Browsersphere

I’ve been doing my best to keep my finger on the pulse of the browsersphere over on Twitter, but you know you’re not getting the real deal until we go “around the browsersphere.”

General

• In addition to needing an editor (”sometimes you a specialist”), Macworld may need to take a look at the latest browser market share figures.  They mention Chrome almost in passing while covering what some of the alternative browsers do better than Firefox and Safari.
• At a WebKit hackfest recently, some improvements were made to context menu handling, including the ability to hold the CTRL key while right-clicking to see the default context menu instead of any custom context menu provided by the current website.  Additionally, some include- and linking-related improvements were made to decrease the overall WebCore build time, which should come as good news to those 80 active WebKit committers.
• Avencius has some interesting thoughts on the competition between Mozilla’s Firefox and Google’s Chrome and suggests that, despite their lead in browser market share, the Mozilla folks should be worried.
• Some videos from Add-on-Con feature representatives for Chrome, Firefox and Safari and delve into topics such as browser security and mobile add-ons (via Dan Moore).
• Royal Pingdom takes a look at what 2010 has in store for the browsersphere.

Chrome

• In a LinuxCrunch review of the Linux version of Chrome (via Slashdot), it is touted as being “stable and fast,” but downsides such as lacking extension and RSS support are mentioned as well.  Additionally, there’s an interesting note about a KDE-related bug that Google has opted not to fix.

Firefox

• An article at TG Daily (via Digg) calls Firefox “clunky-looking” and says that the news Firefox 4 may not ship until 2011 “comes as some embarrassment for Mozilla.”  It goes even further to claim that Microsoft will now have a “clear advantage” over Mozilla and “bit-players” Chrome and Safari.
• An RC1 build of Fennec, the mobile version of Firefox covered here recently, was released tonight.
• You can get a feel for some of Mozilla’s plans for Firefox in the coming year over at Mozilla Links.
• If you long for the good-old-days of Netscape, you’re crazy the new Rebrand add-on may be right up your alley.
• If you’re experiencing some jumpiness with YouTube videos, The Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog has some tips on fixing the problem.
• Daniel Glazman has some thoughts on how notifications in Firefox could be improved.
• If you’re one of those “Danger is my middle name” types of folks, you can already start testing multi-process plugins in Firefox on Windows and Linux.
• As you may have heard, Firefox 3.5 is “the most popular browser in the world.”

Internet Explorer

• Tweak Internet Explorer with IE Tweaker.
• One Betanews reader wants Microsoft to “release [an] HTML5 and CCS3 compliant IE9 by June with a radically new UI.”
• FavBrowser.com points us to some videos from IE9’s JavaScript engine team, namely John Montgomery, Steve Lucco and Shanku Niyogi.

Opera

• In its coverage of Opera’s added support for CSS3 Transitions and 2D Transforms in the pre-alpha build of Opera 10.5, CSS3 . Info mentions that “Opera is the first browser to offer support for Backgrounds and Borders without the need for a vendor prefix, with Firefox and Safari still requiring ‘-moz’ and ‘-webkit’ [respectively].”
• With the pre-alpha release of Opera 10.5, Anne van Kesteren says “we are getting a little better at this iteration stuff.”
• A couple of articles (via Slashdot), Opera 10.50 Unveiled: Opera Is Once Again the Fastest Browser on Earth and Opera 10.5’s new Carakan Javascript engine is fast – Google Chrome fast, go into detail about the impressive performance of Opera’s new Carakan JavaScript engine (which I’ve mentioned here a few times in the past).
• True to form, Opera Watch has a solid rundown on Opera 10.5 pre-alpha as well.
• In reporting on Opera’s State of the Mobile Web report from November, TechCrunch relays that Russia is the top country for Opera Mini usage, but that usage is really growing in Asia and Africa.
• Even though I think it’s a cool feature (which admittedly takes some getting used to), FavBrowser.com lends a hand to those who want to turn off Opera 10.5’s tab thumbnails in Windows 7 (I’m sure this approach works for Safari as well).
• The Opera Core Concerns blog provides some details on Opera’s native support for JSON, including performance comparisons against the other main browsers.
• In Carakan Revisited, improvements made to the Carakan JavaScript engine over the previous Furthark engine are discussed, mainly focusing on garbage collection and caching.  The post also touches on some of the plans for future improvements.
• A New Year’s Eve post unveils a newer pre-alpha build of Opera 10.5 and discusses Opera’s new support for HTML5’s <video> tag.
• Introduce yourself to mouse gestures in Opera.
• If you’re excited about the pre-alpha builds of Opera 10.5, you can show it off with some wallpaper.

Minor Players

• SeaMonkey 2.0.1 was released as a security update this month.
• Now that Avant has been listed as one of the browsers to appear on Microsoft’s browser ballot screen, they need translation help.
• One Maxthon user thinks the browser is so cute that there should be a Windows 7 theme based on it.

There’s a lot more to cover, but that should hold you over until 2010.

Happy New Year, everyone.

Tags: 2D Transforms, Add-on-Con, Add-ons, Africa, Alternatives, Anne van Kesteren, Asia, Avant, Avencius, Carakan, Chrome, Comparisons, CSS, CSS3, CSS3 Transitions, Daniel Glazman, Delays, Development, Digg, Fennec, Firefox, Firefox 4, Furthark, Google, Google Chrome, HTML5, IE Tweaker, IE9, Internet Explorer, John Montgomery, JSON, Localization, Macworld, Maxthon, Microsoft, Mouse Gestures, Mozilla, Multi-process, Netscape, Notifications, Opera 10.5, Opera Mini, Performance, Reviews, Russia, Safari, SeaMonkey, Shanku Niyogi, Slashdot, State of the Mobile Web, Steve Lucco, TechCrunch, Twitter, Vendor Prefixes, Videos, Wallpapers, WebKit, Windows 7, YouTube

Whoa.  Has it really been like eight months since the last time we went around the browsersphere?  Not good.  I guess we should do something about it…

General

• Lifehacker recently put the major players through some browser speed tests after some boasting by the Safari 4 folks.
• In Mobile Browser Wars, Ed Hansberry takes a look at the browser alternatives available for mobile devices (via Web Browsers News and Reviews).
• Ten Web Browsers that You May Have Never Heard of covers iRider, Lunascape, Ultrabrowser and Shiira, among others.

Avant Browser

• Avant Browser 11.7 Build 22, which appears to be a minor release, was released back on the 26th.

Camino

• Camino 2.0 Beta 2 was released back on the 27th.
• If you’re interested in the Camino schedule, get updated.

Chrome

• Read about improvements in the spellchecker used in Chrome.
• It is believed that extension support is coming to Chrome this May (via Web Browsers News and Reviews).
• See the first screenshots of Chrome running on Mac.
• Full-screen browsing has come to Chrome, but apparently doesn’t live up to the way the feature is supported in Firefox and IE7.

Firefox

• Daniel Glazman takes an in-depth look at monetizing Firefox extensions.
• A new mascot, Foxmosa, was recently added to the Mozilla family.
• Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog discusses the Firefox 3.1/3.5 release schedule and how advancements in other web browsers’ JavaScript engines have impacted the schedule.
• Some interesting file uploading ideas came up at a recent Firefox design lunch.
• Jesse Ruderman sheds some insight into the issues surrounding “continuous integration,” which from what I can tell involves how and when code is checked in and how build machines and tinderbox displays are impacted.
• John Slater, Creative Director at Mozilla, is looking for an intern.
• Take a look at the Mozilla Community Calendar.
• Firefox 3.0.7 was recently released.
• At first it was under consideration, and then the decision was made to version the Shiretoko release of Firefox, formally versioned as 3.1, as version 3.5.
• Here’s a granular look at the type of minor performance improvements that eventually make a web browser faster overall.
• Gotta love bugs that are simply titled things like “Make location bar autocomplete faster” and “Make location bar autocomplete even faster.”
• There is a call “for new Web apps that can help people make a difference while browsing the Web.”
• Is Firefox faster on Windows or Linux?
• Firefox is dominating in Antarctica.

Flock

• Apparently the Flock folks thought Flock would make a good Valentine’s Day gift?  Personally, I’m glad I didn’t heed their advice for my wife’s gift this year.   Though, it looks like the Flock folks weren’t the only ones with this bright idea.
• “People using Flock’s Eco-Edition conducted 80% more searches per user as compared to Flock’s overall population of users.”

Internet Explorer

• The Cost of Internet Explorer attempts to track all the “wasted time and effort” on the part of web developers trying to make websites compatible with IE.
• IE8’s Compatibility View explained (and a recap).
• IE8 Beta testers are making a difference.
• It’s not every day anymore that you see browsers like Internet Explorer 4 and 5.5 mentioned.
• An IE8 Reliability Update has been made available for Windows 7 users (like myself) who are using IE8 (unlike myself).
• It looks like the IE team will be pretty busy at MIX09.
• Check out a video that goes into detail about IE8’s new rendering engine (via Robert O’Callahan).
• Here’s a comparison between the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of IE7.
• Is the codename for IE9 “Triton?”
• Sarah Dutkiewicz wonders why Microsoft is held to a different standard when it comes to bundling IE with its operating system, Windows.

Maxthon

• Check out a chromed-out Maxthon icon.
• I think MaxthonGuy and I may have reached some kind of virtual truce.  That is, until the next time the madness reappears over at his blog.
• Learn how to use the custom search feature in Maxthon (via Maxthon Resources).
• A new version of Maxthon 2.5 was released recently.
• At least one Maxthon user is frustrated that his favorite browser isn’t included in the browser reviews found in PC magazines, etc.

Opera

• Avencius’ coverage of the Opera 9.64 release uncovers some details about some platform-specific code that should make Windows users’ browsing experiences more secure.
• Opera unveiled Opera Turbo last month at Mobile World Congress 2009 and it was later discussed at Opera Watch.
• Take a look at a speed comparison between the browsers developed for the Nintendo DS and the DSi.
• Similar to my recent post about various web browser vendors claiming ‘First!’, Choose Opera touches on the topic of whether it matters who developed a feature first or not.  Then, the very next day, they answered their own question.
• Opera Fingertouch is “a technology designed to make interacting with the Web easier and simpler on touch-based devices.”
• Apparently there is a demand out there for making Opera look like IE7 (via Daniel Glazman).
• Check out the Carakan FAQ for more information on Opera’s new JavaScript engine (via Opera Watch).
• Combining Opera with a touch UI.

Opera Mini

• Armenia, a country with around three million people, saw its Opera Mini usage grow by 2800% last year.  See this and other interesting statistics in the State of the Mobile Web report (via Choose Opera).
• “Yahoo! is expected to begin distributing Opera Mini via Yahoo! Mobile and also as a standalone download from Yahoo!’s mobile Web sites in the near future.”

Orca Browser

• The first build of Orca Browser 1.1, Build 1, was released back on the 25th.

Safari

• Avencius’ review of Safari 4 Beta is a very positive one, and some details regarding branding of the new JavaScript engine are ironed out in the comments.

SeaMonkey

• Read a draft of the new SeaMonkey vision (via Mozilla Developer News).
• SeaMonkey 2.0 Alpha 3 was released this past week.

Skyfire

• Skyfire 0.9 Beta was released back on the 12th.

There was a lot to cover this time around, and there’s much more I haven’t yet covered.  Hopefully that means we’ll see the 13th installment of “Around the Browsersphere” sooner than November.

Tags: Add-ons, Avant, Avencius, Beta, Bugs, Camino, Carakan, Chrome, Compatibility, Compatibility View, Daniel Glazman, Design, Extensions, Features, Firefox, Flock, IE7, IE8, IE9, Internet Explorer, Internet Explorer 4, Internet Explorer 5.5, iRider, Jesse Ruderman, John Slater, Linux, Lunascape, Mac, Market Share, Mascots, Maxthon, Maxthon 2.5, MaxthonGuy, Minor Players, MIX09, Mobile, Monetizing, Mozilla, Nintendo, Opera, Opera 9.64, Opera Fingertouch, Opera Mini, Opera Turbo, Orca, Performance, Releases, Rendering Engines, Safari 4 Beta, Schedules, Screenshots, SeaMonkey, SeaMonkey 2.0, Security, Shiira, Shiretoko, Skins, Skyfire, State of the Mobile Web, Themes, Touch, Triton, Ultrabrowser, Windows 7

Since my last installment of Around the Browsersphere was posted back toward the beginning of May, there’s simply way too much going on to get all caught up without breaking things up a bit.  Therefore, this eleventh edition will focus solely on the “minor players,” or the web browsers not named Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera or Safari.

Avant

• There’ve been about four builds (builds 17-20) of Avant Browser 11.6 released in the past month.
• The Download Blog recommends Avant Browser for “XP users who want a Microsoft-based engine but think that Internet Explorer 7 is a pain.”
• A commenter at Lifehacker points out that Firefox 3’s new fullscreen mode is old news to Avant users.

Flock

• A Mac OS X user moving away from Firefox was pleasantly surprised by and subsequently switched to Flock.
• The Flock blog has announced support for a “deeply localized” version of Flock for German users.

Konqueror

• Linux Hater’s Blog, which I was referred to via Ben Goodger’s blog, rips into some of the usability shortcomings in Konqueror.
• Ruben Schade wonders why the evolt browser archive doesn’t include past versions of Konqueror.
• An Ubuntu user is trying to figure out how to clear Konqueror’s find file history.
• Tork allows you to browse anonymously in Konqueror (and other browsers?).
• Someone thinks that the folks who are triaging Konqueror bugs are contributing to more bugs being fixed than opened in KDE recently.
• Karpion is a Konqueror add-on that “utili[z]es the Open Phishing Database to provide the user with information and tools that help protect against phishing.”
• Someone thinks IE gets something right that Konqueror doesn’t…but that’s about all said person has to say.
• A site called Echoes explains how to add new web shortcuts in Konqueror.
• In a review of Konqueror 3.5.9, the same site calls Konqueror “the great Swiss knife.”
• Over a month ago, Konqueror got support for crash session recovery and session management.

Maxthon

• A sometimes-on-the-verge-of-incomprehensible blog (case in point) suggests that Maxthon is the mathmatical equivalent of IE added to Firefox.
• Maxthon’s CEO, Jeff Chen, has been quoted as saying that they are working on porting Maxthon to Linux (via Maxthon Blog).
• One user thinks Maxthon may be a good browser for translators.
• Another user thinks Maxthon and Firefox have different core goals.
• Someone created a Maxthon logo in “cool” colors.
• There’s a list of requested features from Maxthon 1.x that aren’t in Maxthon 2 in the Maxthon forum.
• Here’s some information on where you can go to chat with fellow Maxthon fans/users.
• Here are some interesting opinions stated as facts, if you’re into that sort of thing.
• Rod Trent was counting down the days ’til he could stop using Firefox 3, but he has enjoyed using Maxthon.
• This blog suggests that Maxthon is the best alternative to Internet Explorer.
• Here’s a friendly discussion on the differences between Maxthon Classic and Firefox 3 and Maxthon 2 and Firefox 2.

SeaMonkey

• The SeaMonkey team has started having semi-weekly status meetings.
• SeaMonkey 1.1.10 was released last week.

Others

• In a request for feedback on Avant, someone mentioned Deepnet Explorer, which claims to be “the world’s first browser with RSS news reader, P2P client integration and phishing alarm.”
• Orca Browser, which has been covered here previously, appears to have resurfaced a week ago as a form of Avant utilizing Gecko 1.9 – the same rendering engine used in Firefox 3 – as opposed to Avant’s use of the Trident rendering engine from Internet Explorer.
• Web Worker Daily points to the Off By One Browser, which has “a footprint of about a megabyte.”  I think I may have mentioned it here before because I recognize the website, but it doesn’t hurt to drop its name here again.

I’m hoping to catch up on the major players soon, so stay tuned.

Tags: Add-ons, Avant, Ben Goodger, Deepnet Explorer, Extensions, Features, Firefox 2, Firefox 3, Flock, Gecko, Gecko 1.9, IE7, Internet Explorer, Konqueror, Linux, Localization, Mac, Maxthon, Maxthon 2, Minor Players, Off By One, Opinion, OS X, Phishing, Releases, SeaMonkey, Trident, Ubuntu

Last time around I used Tweet Scan, this time I’m giving Summize a try:

• celeduc switched to Konqueror and then back to Firefox 2.
• Aalaap Ghag is impressed with Opera Mini 4.1’s auto-complete feature.
• noel doesn’t think Safari’s inspector even comes close to Firebug.
• Johnny Canuck realized that Safari’s Private Browsing feature works on Windows, too.
• kennym feels naughty forcing IE8 to render in IE7 mode.
• WebFreelancer thinks that IE8 should use the WebKit rendering engine.
• I’d put money on Chris Lowry being a browserphile.
• I’m pretty sure palalalapolly thinks SeaMonkey is Jesus in the form of a web browser.
  

Tags: Firebug, Firefox, IE7, IE8, Inspector, Internet Explorer, Konqueror, Opera Mini, Safari, SeaMonkey, Twitter, WebKit

Last time around, I didn’t get any feedback on the format of these “Around the Browsersphere” posts, so I’ll give a slightly more organized approach a try and we’ll see how it goes.

Camino

• Camino 1.6, which features a customizable toolbar search field, software update capabilities, a scrolling tab bar, etc., was released on the 17th.

Firefox

• Fuzzbot is a Firefox extention that is “useful for detecting embedded semantic information in web pages and performing actions on that semantic data” (via Microformats).
• Firefox Mastery discusses changing the fonts in Firefox.
• Asa Dotzler attempts to clear up some confusion around add-on installations and required logins.
• Chris Beard gives an update on what’s going on at Mozilla Labs.
• Popular extension Adblock Plus is now compatible with the Firefox 3 betas.
• Deb Richardson gave an excellent overview of bookmarks in Firefox 3 (and did a little damage once her post showed up on Digg).
• Find out how you can help beta test the new Mozilla.com redesign.
• Daniel Glazman figured out how to avoid extension version compatability in Firefox.
• Take a look at the Firefox 3 t-shirt design contest winner.
• Firefox’s market share continues to rise in Europe.
• Paul Kim discusses marketing plans as the release of Firefox 3 nears.
• Robert O’Callahan on the turned-off-by-default ActiveX hosting support in Firefox.
• Firefox was apparently spotted in outer space.

Flock

• Flock is apparently delivering on promises.

Internet Explorer

• IEBlog gives some tips on improving performance in Internet Explorer add-ons.
• Read up on HTML and DOM standards compliance in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1.

Konqueror

• Some improvements are being made to the error pages in Konqueror.

Maxthon

• Read up on the Maxthon Downloader.
• There’s a new IRC channel for Maxthon enthusiasts.
• Some felt there was perhaps some foul play involved when Maxthon won a Webware 100 award, but the Maxthon Blog certainly didn’t think so.
• One user’s in-depth tale of a switch from Maxthon to Firefox.

Mozilla

• You can download some really old Mozilla versions from the Mozilla Archive.
• Mozilla celebrated its 10th birthday last month (more here and here).

Opera and Opera Mini

• Opera was the first to 106 in the Acid3 test
• A version of Opera Mini has been created to work on Google’s Android platform.
• Indexing and searching in Opera 9.5 explained.
• With Daniel Goldman moving on to bigger and better things, the Opera Watch team is changing.
• David Storey has shed a little more light on Opera Dragonfly.

Safari

• Non-Safari users were none too pleased about some of Apple’s recent software update techniques (more links to evidence at Asa Dotzler’s blog).
• It looks like HTML5’s client-side database storage may be coming to Safari and the iPhone.
• Safari 3 was compared to Firefox 3 (from a Mac user’s perspective) over at Daring Fireball.
• WebKit hackers will be busy in this year’s Summer of Code.
• PayPal says they won’t be blocking Safari users from accessing their site.
• Some Safari-related stats would be better served more carefully worded

SeaMonkey

• Some SeaMonkey contributors recently got together for a Hack’n'Cook.

Minor Players

• There is a whole bunch of minor players (and the major ones, too) listed in “A wealth of browsers.”
• GreenBrowser is “lightest on resources” of the IE clones, according to one forum post.
• Interesting abstract about a tactile web browser for the visually disabled.
• Interested in a little web browser history trivia?

Tags: Add-ons, Beta, Camino, Digg, Extensions, Firefox, Flock, Internet Explorer, iPhone, Konqueror, Mac, Market Share, Maxthon, Microformats, Minor Players, Mozilla, Opera, Opera Mini, Releases, Safari, SeaMonkey, Stats, Web Standards, WebKit

Believe it or not it’s been over three months since the last edition of Around the Browsersphere, so we’re long overdue.  Let’s get to it…

• Mozilla turned ten last month.
• Camino 1.5.5, a maintenance release, was made available a couple weeks ago, and Camino 1.6 Beta 2 was released a couple weeks before that.
• Add-on developers need to get their butts in gear and start updating their extensions to work with Firefox 3, primarily because the browser will be out in a couple months and secondarily because I don’t like using the Minefield builds without my favorite extensions
• The Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog points out that over 600 million Firefox add-ons have been downloaded, and that in anticipation of the release of Firefox 3, addons.mozilla.org is being redesigned.
• The Opera Desktop Team has been experimenting with document.all cloaking and is giving users more control over tab-related behavior (more on that here) in the latest builds.
• SeaMonkey 1.1.8 was released earlier this month.
• The Safari team has added support for the new W3C Selectors API and appears to be busy chipping away at bugs related to the Acid3 test.
• The WebKit team has been spending some time focused on SVG performance improvements and a native, Cairo-based Windows port of the rendering engine.
• The forthcoming Opera Mobile 9.5 (not 9.0) is twice as fast as Opera Mobile 8.65 and four times faster than Internet Explorer on Windows Mobile.  Screenshots and videos of the new release have been appearing quite a bit.
• Alex Faaborg has provided a second glimpse at the icons to be used in Firefox 3 (you can see the full sheet of icons here).  Apparently the throbber is still up in the air.
• Firefox has about:config, now Opera Mini has opera:config.
• Glubble is a parental controls suite for the Firefox browser (via Asa Dotzler).
• Will IE8 really pass the Acid2 test?
• Cross-window messaging is coming to Firefox 3 (via Simon Willison).
• VnTutor has a list of 10 hidden features of Konqueror.
• The creator of KHTML, Lars Knoll, has been promoted to VP of engineering at Trolltech.
• Everyone has a pet feature.
• Take a look at Maxthon’s split-view feature in action.

Tags: Add-ons, Camino, Extensions, Firefox, Internet Explorer, KHTML, Konqueror, Maxthon, Mozilla, Opera, Opera Mini, Previews, Releases, Safari, SeaMonkey, Web Standards, WebKit