyways. So anyone spouting that tabs are an inconceivably bad UI design is just reacting to surface characteristics and religion

Cheers

Or maybe, just maybe...

[MohammedNiyalSayeed]

The whole slashdot method of story submission/rejection is an ineffecient means of running a "news site". Maybe, just maybe, it's prone to favoritism and the nuances of ass-kissing/benefit-garnering. Not that I'm pointing any fingers at anyone. It isn't my site, it's OSDN's.

Tabbed Browsing explicitly allowed in Aqua HIG

[frankie]

reading through their HIG to see if they warn against it.

I found information in Chapter 5 Section 14 (Windows With Changeable Panes), which leads to the exactly relevant Chapter 7 Section 13 (Tab Controls):

" The tab control provides a convenient way to present information in a multipage format. Tabs can display centered horizontally across the top or bottom edge, or centered vertically along the left or right side. "

Re:Tabbed Browsing explicitly allowed in Aqua HIG

[frankie]

Also note that use of the Brushed Metal look for Safari is explicitly discouraged in Chapter 5 Section 4 (Textured Windows):

" This window style has been designed specifically for use by--and is therefore best suited to--applications that provide an interface for a digital peripheral, such as a camera, or an interface for managing data shared with digital peripherals, such as the Address Book application. This appearance may also be appropriate for applications that strive to re-create a familiar physical device--the Calculator application, for example. Avoid using the textured window appearance in applications or utilities that are unrelated to digital peripherals or to the data associated with these devices. "

From these examples (not to mention QuickTime 5 Movie Player and many many others) we can see how much Steve Jobs cares about Apple's guidelines. Dogfood? What's that?

Re:Tabbed Browsing explicitly allowed in Aqua HIG

[GnuHaiku]

A few years ago, this most certainly would have been true. However, at this point, it would probably be ok to say that web browsers mimic the functionality of internet appliances, even if it the traditional view is that internet appliances mimic the functionality of web browsers. And Quicktime is one of the oldest applications to have a brushed-metal look, and its functionality is quite similar to that of a TV and VCR.

OT: Debugging under PB

[kwerle]

Let me preface this by saying that I have not done any Obj-C debugging in years.

The GUI debugger for PB is just a layer over gdb. It is unfortunate that it does the worst of both worlds: keeps you from having to learn gdb while hiding it's amazingly powerful features. As is the case with many GUI-less tools, gdb may be one of the most powerful debuggers there are - but the learning curve is damn steep.

Yes, it is possible to save breakpoints - you just have to edit your .gdbinit file. Does that suck? Yup, but that's how it is.

I hope that they do get around to integrating more of the powerful features of gdb with the GUI, but historically, this has been low priority. All the 'old time coders' know how to use the gdb commands and are used to it. It's really too bad.

The Safari Solution for Tab Fans

[Anonymous Coward]

Please try this and then tell me it's not ALL the convenience of tabs without breaking the single document / single window metaphor. I for one would be very pleased to see Apple implement this in a future release of Safari.

Step 1: Goto www.haxies.com and download the APE Manager and the APE Full Screen Safari and install them. This APE prevents new Safari windows from cascading. They will instead open exactly on top on one another.

Step 2: Download Pith and when you install it, set the preferences to sort windows by age.

Step 3: Set Safari's default window size by opening a new window and dragging it so that it's the full width of your screen minus the width of the Pith window (which you should position to the right of the Safari window). Now close that window to set it as the default size.

Ok now when your browsing you have the functional equivalent of a fixed window and down the right hand side a list of all open windows that are instantly accessible via a single click. When you open new windows, hold the Apple and Shift keys to force them to open in the background.

This is better than tabs in that even on my 1024x768 screen I can have +/- 30 windows open and still be able to read the names of the pages clearly. Just like tabs, if Pith is sorted by age you can group windows (i.e. under your original Slashdot page will be all the links you opened from it) and access them with one-click.

Please don't spend 10 minutes flaming this solution unless you've taken 5 minutes to try it for yourself. For me this is browsing nirvana at last.

Re:The Safari Solution for Tab Fans

[Anonymous Coward]

Other advantages to this method: If you have a group of windows open and need to quit Safari for some reason (like installing an update for example) - or if Safari crashes - when you relaunch it, Pith politely asks if you'd like the previous windows reopened. Woo-hoo!

In a browser that uses tabs, who has never accidentally closed a window when you meant to close only that tab, and lost all your opened pages? Won't happen with Pith folks ... this really is the better, more consistent metaphor.

Re:The Safari Solution for Tab Fans

[Anonymous Coward]

Please mod parent up ... this really works!

printing weirdness fixed

[margaret]

I had some very bizarre and frustrating printing problems that appeared sometime after I installed either safari or the 10.2.3 update. But right after I installed the new safari, they magically disappeared! Cool!

Re:Still no command-option-w support (OT)

[PetWolverine]

I am using the Dvorak-with-qwerty-command-keys layout. My complaint is twofold:

a) I had to use this instead of pure Dvorak because certain programs wouldn't recognize command keys at all otherwise, and

b) even with this layout, command keys are extremely inconsistent. As noted in my original post, Word still uses Dvorak command keys even though I have it set to qwerty command keys; HotApp behaves extremely strangely; and keyboard shortcuts that use the option key or other modifier keys in addition to the command key are inconsistent and in some cases broken.

Re:drag & drop and improved suppor

[tim1724]

This delay is exactly the sort of little things that make the Mac experience so much smoother -- provided of course it's adhered to consistently, which it always has been. This thing is thought out.

I have to disagree. Apple got it right the first time, back in System 7.x (I don't remember when it was that they first added this feature, but it was a long time ago). The "Mac experience" never included any "wait before dragging" until Cocoa.

I nearly always get my selection right. If not, I shift-click to extend or contract it. Or in an extreme case I click once to deselect the text, and then make my selection again. When using Cocoa apps, I always have trouble because when I try to drag my text, my selection disappears and I have to do it again. Even when I remember to wait, I still end up losing my selection half the time because I either don't wait long enough (there's no indicator of when enough time has passed!) or because my PowerBook's trackpad has decided that I moved my finger even when I don't think I did. (It's not as bad when using a real mouse.)

Do you have to wait for some stupid delay when dragging icons? Or images in the web browser? Or links in the web browser? No. So why have a delay when dragging text? It's inconsistent and annoying. I much prefer the Carbon behavior.

I love Cocoa ... I write all of my Mac OS X software in Cocoa. But this is one of the things which it does wrong. (It also has issues with text selection, but I can deal with those. It's the drag & drop implementation which bugs me.)

Sweet!

[Anonymous Coward]

Where do I get the Windows version?