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Too Good To Ignore — 6 Alternative Browsers

Posted by timothy on from the hit-the-internet-button dept.

bsk_cw writes "With the exception of Google's Chrome (which got attention because it was, after all, Google), most of the alternative browsers out there tend to get lost in the shuffle. Computerworld asked three of their writers to take some lesser-known browsers out for a spin and see how they do. They looked at six candidates: Camino (for the Mac), Maxthon (for the PC), OmniWeb (for the Mac), Opera (both the Mac and the PC versions) and Shiira (for the Mac)." It would have been more interesting if they included some popular open source, Linux-friendly browsers like Konqueror or Epiphany, as well.

9 of 291 comments (clear)

  1. Finally! by netsavior · · Score: 5, Funny

    Finally I can browse the internets on the Mac, it was the one thing missing from that experience...

    1. Re:Finally! by Mister+Whirly · · Score: 5, Funny

      And what about Gopher? Won't someone please think of the Gophers!

      --
      "But this one goes to 11!"
    2. Re:Finally! by guyminuslife · · Score: 5, Funny

      The only thing I ever use Lynx for is Googling how to configure X.org.

      --
      I don't believe in time. It's a grand conspiracy designed to sell watches.
  2. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  3. Re:aren't there only 4 engines? by danhuby · · Score: 5, Informative

    That's right, all current browsers use one of four layout engines, or derivitives thereof.

    Gecko (Firefox)
    Trident (Internet Explorer)
    Presto (Opera)
    KHTML (Konquerer, Safari via WebKit fork)

    Writing a layout engine is, I expect, very difficult so I'd say starting from scratch is only for the brave.

    There are other layout engines but they are generally not compliant with the latest standards, with the possible exception of this one (although it is in alpha):
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tkhtml

    There is more to a browser than the layout engine though.

    Dan

  4. No they don't by Roger+W+Moore · · Score: 5, Informative

    6 more browsers that all do the same things the mainstream ones do.

    Unless I've missed it there is one thing that none of them do as well as Firefox and that is block ads. The browser extensions like this are the one thing that, at least for me, puts Firefox head and shoulders above the rest.

  5. Re:Mac over represented? by Yvan256 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Opera is available as a download for the Wii (and was free for quite a long time), as a cart for the Nintendo DS (discontinued, but still) and as a built-in app/download (not sure which) for the new Nintendo DSi.

    If anything, Opera is the fourth on what should be the "top four".

  6. Re:Mac over represented? by cyber-vandal · · Score: 5, Funny

    About $500

  7. Not by stats by ThrowAwaySociety · · Score: 5, Informative

    It depends somewhat on your geographic location, but these days the breakdown is something like

    IE - 70-80 %
    Firefox 15-20 %
    Safari - 3-7 %

    Opera - 1% or less
    With some others thrown in.

    Opera is a fine and often innovative browser, but its share of the market is negligible. Luckily, it's standards support is good, so it works with the same pages that Firefox and Safari work on.

    Being the premier browser on a gaming platform doesn't do much for market penetration.