Mozilla Firefox 3.0, best Fx to date!

[Mike Smith]

This came up earlier and thought I may as well make a thread about it. For those of you unaware, Firefox, is a web browser like Microsoft's Internet Explorer or Netscape's Navigator.

So what makes Fx (abbreviation for Firefox) any different? One word; Security. Last year, Internet Explorer was considered in an "insecure" state 284 days out of 365. Firefox, about 9 days, and then a patch was released to fix the problem. You can read more on that at Wikipedia's Firefox Page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox#Security).

Firefox also is widely supported by the community with add-ons and themes you can apply to the browser to change the way it looks, feels, and functions. I also think it has a very clean and easy to use interface, haven't found anyone who cant say the same yet.

One extra thing it does for you, that is something new I've seen in browsers, is its own built in spell checker, which is VERY useful on forums like this or anything else you may need to type something out in. It's just like working in a word processor, when a word is misspelled, it will be underlined in red and you can right click it, which gives you a list of suggestions, or, you can add it to the dictionary so it doesn't come up misspelled again!

So for those of you willing to make the switch, check out Firefox's Page (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/) and download and install it, I'm sure you'll love it.

btw, if you worried about losing all your IE favorites, upon installation, Fx gives you the option to import settings from IE including home page and your favorites.

Update:

While we're here talking about security, I think I'll make a note on how to keep your windows installation up to date (for those of you running windows of course). This should be relevant for all of you running Windows 98 and up, with IE version 5.5 and higher I think it is, any lower and windows update will not work properly.

The easiest way to keep windows up to date, is running what's called "Windows Update (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_update)" (Wikipedia's explanation of it) , a service provided to all legit copies of Windows from Microsoft and will download all the latest patches and fixes for Windows and/or other Microsoft applications (including Office).

In order to do this, simply open up IE, yes will ONLY work using IE and only thing I personally use IE for, and go to http://www.windowsupdate.com/ . From there, you can select either Express or Custom. Express will go ahead and get all the "High Priority" fixes and allow you to install those, while Custom will give you choice of which updates to install and also access to get driver/software/hardware updates.

Automatic Updates (accessible through your computer's Control Panel) automates this process if you're running Windows XP and will download and/or install these updates for you at any time you like.

[Jim Clark]

Firefox all the way. A satisfied user for the past year and a half. I'll also mention its companion mail client, Mozilla Thunderbird. Outlook hasn't worked worth a ---- for a long time. It's amazing how many inconveniences computer users have become accustomed to because of unreliable applications. Imagine how rich Bill Gates would be if his stuff worked consistently...

[Mike Smith]

Imagine how rich Bill Gates would be if his stuff worked consistently...

I'm sure he's rich enough no matter how his applications are doing nowadays! He has still got windows, and now windows Vista (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/) is out, which has some very mixed opinions ranging from "awesome" to "worst os since windows ME". Personally, I have tried RC1 of vista (haven't had the time to finish installing the final build) and must say, there's a lot of "eye candy", but not a lot past that. Have fun finding drivers for it, and you'll really hate attempting to find drivers for 64 bit vista:mad:

On Thunderbird, I do hear a lot of great things about it, when I decide to stray away from webmail services I will definitely be using Thunderbird
, but I like the idea of bringing my mail box with me everywhere I go.

[Kam Markworth]

Wow, I didn't even know Firefox 2.0 was out. I just upgraded and like the new features. Spell check is great for boards like this!

[Mike Smith]

Wow, I didn't even know Firefox 2.0 was out. I just upgraded and like the new features. Spell check is great for boards like this!

If you really want to be on edge, you'd grab 3.0 alpha :p

From what I hear it's mostly internal (code) improvements, but the layouts the same, not sure exactly though, haven't tried it out myself!

[Steve_M]

I use firefox-based Flock for posting to webforums because its integrated with Photobucket, so I can manage my images conveniently. Flock is on V2.0 as well and you can use most of the Fx extensions.

The only issue I had with it was the lack of browsing history but they've put a limited list under the Go menu now.

http://www.flock.com

[Mike Smith]

The only issue I had with it was the lack of browsing history but they've put a limited list under the Go menu now.

http://www.flock.com

by that you mean of flock or the browser?

[Steve_M]

flock IS the browser :) Its a customised version of firefox.

[Mike Smith]

flock IS the browser :) Its a customised version of firefox.

oh.. i thought flock was just an add-on/extension..

[Steve_M]

install it and have a play with it maybe? :)

[Mike Smith]

I'll think about it ;)

[Richard Prowse]

Why does it say 'All cookies cleared!' when I log out? Do we all get different 'farewell' messages? Down Here (NZ) cookies are generally called 'biscuits'.
Is it possible to change the farewell to 'All biscuits cleared!'?

[Ken Smith]

Why does it say 'All cookies cleared!' when I log out? Do we all get different 'farewell' messages? Down Here (NZ) cookies are generally called 'biscuits'.
Is it possible to change the farewell to 'All biscuits cleared!'?

Richard, maybe you should do a search and give us all the world wide possibilities for this clearing. Maybe in the UK it's 'Muffins'?;)

In New York it's probably something like 'all junk cleared'...:confused:

[Richard Prowse]

Richard, maybe you should do a search and give us all the world wide possibilities for this clearing. Maybe in the UK it's 'Muffins'?;)

In New York it's probably something like 'all junk cleared'...:confused:
Maye you should just list the ingredients.
'All gluten, flour, milk, peanuts and butter cleared, after 45 minutes in an oven!'

[Mike Smith]

I just discovered this extension by the name of iMacros for Firefox. This add-on lets you record repetitious actions and save them so you can just simply run the macro, and let it run lightning fast without you having to do anything :)

I find this useful when checking email, because there are a few different providers I check, so now, I simply open up a new window, run the macro, and a few seconds later, I can view all my emails, without having to enter in any info at all ;) I had to play around with it at first to figure out how to work it, but now, seems fairly simple :cool:

Same thing goes for checking various forums, simply open up a new window and then begin running the macro, a few seconds later I'm all logged in and good to go.

Only issue I see with it is that if your macro requires multiple tabs, you must open the correct number of tabs first and be sure the first tab is focused before running the macro, other than that, I love this extension :D

[stan haskins]

hey Mike (or any other tech-savy person) -

Do you have any idea why Firefox would delete itself? I'm running OSX 10.4 on my wife's MacBook, and we've installed Firefox four times now. It keeps deleting itself on shutdown.

Not interested in browsing tech sites (spent too much time doing it in the 90's) -

Stan

[Tim Bishop]

hey Mike (or any other tech-savy person) -

Do you have any idea why Firefox would delete itself? I'm running OSX 10.4 on my wife's MacBook, and we've installed Firefox four times now. It keeps deleting itself on shutdown.

Not interested in browsing tech sites (spent too much time doing it in the 90's) -

Stan


Stan, do you have Spyware software installed and scheduled to run routinely? :confused: If so, it is possible that Firefox (among other "considered" threats) is Quarantined until you re-boot. Upon that time, anything Quarantined is most-likely deleted. ;)

[Mike Smith]

I'm not really sure as I'm not familiar with Mac systems really... I don't think it would hurt though to try a Google search somewhere along the lines of 'Firefox uninstallation on reboot of Mac OS X.' I also wasn't really aware that Macs got spyware/viruses too often either..

[Robert Prowse]

It's nice to have the weather but is it just me or is firefox slower and has hiccups ...

[Steve_M]

Not for me - I used Firefox for general webbrowsing and Flock for forums.

[Robert Prowse]

Download latest explorer update! Then tell me firefox is better!

[Steve_M]

Download the latest Firefox update and then install some of the free browsing plug-ins. :) IE still doesn't compare.

[Mike Smith]

Download latest explorer update! Then tell me firefox is better!

IE7? Yes, there have been improvements, also, if you haven't noticed, they ripped a lot of things straight from firefox, such as the tabbed interface or even the rss feed icon. And as far as security goes, IE7 IS more secure than previous versions, but it's still much easier to get malware through IE than it is through firefox. If you haven't had problems in the past with either IE or Firefox, then your safe browsing habits will provide security in its own in which case, it really doesn't matter which you use, as long as you like that choice.

[Benjamin Bates]

I have firefox, but my lecturers at Uni prefer Safari, that one wasn't on your poll, but I find it quick and easy to use.

[Mike Smith]

I have firefox, but my lecturers at Uni prefer Safari, that one wasn't on your poll, but I find it quick and easy to use.

yes, I probably should have added Safari to the list, considering it's the default browser on most Mac machines nowadays (i sometimes just forget all about mac users). Safari is pretty similar in Firefox though, has many of the same useful features such as the tabbed interface and integrated spell checking. Prefer Safari over Firefox? I guess that's up to you, At this point, I'm pretty much Firefox for life :)

[David Powell]

hey Mike (or any other tech-savy person) -

Do you have any idea why Firefox would delete itself? I'm running OSX 10.4 on my wife's MacBook, and we've installed Firefox four times now. It keeps deleting itself on shutdown.

Not interested in browsing tech sites (spent too much time doing it in the 90's) -

StanStrange indeed. I have been running Firefox on my Macbook since I bought it in August '06. It is OS version 10.41. There might be some incompatible software somewhere else in the machine that conflicts, but on my machine Firefox and the Mac OS have had no problems at all. I still use Safari for network use because it allows file sharing through the browser, but for general internet use I use Firefox all the time.

The only disadvantage to Firefox is that there is no version for OS9 for those times when one want to boot up some nostalgia.

[Mike Smith]

Just thought i would mention, recently, i felt like the current firefox updates haven't been doing it for me, and performance was being hit severely. I took the risk of grabbing firefox v3 release candidate 2, and i must say, the improvements are great. First thing you notice, is its performance. Lately, regardless of my 2gb of ram and overall beast of a computer, firefox would lag while opening several tabs simulataneously, but after installing the beta version of firefox, my problems have gone away. Give it a try if you feel like you've been let down lately with the fox as I have :p

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/all-rc.html

[Mike Smith]

Firefox v3 is now officially out and had 9 MILLION downloads in its first 24 hours of being released... the count is almost up to 12 million.

http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/

they got so many downloads that it actually crashed their servers. http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/browsers/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=208700161