Submitted by The open source Firefox Web browser continues to grow in popularity. Discover new XML features for the fastest-growing Web browser, including XML parsing, XHTML, CSS, XSLT, SVG, and XForms. Additional third-party extensions provide even more XML support. Elsewhere, Firefox faces challenges as it matures, according to analysts.
Those issues that Symantec and so-called analysts are talking about are resolved in FF 1.0.7
Who writes these dumbass articles?
Challenges are what open-source folks live for.
Then why don’t they live up to one and create a slick, usable, and non-fat desktop environment? Or a Linux distro that works out of the box?
* cue the Ubuntu/SuSE/FC/etc. fanboys saying “______ worked for me”
“Then why don’t they live up to one and create a slick, usable, and non-fat desktop environment? Or a Linux distro that works out of the box?”
Because that’s largely the responsability of distributors. Distributors job idn’t simply rounding up all the software and putting it in one place. There’s is to cater to their respective customers, and their unique needs. And yes, for a lot of people the interfaces to pick from (try that with Windows?) give them the experience that fits them.
“* cue the Ubuntu/SuSE/FC/etc. fanboys saying “______ worked for me””
Are you implying that it doesn’t? Anyway Linux has come far and largely “works out of the box”. Even against the gold standard (Windows. Which is what most people who bring up the ‘out of the box’ argument mean) it does well. It’s not going to “work out of the box” for everything. But then again the gold standard doesn’t always “work out of the box” either. e.g. SATA drivers.
Then why don’t they live up to one and create a slick, usable, and non-fat desktop environment? Or a Linux distro that works out of the box?
Troll! – This thresd is about Firefox not about the Linux desktop. Firefox is a cross-platform web browser. It runs on Windows, Mac OSX, Linux and most Unix platforms. Go away and spread your FUD at least in a thread that’s about the Linux desktop – better still go away and don’t come back.
> * cue the Ubuntu/SuSE/FC/etc. fanboys saying
> “______ worked for me”
Are you saying it didn’t? Don’t be a tool.
BTW, most people can’t install Windows for the life of them. Windows comes pre-installed on most people’s computers… if your average computer newbies were forced to install it themselves, like most people do Linux, they’d just as, or even more, lost.
Don’t drink the kool-aid.
My mom’s friend’s son, who is 11, and an almost complete computer-noob, installed XP, along with his sound and graphics drivers. I though he did a pretty good job — though I still ended up tweaking a few things here and there.
Find me a Linux distro that works with my WiFi adapter, my X800 XT PE, my Audigy 2 with 5.1 digital output over the coax, my TV tuner, my nForce SATA RAID, my laptop’s graphics adapter … and so on.
“Find me a Linux distro that works with …”
How about we just drop this? After all, I can say exactly the opposite to you, Ubuntu works straight off for me, whilst XP makes me download drivers for both my sound and graphics, plus it doesn’t even install firefox (!).
What does this prove? Precisely the same as your example: nothing.
I’m not certain you realize the double standard you just demonstrated? “Out of the box” for most people means someone else did all the work. e.g. buying a pre-built computer or the ‘box’ has all the drivers and setup for the hardware.
But in your Windows example you had to get the manufacturers drivers for some of the hardware. e.g web site, or on a CD. That’s not what most mean by an “Out of the box” experience (Maybe several boxes? One for the OS. One for the video driver. One for the sound, etc.). Plus you ended up “tweaking a few things”.
As another poster pointed out. If you purchased your computer the same way most Windows users purchase a computer. Your “out of the box” experience would be the same.
SATA RAID? Whew! Let me get up off the floor. I fell off my chair you made me laugh so hard.
I bought an AMD64 computer with three SATA drives not too long ago. My brother bought the exact same machine at the same time. I installed Linux on mine and he tried to install Windows.
I was up and running in less than an hour. Linux detected my SATA drive “out of the box”.
On the other hand. My brother was unable to install Windows because the SATA driver that shipped with the motherboard was on a CD, but Windows only supports additional drivers during the install if they are on a floppy drive.
Guess what, nobody buys floppy drives anymore. At least not until they try to install Windows on a machine with a SATA drive and their drivers only come on CD.
Bottom line: Linux supports SATA out of the box. Windows supports SATA out of the box after you drive back to the store to buy a floppy drive and then drive over to your brother’s house to ask him to copy drivers off of a CD onto a floppy so you can install Windows XP.
Bzzzt.
Plain SATA != SATA RAID
DOS supports my plain SATA drives because of how the BIOS exposes the interface. SATA RAID is a different beast.
Of course, my response to this gets modded down -4 because Linux gimps can’t handle the fact that *oops* sometimes they’re wrong, and that Linux does not in fact support something very nicely.
Excellent groupthink efforts! Keep them up.
Well, perhaps that’s because your response was nothing but a childish troll?
I think most linux users who are in contact with reality is also aware of the fact that every distro sucks in one way or the other, just as Windows, OSX, BeOS, *BSD etc. does.
The mozilla/firefox developers has done a fantastic job transforming the slow ugly hog they had a few years ago into a terrific, easy to use, flexible product that both your geeky teenage neighbour and you grandmother can use.
I’m not saying it’s perfect. But it’s a proof that the open-source community can take on a challange and deliver a high quality product that competes with the industry leader.
Hopefully they will be able to do the same with Linux in the near future.
I might also add that I’m talking about the desktop.
In the server area has OSS proven itself over and over already.
<i
The mozilla/firefox developers has done a fantastic job transforming the slow ugly hog they had a few years ago into a terrific, easy to use, flexible product that both your geeky teenage neighbour and you grandmother can use.
I’m not saying it’s perfect. But it’s a proof that the open-source community can take on a challange and deliver a high quality product that competes with the industry leader.
Hopefully they will be able to do the same with Linux in the near future.[/i]
Mozilla developers != Linux developers.
Most development for the Firefox web browser comes from the Windows users.
And for the record, that “slow ugly hog” is now http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey“>faster and uses less memory than Firefox, and that’s *with* an integrated email client, composer, chat client, and address book.
Linux Is Poo, what the hell is wrong with you?
(That rhymes!)
Where in my post (first one) did I mention operating systems?
Firefox, like Opera, are multi-platform browsers.
Why did you even raise the subject of OSs into it?
The article is about Firefox and the challenges it may face in the future.
I merely brushed this article off as PR, because as an open-source software developer, we are used to challenges.
Its really sad that people like you feel this way.
Oh well, someone has to feed Microsoft and Symantec.
“linux is poo” is back! I missed your dumbass comments. Keep up the great trolling.
BTW, most people can’t install Windows for the life of them.
Sorry, I don’t believe that. Really, I don’t. I rebuilt a computer for a friend who doesn’t really know jack about computersand finds tabs too complicated to use. However, before I got around to bringing my XP disc to her house (hers was scratched) she had got one from a friend and just decided to try it herself and it worked. Really, installing XP is not difficult at all even for someone who doesn’t know what they are doing.
f your average computer newbies were forced to install it themselves, like most people do Linux, they’d just as, or even more, lost.
No kidding! I have been using Windows x64 and it’s as bad as Linux ever was. I’ve had to do things like recompile .msi installers, find exactly the right versions of Java and Eclipse, and use beta .NET frameworks.
Also weird issues with the motherboard drivers and things like needing to remove the firewall software before 3dmark05 can complete.
OMG, what is with all these articles? Is someone (I wonder who) trying to debunk Firefox’s merits? All of these articles have just been spinning the facts to get the “desired” result, it is angering. Oh yeah, I have a hate of marketing departments, can you tell?
Seriously, Firefox (and other browsers) are inherently more secure than IE due to their lack of ActiveX and direct ties to the Operating System.
“Seriously, Firefox (and other browsers) are inherently more secure than IE due to their lack of ActiveX and direct ties to the Operating System.”
I’m not certain that’s saying all that much. That’s like saying that our levee doesn’t have a big gaping hole in it, but ignoring the little finger-size holes that spring up. A security hole is a security hole regardless of how it comes about, and someone acting maliciously doesn’t really care about the differences. Plus need I remind you that while we don’t have ActiveX. We do have extensions. Presently no ones done anything bad with them, but I wouldn’t count on that staying that way.
from http://kb.mozillazine.org/Spelling_Firefox
“Firefox is spelled F-i-r-e-f-o-x – only the first letter capitalized (i.e. not FireFox, not Foxfire, FoxFire or whatever else a number of folk seem to think it to be called.) The preferred abbreviation is ‘Fx’ or ‘fx’.”
So stop writing FF.
I use Firefox over IE because it has better features, supports CSS better, and has some very useful development tools.
IE is feature-retarded, it’s CSS support is lacking, and if it has any development tools, they are lame enough to be completely overlooked.
To the fanboys, throwing around the term FUD is like crying wolf now. The term has been played.
If the security and usabilitiy benefits dwindle, then that’s less reason to switch to Firefox.
Mozilla has to make sure that the codebase remains somewhat accessible through refactoring or the open source benefits are gone.
Mozilla has to promote itself as more than just a browser, but as a crossplatform platform as well as making sure docs are good and developer sites – developers.mozilla.org.
Mozilla growth could easily stall, so fanboys crying FUD achieves nothing.
“analysts said”. Who are the ananlysts? What exactly did they say? How did they back up their ideas? This article is fluff.
On my Windows machines, I’ve already migrated:
Netscape -> IE -> Mozilla -> Firefox (in 2004) -> Opera 8.5 (yesterday)
Having been a satisfied Firefox user, I couldn’t understand why people paid to use Opera–thanks to Opera 8.5 becoming ad-free and freeware (beer) on 9/20/2005, I didn’t have to pay to find out yesterday.
At least on Windows 2000, Opera is more secure than IE and Firefox (for now), feels faster, and has better usability features (like the custom dropdown panel when you click the URL adress box and may more).
I modify about 5% – 10% of software I download so it isn’t ideal for me not to have the source code to Opera but the above benefits outweigh it. And frankly, I never bothered modifying Firefox and compiling it.
Maybe some other browser will come out within 12 months that’ll make it worthwhile for me to switch yet again. Maybe it’ll be Firefox 2.0 or IE7 (unlikely but possible). Who knows?
Opera easily imported my Firefox 1.06 bookmarks and automatically added my Firefox plugins directory. I switched primarily for security but was very pleasantly surprised at the improved usability in Opera.
Whenever Opera will become popular at the same level, it will have to deal with its own specific bugs yet to be discovered. It will be very interesting how Opera team will deal with these new unkown issues. Now that Opera is freeware, I will take time to bleed the rendering engine .
Given that most of Firefox issue are minor, this is just an example of active security instead of passive security like Microsoft do with its Internet Explorer.
I’ll mail a bottle of ice-cold Guinness to the first person that proves Firefox insecurities have caused them any problems at all. (Error 40 does not count)
And the IDN issue didn’t cause at least an inconvience for international users?
The one fixed within 20 hours by Red Hat and 7 days by Mozilla Foundation? Meanwhile look at IE
http://www.dwheeler.com/blog/2005/08/06/
… rocks! Firefox 1.5 (Deerpark Beta1) is a bit more finicky about correctly written SVG than is AdobeSVG, but it’s nice to have the native support at last. Granted not many people are posting SVG on the web yet, but for mozilla based apps, this makes for a real advancement.
So, I forget, when was IE going to support SVG natively, or will it be several years behind the times as it was with tabbed browsing?
I don’t think it matters. IE still doesn’t support Flash but the plug-in is free and easily installable so people do it. All an competent webdesigner has to do is place a link saying “If no image appears install [u]this[/u]”. And since in XHTML you can nest media and if the top-most media fails then it proceeds to the next one IIRC, this should be no problem.
Lets just hope that Adobe keeps the plugin (1) beer free, (2) security hole free, (3) respectable resource requirements, and (4) easy to install and the problem will solve itself.
I’m sure there are tons of people who want flashier webpages which should drive adoption alone. (not to mention of course more legitimate uses. I could googlemaps using it for bandwidth reasons alone.