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Firefox Browser On An Upward Trend
carbolic writes "The Firefox browser is ramping up as fast as Internet Explorer is ramping down. According to these stats posted from the Engadget logfiles, IE has dropped to 57% of all browsers used to visit the site, while Firefox is up to an amazing 18%! The Engadget stats reflect an early-adopter consumer crowd and backing those up, this chart from w3schools shows the same trend. I guess CERT's recommendation and a mature product are finally paying off for the Mozilla project. Less than 2 years ago, IE had a 95% lock on the market. Anyone else see a trend here?"
The logfiles for a single site can hardly be used as proof of an overall trend throughout the Internet.
Microsoft's site can probably claim higher numbers of IE users.
RedHat's site can probably claim lower numbers of IE users
But you have to give the developers time to update their extensions/themes for the new release. Yesterday, the only one of mine that worked was AdBlock (the best one) and then today there was already an update for FoxyTunes - so the work is getting done, you just have to be patient. :)
Yes. Look at recent changelogs: They're patching /potential/ vulnerabilities and removing ambiguities to make it harder to annoy/confuse people. They're doing this BEFORE it becomes a big problem. Microsoft may know the potential exists, but they wait until their entire user base is up in arms before releasing an update. The Firefox folks notice the potential and head it off. Because of the whole "there are daily builds" thing, likely you'll see patches merged for any serious exploit within a few days, ready for enterprising people to download. And if you don't think average people go for nigthlies: at least with Firefox official releases are damned frequent, not once every six to eighteen months, as with IE.
I want my Cowboyneal
It's obiviously a challenge, but considering that most IE vulnerabilities are linked to the tight coupling of OS and browser (and the stupid ActiveX), Firefox offers fewer points of attack for the l33t hax0rs to poke holes at. Yes, there will be vulnerabilities, but I expect a lot fewer than with MS products.
All Mozilla/Firefox now needs is a good update system. Normal users have already been teached by MS that everything magically gets updated via Windows Update. Not so with the browser - if they use something other than IE.
Yes, advanced users hate autoupdates. So what, they can always be disabled. Firefox and Mozilla need builtin autoupdaters that at least point the user to a page when a new update is available. Or preferrably just go ahead and do the update by default. That way people can browse safely even as new exploits crop up.
The problem is, Firefox people will go read the site, there by pushing the points up more.
Most IE users (that I know) are pretty much ignorant when it comes to browsers.
Ah, but be fair, it's not at 1.0 quite yet.
~~~~~ BigLig2? You mean there's another one of me?
This has been discussed on many /. threads regarding firefox ... The main reason for extension incompatibility between point releases is that Firefox hasn't yet reached the 1.0 release mark ...
... your criticism would have been relevant for Firefox 1.+ ... but not now
Meaning
Never underestimate the power of idiots in large groups
> Normal users have already been teached by MS
Who teached you your english?
On a more serious note, I'd have to agree that firefox seriously needs an automatic update system that doesn't invalidate a user's extensions.
Me email iz skyewalkerluke at microsoft's free email service.
No, by this logic two slashdot polls showed the number of Linux users double you could claim Linux was gaining on Windows.
RTFS!
Sindri Traustason.
What helps for me so far (100% score until now): If you find an IE-only website, make a screendump of what the website looks like in FireFox, and mail it to the sales- or marketing-dept of the company. You can be sure they contact their developer/ site-maintainer about it.
If you contact the "developer" directly, you can end in a yes/no battle about W3C, so get to the guys with the money instead
"Honey, I feel a certain distance between us..." "Really? A 31ms ping ain't that bad..."
Are you serious? In fact the potetial loss rather the control over the dominant client platform. Just think a bit about what you get with proper completely cross platform GUI rendering engine with nice development bindings and wide install base. Just take a look on this .
Is it right? Not?
if that be the truth, then the mozilla folks should market firefox as a developers release, instead of pushing it to all users. I mean, Firefox is the first thing you notice when you arrive at mozilla.org. You shouldn't treat Firefox as a polished app, and then pull out the old "it's pre version 1" speak when critcism abounds. It only frustrates users.
if that be the truth, then the mozilla folks should market firefox as a developers release, instead of pushing it to all users.
:-P
It's the truth, and it's pushed as a "Preview Release" and a "Technology Preview". So they should expect about as much as a public beta version of IE from it.
You shouldn't treat Firefox as a polished app, and then pull out the old "it's pre version 1" speak when critcism abounds. It only frustrates users.
Yeah, and it frustrates people with insight of the Firefox status if people whine about pre-1.0 software that's released for preview purposes (says so right on the Mozilla.org front page).
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Just goes to show you - all you need to do to defeat Microsoft is to release something better. And release it for free.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
True, the loss to MS is zero in ONLY the browser space. In other spaces, the loss may be FAR greater.
Microsoft didnt make IE out of the goodness of their hearts, they paid staff, millions of hours of development time, a court case with the DOJ, to get this "free" browser out. And we know MS doesnt give things away unless they are either goign to earn profit somewhere else, or to prevent loss occuring somewhere else.
going back to 1996/1997, Microsoft realised that Netscape, the dominant browser at the time, were slowly morphing from "Just a Browser" into something that together with Java resembles an OS. It was a platform that allowed applications to be delivered over the net, making the core OS irrelevent. Have a look at archived docs about Netscape's Aurora, and you will understand why MS was scared.
Secondly the Java & HTML can be developed by MOST students for free. You only needed a Text Editor, a paint package and a freely obtainable JDK. There is no relatively "simple" ways to create windows applications for free. This was the reason why Microsoft gave away Visual Basic Active X edition for free, to get people less intrested in Java, and create More MS centric solutions.
Therefore dont assume that there is no value to MS from Internet Explorer. It is core to them. They only got a bit of a breathing space because fo the Dot Com bust, didnt create as much intrest for Web Applications as originally thought.
Obligatory Mastercard Parody:
- development time: 10000 Man hours
- Cost of development: $1million
- Sending SP2 free to anyone who asks: $1 per CD
Mahing the Windows/Office/Visual Studio triopoly maintained, and seeing Netspace and many other compeitors ground to dust - PRICELESS.
Have a nice day!
Wouldn't web developers be most likely to use IE. After all, if it is the most used browser (perhaps still >90%) then it is in a company's best interest to make sure their website works properly in IE and not spend time making things working Mozilla if it works find in IE. There was much discussion on this regarding the lack of IE PNG alpha blending support.
I'm not saying this is a good thing, I'm just saying it seems to be the business attitude. There isn't much financial benefit in spending time to make their website compliant with a browser that has 5% market share if the site is fine in the browser with 95% market share. I do find this shortsighted though, since Mozilla/Firefox could be the dominant browser in, say, 6 months for example. Then all these companies would need to re-do their websites at extra cost so it would have been cheaper to make it compliant in the first place.