Slashdot Mirror
PC Magazine Reviews Firefox, Opera
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."
Mozilla, Opera and Firefox, from my unscientific perspective, seem to load web pages quicker than IE, but what really bothers me is how slow the mozilla opera and firefox load times are. I can either get to the web quickly with IE, or wait a while with firefox for a minute page load time diffrence.
IE 6.0 got a 4 out of 5 on their reviews site. Click on "more reviews" and it lists all their reviews.
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.
our site was roughly 95% internet explorer 4 months back...we've started plugging firefox fairly often(has to be repeated - people that use IE are too slow to get it the first time, no?) and it's now at 30.3% moz/firefox users.
isn't FUD usually just speculation and half-truths.
All the recent stories concerning IE's horrible security have been demonstrably true.
my pet machine
I read an article on the register that indicates for the first time in ages Internet Explorer has gone down in usage "For the first time since Microsoft saw off rival Netscape in the 1990s Internet Explorer's virtual stranglehold on the browser marketplace has loosened. IE's share decreased slightly from 95.7 per cent to 94.73 per cent in the month up to 6 July, according to Web metrics firm WebSideStory." Baz
There was a recent Slashdot post discussing a PC World report that IE's market share has decreased 1% in the past month.
Has anyone been tracking Firefox/Mozilla in the User-Agent stats for a large site to see if it is truly pulling browsershare from IE?
Well, when I linked to a little-viewed page on my site (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.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
If there's one thing that I couldn't fault IE on is the fact that it actually displays pages pretty fast.
I switched to Firefox a little less than a year ago and let me tell you the difference then was incredible. After I got used to the new UI everything was smooth sailing. The only complaint I had about it back then (.7 at the time IIRC) was that, compared to IE it was a little sluggish when loading pages. However this was fixed in .8 and keeps getting better and better with each new version. The only complaint I have now is that some webpages will only work properly in IE. (I know it's not Firefox's fault but it's still annoying.) However there is an extension you can download that will add an "Open link in IE" option to the context menu which makes this problem a lot easier to cope with. All in all I say go for it!
Chaos reigns within.
Reflect, repent, and reboot.
Order shall return.
it's a very nice thing to use a browser built on a framework which allows you to decide for yourself which components you want active. Obviously you can turn off Active-X and other IE only stuff, but it's annoying that something so easily exploitable is there, on by default, and used by website designers designing for IE. Basically, the thing overlooked by the review is that Firefox is, to some extent, everything to everyone (so to speak); it can be lightweight, it can be feature filled. IE is... well, it's IE. it's buggy, non-standards-compliant software.
In my book gets 4.5 stars. But the java/javascript errors that come up constantly are a bitch and a half.
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.
The BBC are running a similar story too:
The only issue I had initially with FireFox and Mozilla is how slow they seem to load picture-heavy sites such as www.cnn.com
// This one makes a huge difference. Last value in milliseconds (default is 250)
// Change to normal Google search: q =");
// Instead of annoying error dialog messages, display pages:
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
"To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield." - Tennyson
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.
Simply Accounting. Of course, since this depends on ActiveX controls, it really *does* depend on IE -- PureTracks just says it does, because their DRM can be bypassed by any other browser.
First off, you shouldn't totally uninstall it, else you lose access to Windows Update. Sure you can use the auto-update, but you lose a lot of control that way, and you won't get access to the non-critical patches that way.
On top of that, the benefit of freeing up the drive space IE requires is not worth the headahce of trying to remove the damn thing, especially since part of it is built into the OS. Instead, if you have the Service Patch installed, you can use the Control Panel uninstall, which simply removes access to IE. At least it'll keep IE "out of sight, out of mind..."
This is not the greatest sig in the world, no. This is a tribute.
...just want to point out that it's just a Google text ad in the toolbar. Completely unintrusive, and after two days unnoticeable unless you happen to be bored and want to look at what it's saying (which ranks up there with reloading /. on ways to waste time effortlessly).
Work is punishment for failing to procrastinate effectively.
Firefox has this (Tools, options, privacy, cookies, exceptions) and the prompt for cookies allows always accepting cookies from the site (adds the site to the Exceptions list).
Has anyone been tracking Firefox/Mozilla in the User-Agent stats for a large site to see if it is truly pulling browsershare from IE?
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.
This annoyed me too. But then I found Cookie Culler, an extension.
happened a couple of days ago for the windows build (with the shell: exploit) a few hours later there were already multiple(3) ways of updating(2) or disabling the feature (1)
Artists against online scams http://www.aa419.org/
as another poster said, this has been fixed, and if i remember correctly from the coverage on slashdot the other day, it's really an OS (Windows) issue. Moz. on other OSes wasn't affected and all browsers using the shell support suffered from this. Publicizing this as a Mozilla flaw is clearly just grasping at straws to try and drag Mozilla down. And the fact that there's already a fix for Moz. speaks highly for the developers.
NERDS!!!!
Try loading a huge page (say 2MB of HTML or so) in Firefox. Verrry Sloooow. Also, javascript can be sluggish.
Opera has an option to start where you left off last time, Mozilla has the Session Saver extension.
And if that happens, where is the security update infrastructure to ensure everyone gets patched?
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.
Erm, Domino Web Access (previously called INotes) works just fine with Firefox. I use it everyday. Your Notes admin most likely needs to update your mail template to the latest version.
I've always equated FUD with the use of disinformation to gain a competative advantage by invoking fear, uncertainty and doubt in the public about your competitor's product. In this case:
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=
Let me explain: We'll take the browser word as all of we are thinking, ie. a program that displays/navigates webpages. Web pages are HTML, transferred to the browser using HTTP. HTTP is a "defined" standard, and it marks as REQUIRED the compliance with some other RFC docs, one of them being the URI definition doc, in which is allowed the proto://user:pass@site/path that MSIE disabled in one of the latest 500 patches. Let's do some 1-1=0 MSIE doesn't support http, and then it shouldn't be called browser.
If you like CrazyBrowser, you really should be using Maxthon (formerly MyIE2):
;) And it's updated constantly.
http://www.maxthon.com
It's like SUPER CrazyBrowser
Use the extension MozEx, which allows you to select which apps launch when you click on a link.
by Paul Roub
http://texturizer.net/firefox/extensions/#ieview
Version: 0.8
File Size: 22 KB
Updated: 2004-06-15
Adds "View page in Internet Explorer" links to the content and link context menu. Handy for previewing pages in IE, loading up IE-only pages when you run across them in Mozilla, etc.
You mean just like at update.mozilla.org?
FF has an image zooming extension but AFAIK it won't scale text and images automatically.
"...personality goes a long way."
--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 in Opera and Mozilla. Here's a comprehensive article on how to manipulate the User Agent strings.
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
Umm... find out a little more about what the browsers are doing.
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 on Dave Hyatt's (Moziila/Apple developer) weblog.
What's the frequency, Kenneth?
"That's not a feature that is unique to opera. I know for a fact that IE can do it and I am fairly certain that FF can do it as well. "
c ities/ca n/pages/CAON0512.htm
Actually having the option is not the same as having a speedy implementation of it. I just tested all three browsers.
I changed IE as you suggested. With firefox I used preferential to change the cache check_doc_frequency to never.
I then ran a series of web pages in each then stepped back and forward with buttons. Results:
Opera seems like you are flipping a static image cache it is that fast. No hesitation absolutely instant.
Both IE and FF have noticiable delay, you can see the items drawn on the screen. In one page they took a long time. Firefox was the slowest and still seemed to be loading. Perhaps the option doesn't work.
This page was quite slow on both. All pages lightning on Opera.
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/weather/
If I had to guess, I would say opera is caching pre-rendered pages, while the others store files but render when you load the page.
Whatever the reason, my original point remains, Opera is an Order of magnitude faster with cached pages. It is not contest. Once you get used to INSTANT, you can't go back.
Try this: create a page with a hidden layer
Um... layer tags aren't standard HTML. It is a Netscape invention. So, this is one place where IE does the right thing. See here
Let me just add that BSPlayer is an amazing program that runs much faster and easier than any current Windows Media Player version (admitedly, I have no problems with the 'unsupported' WMP 6.x but you can't get that from Microsoft anymore). I'm surprised more people on the Windows platform haven't heard it. In addition to a wide variety of features like subtitles, surround sound, faster seeking and... well actually I'm not very good at remembering which features WMP also has. But here's something really cool... BSPlayer can play incomplete files fairly well. That's right, corrupted downloads or badly compressed video is no longer a problem... as long as you have the appropriate codecs installed (still a necessary evil to install them manually, Gregorian Knot helps though)... you can view it. Even from unfinished P2P.
Having just pronounced my love for BSPlayer, let me just say that an open-source application named VideoLAN plays incomplete files even better than BSPlayer, but it falls short in many other areas. I believe it's original purpose is to view streaming media off of a network.
Until about a week ago when i was introduced to Firefox. Here I'll give my opinions based on years of browsing and although I've used virtually every browser out there from lynx to safari I primarily use IE and have for the last several years so I will compare Firefox to it. As I've read other posts comparing speed, I find both of them render comparably fast, are compatible with roughly the same media and are basically equal at this level. People complain about the load times compared to IE but I really don't notice it that much, and there is none with tabs, they're very fast. I was skeptical at first and it still has a few annoying things I don't like but they're fewer than what I do so I'll list them first:
/. i'm looking at right now.
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.
Neither Netscape Navigator v3 nor v4 had tabs. Not even Mozilla had tabs in the beginning.
Oh, and Opera doesn't have tabs. Opera has true MDI, which is a gazillion times better.
One thing not mentioned in the reviews is that, while both browsers allow the user to change the reported user-agent string (Firefox through an add-on extension), only Firefox does this correctly, while Opera reports the user-agent you specify, PLUS Opera as well.
To make Firefox render pages faster than IE, start by typing "about:config" in your FireFox address bar. Look for nglayout.initialpaint.delay and set it to 0 (zero).
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.
"You should never doubt what nobody is sure about." -- Willy Wonka