Omni Releases OmniWeb 4.5 Using Safari Engine

John C. Worsley writes "The Omni Group released version 4.5 of OmniWeb, based on Apple's WebCore and JavaScriptCore frameworks (the same KHTML-derived APIs that Safari uses)."

Comments

still no Pogo?

[boomerny]

I may be the only one wanting this, but there still seems to be no Mac OSX browser that is able to run Pogo games. Under 9 I could use IE, and it still works under Classic, but I prefer not to use Classic if I can help it. Oh well, just another gripe of mine.

Still no tabbed browsing

[Sick Dave]

When the hell will they add tabs? Everybody else is doing it, why can't OmniGroup?

Re:Still no tabbed browsing

[kingLatency]

They're waiting for eveyone else to jump off a bridge first. This is nonsense. I've met one person ever that didn't like tabbed browsing. Everyone else recognizes it for what it is, a very useful feature. Also, it's unobtrusive for those that wish not to use it. I think that if they added this, they'd get a lot more people to try (or come back to, in my case) to their browser.

Re:Still no tabbed browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

I've met one person ever that didn't like tabbed browsing.

Then you don't get out much. Use google if you must. Tabs are merely a poor substitute for a decent window manager.

Re:Still no tabbed browsing

[Onan]

And allow me the honor of being the next in a long line of people you'll meet who dislike tabs. They are a poor solution to the problem, and unquestionably implemented at the wrong layer.

If what you want is a single-gesture way of switching linearly through the windows in the current application, you want command-~, something all Cocoa applications get for free.

And tabs do have a cost to those who don't use them: the opportunity cost of the development time spent on them. Tabs don't implement themselves, and I'd almost certainly rather have whatever other feature those developers were creating instead.

Re:Not zactly.

[Elwood P Dowd]

Omni Group isn't exactly "the public" when it comes to NSprogramming. There may be features that they would like to implement that require reaching in and grabbing stuff inside WebCore and JavaScriptCore. They wouldn't have that option with WebKit.

I don't see why this would necessarily give rise to compatibility problems or bugs. The Safari and KHTML groups should keep both WebKit and WebCore updated just fine.

Has anybody used the product? Is it the vast improvement that we all expected?

Kudos for a good decision

[HotButteredHampster]

Way to go, Omni Group! IMHO, nothing can kill a small company faster than trying to reinvent the wheel. HTML rendering is a commodity. The public expectation is that it will happen correctly. Do it wrong (like OmniWeb used to with annoying frequency) and people will jump all over you. Let a bigger group/company do it for you and reap the rewards!

That way you can spend your developer time creating the application experience, which is where OmniWeb has excelled in the past and will continue to in the future. I expect to see great things, maybe great enough to make me part with $29.95!

HBH

Re:Why would I want to use this???

[jcr]

Why would I want to pay someone $29.95

There were three main reasons for me.

1) Cookie control. "Take the cookie and toss it when I quit the app" is a great thing.

2) Killing banner ads.

3) Showing me when pages have changed. Big time-saver for me.

YMMV, but for my money, OmniWeb would be worth $50, easy.

-jcr

Re:Looks good but..

[ihatewinXP]

"or Ill just wait for opera 7 for OSX..."

Youre going to be waiting quite some time. There is absolutely no room for another browser on the mac platform. I wish there was room for OmniWeb and I hope it suceeds - but Opera? Sorry but 1. its an ugly port and 2. they burned any credibility they had in the mac community when they bashed Apple for not licensing their HTML Engine.
And btw, mouse gestures can be added to any cocoa app (which OmniWeb is) just do a search for gestures on Versiontracker and im sure you will find it.

Re:Omniweb's Unique Features

[Mikey-San]

(2) Form Spell Check (I'm Soaking in it)

I write my posts, etc., in text editors first, and then paste things in. I find text editors are more stable (and manipulate text better) than Web browsers. (And OmniWeb does like to crash, you know.)

(3) Self Updating Bookmarks Through The Dock

What do you mean? Are you cluttering up your Dock with bookmarks? More info, please. :)

(4) Self-Fixing Bookmarks

I seem to recall typing "www.slashdot.org" for a bookmark and Camino asking if I wanted to redirect it permanently to "slashdot.org" once the URL resolved.

(5) Superior Cookie Management (Three Levels)

No more complex than Mozilla. Deny, accept, accept and discard at end of session. You can also whitelist/blacklist sites so you don't get cookies from anywhere you don't want to get them from.

(6) Programmable Address Bar Searches (Google, VersionTracker.. etc)

http://www.google.com/search?q=%s -- Create a new bookmark with that as the location and the title as "google". Type "google string" to search what you want from the URL bar, exactly like OmniWeb. Repeat for other sites with %s as your variable.

(7) Ad Blocking (And Yes OmniWeb Has Pop-up Blocking Too)

Hey.

(9) Extensive Source View, Edit, Publishing Capabilities

You haven't seen Hydra, I take it.

(10) Fully Voice Activated Interface and Link Navigation

Voice recognition sucks on computers, and you look dumb when you do it. Not a feature.

(11) Speakable Pages (Useful When Your Eyes Just Can't Read Anymore)

Other browsers do this, too, via the Services menu. Highlight text and click "Start Speaking".

(12) Browser Compatibility Settings

(13) JavaScript Compatibility Settings (Can Tie in or out With #11)

(14) JavaScript Bookmarklets

Don't even begin to pretend like other browsers don't have these features.

(15) Application Helper Settings For Downloads

This rocks harder.

(16) Network Activity Monitor (Similar to Mail.app's)

What activity are you monitoring?

(17) Much More that I'm Overlooking

Uh-huh.

I'm not saying Omni is a bad browser. It isn't. I used it for a long time, and loved it, but honestly, it doesn't have anything worth $30 that other browsers or programs have for free or less money.

Re:Omniweb's Unique Features

[Anonymous Coward]

You're not talking about searchable history at all. You're talking about URL autocomplete. The original AC was right: Safari has live, searchable history. It has a different sort of URL autocomplete from OmniWeb's.

In the future, please try to be more precise. It'll alleviate a lot of confusion if you refer to things by their proper names.

Thanks.

Re:Omniweb's Unique Features

[dwightk]

(2) Form Spell Check

Is not one of Omniweb's unique features... (at least all the forms can be spell checked for ME in Safari)