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Firefox for Intel Macs Planned for March
daria42 writes "Although there are unofficial builds already available, Mozilla will release an official version of Firefox for Intel Mac OS X in March, developer Josh Aas says. There are only a couple of minor bugs to work through, such as Flash and Java support."
A file named "Please Spread Firefox.kext" has been located in the pre-release versions.
Is it so difficult to toggle them off already?
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
Looks like the trolls have bitten even at the first post.
Aaaaanyways, what I was actually going to say was that it shouldn't really matter that much, speedwise, whether or not there is an OSX86-native binary of Firefox or not, what with all of the good speed tests I've read. Either way, that's a pretty darn good schedule for *any* piece of software - completely up to date with totally new hardware within 2 or so months.
Congrats to the Firefox team!
"We are targeting the official release of Firefox for Intel Mac OS X in late March with the Firefox 1.5.0.2 update," Mozilla software engineer Josh Aas told ZDNet Australia.
One thing I enjoy about Free Software organizations, but especially Mozilla, is that they give plenty of information about their release goals and we can trust them. After all, we can just download the nightly files and make our own, or check on the progress.
It would be interesting to see a comparision of target dates set by companies, and see how well the initial target date was met. Microsoft vs. Apple vs. Mozilla vs. Opera for instance.
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Stop Sparky's brain from being probed by Bush
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Flash and Java support are NOT minor bugs.
Camino is seriously a lot nicer gecko for mac than firefox. It actually integrates with OS X and it uses Cocoa. From a usability standpoint is much further ahead.
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Go canucks, habs, and sens!
Anyone know what sort of performance hit there is running the current Firefox release under Rosetta? I mean, do the Flash ads stutter or anything? I'm assuming it would be a better browsing experience than I currently get on my iBook (G3/600).
This guy's the limit!
I'm really disappointed in the PPC version of FireFox. It's slow and chews up RAM. I've gone back to Safari, however am underwhelmed by the lack of ad-blocking plugins. PithHelmet is OK, but something like the AdBlock plugin for Firefox would be much nicer.
I hope it's faster than the PPC version, because that's the main reason I'm still using Safari as my primary browser.
I have a feeling that the slowness has to do more with Aqua and Cocoa then with the processor.
Why make a Mozilla for x86 Macintosh and a Mozilla for PowerPC Macintosh? Make a universal binary, that's what they are there for aren't they? I mean relying on rosetta for a few things like flash and java can't be that big of deal, it's not like the bottleneck in a browser is the browser itself, it's more commonly the pipe feeding the browser. Isn't the point of Rosetta that Mozilla Firefox as it stands now runs just fine on a MacBook or iMac regardless of the proc under the covers?
Also most of the user community doesn't care that at 10.4.4 there is a version that runs on an Intel processor and a PowerPC Processor, so when we download trying to decide between Mozilla Firefox for Macintosh OS X (PowerPC) and Macintosh OS X (Intel) isnt' something we should have to decide. The ability to make univseral binaries is there, why not take advantage of it? Why create yet another file the world has to mirror and worry about which is the right one?
Just a thought.
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
Why is the beta release this kind of "under the table" beta release from one of the developers? It seems like it'd be a better idea to make the build they have now more widely available in a more prominent spot, especially considering the scarcity of x86 Macs at the moment. Is the problem one of public perception of releasing (even a beta) of a product that's not feature complete? Will there be a more official beta before the march release?
AccountKiller
no one is going to be stupid enough to blow a ton of cash on overpriced Apple x86 hardware.
One would blow a ton of cash on a so called overpriced hardware if they make a ton of money fixing cheaply made x86 boxes that come with a security hole ridden OS.
If you didn't want things like Flash, you wouldn't be buying a Mac anyway.
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http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/new-for-you/t op-sellers/-/pc/all/pc/0/1/1/1/104-6461076-7991161
A bigger growth market is, by far, offering a version for Java-based phones (e.g. Opera Mini) and for Pocket PCs.
I know Mac users are desiring an official release, but will Macs outnumber phones and PDAs?
It's not just a question of speed. If I'm interpretting the what-Rosetta-won't-support statements from Apple correctly, translated PPC apps running embedded Java applets will not run on OSX86. The archetypal example of that is a web browser using a Java runtime environment. That makes an Intel-native version of Firefox necessary to maintain compatibility with a bunch of web-based apps and a fair amount of website candy. You can grouse about how horrid Java applets are, but it's a "failed" item on the capatibility checklist, which is Not A Good Thing for everyone's favorite cross-platform browser. (And it's another nail in the coffin of IE:Mac, which will never be distributed in Intel-native or universal binary format.)
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
"There are only a couple of minor bugs to work through, such as Flash and Java support."
I knew it that Flash and Java support were bugs all along.
how about some linux builds for 64-bit.
It has been statistically shown that helmets increase the risk of head injury.
You've got a Slashdot username. You have a preferences page. You have a checkbox labelled "Apple" just begging to be unchecked. Seriously, if you don't want Apple stories, just turn 'em off and stop complaining. There's a reason why there's a lot of Apple stories at the moment anyway - it's Macworld, so you'd expect maybe just a little more focus on them?
And tomorrow the stock exchange will be the human race
Try using Privoxy.
It is a *great* ad blocker. It works as a transparent proxy, so it will work with any browser. It is available for OS X, Windows (which I use) and various Linux distributions.
Its funny how for years people have been petitioning Macromedia and now Adobe for and amd64 version of their flash player and have only weeks ago been told in a developers blog that amd64 is unofficaly planned after the flash 8.5 release for Linux x86. I am curious about Java though, I thought apple provided that in their OS.
Two new Mac models are announced and Firefox with plugins is a priority. Meanwhile, AMD64/EM64T platform users can't run a native Firefox with plugins under any OS, with no ETA at all for that ability.
Yeah, that's exactly it. Never mind the fact that "desktop Linux" requires you load GTK, Qt, and god knows how many other libraries because everyone insists on using some obscure package nothing else uses. Never mind the fact that there aren't teams of developers optimizing all the code that runs on startup (unlike, say, Apple and MS). Never mind the fact that virtual memory management in Linux is good enough that it hardly affects anything from a usability standpoint. Never mind the fact that you can set up a lightweight WM that cuts out the fat.
And if programmers upgrade every six months, why are so many Linux packages still i386?
If only MS would optimize windows's shutdown crap. Shutting down a domain controller takes AGES.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
I have no clue if it's available or not, but I always recommend Opera for old/slow/low resource machines.
The Mozilla project didn't have the resources to maintain separate ports for Mac OS 9 and Mac OS X. They switched from CFM to Mach-O in order to get much better performance on Mac OS X, but since Mach-O binaries can't run on Mac OS 9, support for that OS had to go.
If you think you can back-port Firefox to Mac OS 9, go ahead. Don't expect anyone else to help you, though.
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Hmm..i guess if you're basing your judgment of obsolescence purely on 64-bit versus 32-bit processing. Let's take the topic of this thread stick to it, Firefox is not going to be obsolete because of the lack of 64-bit processing. Neither are a host of other programs.
In fact, benchmarks suggest that 64-bit processing is slower for certain applications. However, put the benchmarks aside and just look at the market today, there are as many 32-bit desktops being sold as 64 and no onee is calling them obsolete.
You need to make your purchase decision on what you're going to use the laptop for. Personally, I'm a hobbyist photographer, hobbyist programmer and full time network engineer. The many features of the MacBook will incresae my efficiency and let me do my full time job. I will not suffer for lack of 64-bit processing.
Take a look at what you need, if 64-bit on a laptop is what you desperately need, then please hang on until next year!
So IE:Mac needs another nail?
There's plenty enough nails in that coffin already, surely.
But there is no (recent/decent) Opera version for OS9. For classic I'd recommend iCab 3 beta - it's pretty usable and passes Acid2 test.