Web Browser Wednesday
It’s been a year and a half since Mozilla shipped Firefox 3 Alpha 1, and what we saw initially wasn’t very breathtaking. For this first milestone release Mozilla focused on backend improvements that would, in the long run, make the browser a better competitor in a world that is largely dominated by Internet Explorer. Fast forward to the final release of Firefox 3 yesterday and we’ve got ourselves a rich browser that I believe Firefox users will embrace with open arms.
Firefox 3 has its sights set on Internet Explorer as it comes barreling through with over 15,000 updates. There have been enhancements to performance, stability, rendering, security, bookmarking, and much more that makes this the best version of Firefox yet. For the first time we’re going to list out all of Firefox 3’s best features for those of you who are jumping on the bandwagon for the very first time, and we’ll even take a brief look at the browser’s performance.
–Table of Contents–
In this article we’re focusing on several different aspects of the Firefox 3 browser, and we thought it might be easier for you to navigate if you had a table of contents. Here are the main topics that we’re going to cover:
–Themes–
One of the most frequently discussed aspects of Firefox 3 is the fact that it ships with a handful of different themes that are all customized to the operating system you’re using. They’ve got one for Vista, Linux (varies depending on distribution used), Mac, and Windows XP. Each one focuses on trying to make the browser appear as though it was designed specifically for that operating system. There is, of course, some debate as to whether Mozilla succeeded in doing so.
Firefox 3 themes, from top to bottom: Vista, Linux, Mac, XP
The theme changes go beyond just a few changed icons, too. As you can tell in the screenshot above there are some rather drastic differences between each of the themes. A good example of that is the address bar and search box which have rounded corners on some operating systems, and don’t on others.
As you begin to dive a little deeper you’ll notice that the OS-specific skinning impacts more than the browser’s main window. Everything from the settings to managing bookmarks have all been designed to fit in with the general appearance of your operating system.
–Performance–
We’re not going to dive deep into the performance realm today because that’s something we plan on exploring more in the future. One thing that we can say is that the performance hasn’t changed much since our last extensive test, especially in the memory usage department. Firefox 3 still knocks the socks off of the competitors when it comes to minimizing the amount of memory it uses.
But you know darn well that we won’t move on without giving you some sort of benchmarks. We decided to see how Firefox 3, Opera 9.5, and Safari 3.1 do on the SunSpider JavaScript test. We left Internet Explorer out of this because it is pretty much the only one not claiming that it has significant JavaScript speed improvements. Here are the results from the three browsers running on Windows XP (a smaller number is better):
What’s interesting is that on Apple’s Safari site they say that “it executes JavaScript up to 4.5 times faster than Firefox 2 and up to 5 times faster than Opera 9.” While that may have been true at one point, I think they’ll need to be updating their facts. Although you know darn well that they won’t admit defeat to Firefox 3. 
–Security–
Security is normally one of the main ways that people try to “sell” Firefox to their friends and family. They talk about how vulnerable you could be if you’re not using Firefox, and it looks like this will continue to be a selling point even in Firefox 3. Take a look at some of the new security features it brings to the table:
- Enhanced Web Forgery Protection: Firefox will try and block any sites that are infested with malware (example site), or are trying to compromise your confidential information through a phishing attack (example site).
- Antivirus Integration: After you download a file Firefox 3 will automatically scan it using any antivirus software that you have installed on your computer.
- Vista Parental Controls: I wish Mozilla got around to integrating with Vista’s parental controls a little better, because the only thing Firefox 3 will honor are any download restrictions that have been established. That’s nice and all, but website blocking is something most parents are probably concerned about more.
–Usability–
While Firefox 3 has a lot of improvements that are constantly working behind the scenes, there are also some great things that you’ll want to start taking advantage of right away. Here are the main features that you surely don’t want to miss:
- Enhanced Address Bar (a.k.a. Awesome Bar): The address bar has received one of the biggest overhauls, and it now uses an intelligent algorithm to determine which results you’re likely looking for. It uses a combination of the recency and frequency of your visits to figure out what belongs at the top of the list.
- Better Download Management: The download manager in Firefox was revamped a bit, but what’s more important is that in the Status Bar of the browser you can now keep an eye on how much longer your downloads have. Plus you can resume your downloads after you’ve restart the browser.
- “Remember My Password” isn’t so annoying: I absolutely hate when a browser asks you if you want it to remember your password before you even have a chance to see if what you entered was correct. I use different passwords on different sites, and now with Firefox 3 it will popup with an information bar along the top of the browser asking if I want it to remember my password. What’s nice about that is it doesn’t interrupt the page from loading, which means you can actually see whether the login credentials you used were correct before having Firefox store that information in its database.
- Simplified Bookmarking: Bookmarking a page is now as simple as clicking on the star located in the address bar. If you click the star a second time it will let you edit details such as the name of the bookmark, the location, and even any tags that you think will help find it in the future.
- Smart Bookmarks: The Smart Bookmarks are kind of like the automatically generated music playlists that applications like iTunes create. These special bookmarks can show a listing of your most visited sites, places you recently bookmarked, and more. We’ve even put together instructions on how to create your own Smart Bookmarks in Firefox 3.
- Full Page Zoom: By default when you go to zoom in and out on a website it will now zoom the entire page instead of just increasing or decreasing the size of the text. This is more like what the other mainstream browsers do, but you can always go back to the old way of “zooming” only the text if you want.
–Developers–
There are also some great things that developers of websites and extensions alike will want to take advantage of. Here are some of my favorites:
- Offline support: Firefox has the ability to take a website offline so that users can still interact with it even when not connected to the Internet.
- Web-based protocol handlers: We’ve already shown you how Firefox can integrate with online services (here and here), and hopefully there will be more web applications looking to take advantage of this feature.
- Animated PNG graphics: Could this be the thing that drives animated GIF’s into the grave?
- Several new XUL elements for extension creators: Now add things like date and time pickers to your extensions.
- And much more!
–Conclusion–
Firefox 3 is undoubtedly a next generation browser, and I’m anxious to see how well this version can compete against the other top-dogs out there. Let us know in the comments what you think of it, what your favorite features are, and when/if you plan on making the leap to Firefox 3.
P.S. Keep an eye out for next Wednesday’s CyberNotes as we show you some tweaks that can help make the browser even better.
Made the leap at RC2 – loved it so much I installed it on all my machines. This is the best browser hands down. It’s so easy to use and a huge improvement on 2. Love it.
Opera copy.
Enhanced Address Bar (a.k.a. Awesome Bar) – Stolen from Opera
Simplified Bookmarking – Stolen from Opera
Smart Bookmarks (most visited) – Stolen from Opera (Top 10)
Full Page Zoom – Stolen from Opera
Animated pngs – Opera has them already…
Sometimes personal experience reveals different results from tests. I refer to the SunSpider JavaScript test. Firefox may produce better results in the test, but while running some JavaScript applications I find Opera 9.5 to be faster.
Same thing for RAM usage. Initial tests showed Firefox 3 beta5 using less RAM than Operan 9.5 beta2. Well, again based on personal experience, both on startup and after 2 hours of browsing Opera 9.5 final uses less RAM than Firefox 3 final.
Overall, the buttons and menus responsiveness, as well as mouse gestures in Opera are faster than in Firefox.
I’m on WinXP with 1GB RAM.
They have got a lot of improvements to do before I download FF3. Have gone back to the old FF. I might even give Opera another go and see if they have improved the IE link with MSN groups. Although the FF3 has updated its IE tab it still has a lot of improvements. Its like a test drive car without the radio, lights, horn and heater.
Opera might have had some of those things before Firefox, but Mozilla took some of those features to a new level. For example, the Smart Bookmarks can be customized so that they serve different purposes other than just the most visited. And the Address Bar searching I find to be a little more useful than Opera’s full-page search.
I’m not quite sure how the simplified bookmarking stolen from Opera?
Huh, Firefox 3 uses less RAM than Opera 9.5 for me. Must vary depending on the computer, and my test is on Vista.
I can’t get FF3 to “automatically scan downloads with any antivirus it finds on your machine”. Of course, I can’t tell if it’s *found* my antivirus… I’m using AVG8.
I thought maybe Download Toolbar was getting in the way, so I disabled it, downloaded a file, checked AVG’s log… and it’s not been scanned. There’s no setting in FF3 that I can find, probably as it’s “automatic”. Is there a list anywhere of packages that it definitely works with?
ryan
are you going to do the same thing for firefox 2 with the 200 addons for firefox 3.i think you 300 addons for firefox 3
i think you mentioned 300 addons for Firefox 3
firefox 3 world record —over 7 million
For me Opera has better RAM usage than FF3 does, running Vista SP1 with 2GB of RAM. I think it might just depend on the system your using.
Firefox 3 certainly looks like a new generation browser. How much you like it will depend on your browsing preferences and habits.
My experience with Opera is not a good one; mainly because it doesn’t render my favorite sites well. Having this main disadvantage, I won’t use it, having better options available like Firefox or Flock.
After using Opera, Firefox and Flock, I’ll pick Flock social browser without any hesitations whatsoever.
for those of you who are experiencing memory problems i think you will find that it is your extensions that are causeing the memory leaks
i think you will find that Firefox notify s AVG whether AVG takes any notice well that’s another matter
and at last check the download count was at nearly 7.6 million
Crucial addons don´t work in FF3!
Tab Mix Plus, ColorZilla, FEBE, Google Browser Sync, ImageShack uploader, Switch Proxy Tool, URL Fixer, Megaupload SX, just to name a few I miss now!
I regret I installed FF3 now as these addons helped me in my work!
I understand it´s not Mozillas´ fault but I believe you understand that FF3 is not working for me.
Real Player’s plugin doesn’t work either. It’s unbelievable to me that Real Networks didn’t bother to upgrade its plugin for the 2nd most popular browser on the planet.
Oh, well.
I’m currently debating whether I would rather use Opera or Firefox as my main browser. Opera is so powerful, so useful, and so efficient in everything it does right out of the box, while Firefox requires add-ons to really be useful for me.
I guess the debate will continue for myself on my site. I have both FF3 and Opera 9.5 installed, and love them both…I’m on the fence right now though as to which one I want.
Maybe I’ll forget both and go with IE. Hahahaha!
Firefox 3 downloaded 14 million times on download.com
The best way that you can see this happen is by downloading a larger file, and watching the download manager. Where it normally shows the speed/duration left on the download it will be replaced with a “scanning for viruses” message once the download is complete. If the file is too small it may happen so fast that you won’t see the message.
I’m thinking about it.
It really just depends on what browser you’re more comfortable using. If you have to install a lot of extensions to get the same functionality that’s included in Opera you might be better off just using Opera.
That is the total number of downloads for Firefox over all time on Download.com. In the last week alone they only have 73,000 downloads.
Back to Fx2?!
What kind of improvements are you looking for?
I certainly love the much improved performance, the awesome bar (such a time saver!), the new “Remember My Password” method and the simplified bookmarking with tagging!
Awsome adress bar, Browser loading page before saving any login (Uname And pwd), Bookmarks handling, DL feature and devTools are yet present in Opera.
Bookmarks and speed-dial synchronization are very handy in Opera.
But I agree this release is a step ahead for FFox.
Still not as professional as Opera in handling multiple Imap/Pop mail accounts, still working like a lego to build with its extensions not embedded in the browser itself, this release is anyway a super alternative to IE.
But for serious professional reasons, Opera stays the framework of my internet experience.
Enhanced Address Bar (a.k.a. Awesome Bar)?
a.k.a Awesomely Stupid Bar. What is the point showing the “name” of the bar and the address? You never need that and it looks like a mess. When you are typing an address you know damn well what site it is referring to even if those names arent the same. Also it does not put the plain address top of the list. I mean if I write “cybern” to the address bar the list is as follows?
[cybernetnews.com]
[cybernetnews.com]
[cybernetnews.com]
Even IE can always put that [cybernetnews.com] to the top of the list because that is the most used one no matter what is the last visited.
Opera users always seem annyoed that Firefox takes there ideas, but i think as “The Times” said, “Firefox made most of those features mainstream as the “average” user only ever see IE and thats it”.
I see it this way, If firefox took more of the sharemarket from Microsoft its good for Opera and other web browsers. Take parts of europe Firefox owns 28% of market already
Do you mean the bookmark name? I generally put a lot more info in the bookmark name (and tags) than the URL contains. By also showing and searching for the name, it can return a lot more results that might apply to what you’re looking for. I find that these days I hardly type in the address anymore, just the name or type of thing I am looking for. I love that option.
Yeah, true, that annoys me too. It should put more emphasis on the top level/directories (and not pages).
By the way – for you Opera users, in Opera I wouldn’t be able to search for “cyb news” and get a result. In Firefox I will, so I think Firefox didn’t just copy, but also improved and thus innovated slightly. You should applaud Firefox for taking it mainstream. Besides, I’d see this as a huge compliment towards Opera.
It will learn what pages you visit the most, and put those toward the top. So if you visit our homepage more then it will start placing that as the first result. It also looks at whether a particular page is bookmarked and give more weight to those.
I’ve just entered “cyb” in Op adr.Bar, and a plenty of Cybernet entries and levels were proposed, with others. Why would you want to put “cyb news”, Ryan? I must have missed something.
FFox is the great browser for average surfing users. No doubt.
It wouldn’t have 14 millions downloads if it was not.
But, question of taste and experience in my professional daily use, Opera just fits my needs, and I admit the buit-in e-mail client is one of these important points, along with instantaneous loading, starting dialog and overall never a trouble.
But FFox is great in its aiming, no doubt.
I’m not Ryan but you probably meant to respond to me. In this case, you remember that the site was called “cybernetnews”. Imagine that you visited this site as a new user, and a few days later you think “hmm, what was that site with ‘news’ in it again?” and you type “news”. If you visit a lot of news sites, you’ll likely get tons of results. So you remember “ah yeah, it had something with ‘cyb’ in there too”, so you type ‘news cyb’.
You get the exact result in Fx3, but in Opera you’re forced to search Google. This is more useful with sites without such a distinctive name as Cybernetnews of course, that was a very simple example. What’s important is that Fx’s interpretation of the “query” in the location bar is smarter, thus returning better/more results.
jacques wrote: [quote]Why would you want to put “cyb news”[/quote]
I bookmark many cybernetnews news, and with Firefox3 i can find right cybernet news easy, i can type like “cybernetnews acid test”, and i more likely see all right cybernetnews bookmarks i have.
1. Developed at the same time.
2. Where has Opera the single click bookmarking UI? Oh wait, there isn’t.
3. Don’t know
4. True, Opera had this first. Guess that makes it stolen then.
Plain wrong. The APNG proposal comes from two Firefox developers.
Get your act together and stop being a fanboy. You are just hurting the image of Opera. Btw, I use Fx 3 as my primary browser, but I also think Opera 9.5 is just fine.
ff3 only uses 2megs and under of ram for me because i use firefox ultimate optimizer.
@Change
Yes. You’re right. It was me missing something, and i clearly see what you mean. But this feature is present in an other way in history. (finding a forgotten site name). (Op may keep up to 5000 entries). Though I don’t use this very often. Almost never, in fact.
But for sure it’s handy for those who need to retrieve smthng.