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Chat Area => General Discussion Area => Topic started by: waspy on 07 March 2008, 19:38:18

Title: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: waspy on 07 March 2008, 19:38:18
My mates just told me he uses Firefox as a browser, he says it's better than Windows Explorer.
Has any of you lot had experience of Firefox & is it better?
Thinking of changing, but don't wana if it's crap  :(
Things like security are parramount, so does it have better security?
Your thoughts/views please.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: platty on 07 March 2008, 19:41:28
IMO Firefox is much better - but I have been using it for 5 or 6 years. Not sure as though I can justify why its better, but I'm used to all the handy little functions - Plus I use Thunderbird too.

Just my tuppence  :)
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: caolan_p on 07 March 2008, 19:42:54
Quote
My mates just told me he uses Firefox as a browser, he says it's better than Windows Explorer.
Has any of you lot had experience of Firefox & is it better?
Thinking of changing, but don't wana if it's crap  :(
Things like security are parramount, so does it have better security?
Your thoughts/views please.
i had it on my other laptop it had a firewall for security me i found it was good  :y
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Debs. on 07 March 2008, 19:50:06
Firefox on Pc and Notebook here; so much better than IE!  :y
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Bo Bo on 07 March 2008, 19:51:56
I much prefer Firefox than IE but TB says there may be issues...
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Jimbob on 07 March 2008, 19:59:16
Firefox on both PC's heres

Smaller, more efficient, less bloater, seems faster
Also seems much less confusing to new users than IE7.

Download it and have a go, you will still have IE if you dont like it  :y
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: tunnie on 07 March 2008, 20:06:11
firefox here.... its a must have for me.

UML extensions to allow me to see wap sites.

User Agent Switcher, allows me to fool wap sites into thinking i am a phone, any phone! Essential for my job

I also use google bookmark sync, means it syncs my bookmarks from my workPC to this laptop. I create a bookmark now, on monday it will be on my pc. its instant at updating. also syncs passwords and cookies, so its great  8-)

Just wait for FireFox 3  :)
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Bo Bo on 07 March 2008, 20:07:54
& the inbuilt spell checker is cool  :)
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: waspy on 07 March 2008, 20:35:05
Firefox it is then.
Thanx guy's & gal's  :y
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: PaulW on 07 March 2008, 20:45:42
Did away with IE 3 years ago and solely used FireFox since then :)
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: cem_devecioglu on 07 March 2008, 20:53:40
from a programmers view Firefox much efficient..

parameter buffer is very big.. and more stable..not changed with

patches..

however as there are too many ie 6 around , for development I need to use IE 6..

IE8 beta is now ready for download..
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: yatesDELTA on 07 March 2008, 21:33:53
I use Opera lol. Have done for a while now
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 07 March 2008, 23:59:50
I use most, but prefer IE. Why? Security.

Now while many of you are laughing as you've been suckered in by all the Windows/Micosoft/Office/IE is so insecure, IE has once again proven to be the most secure common desktop browser again - looka t the cert adviseries, every week its Firefox or Safari etc with High vulnerability flaws, rarely do you see MS software on these notices.

Microsoft, being prime target, tends to have closed off all the holes years ago due to its popularity.

Most security firms are now issuing warnings about Apple and OSX as because its popularity has increased, it is now becoming a worthwhile target for the virus/malware writers.  If ever Linux gets popular enough (unlikely), that will become a target, and instantly destroy its one perceived advantage.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Markjay on 08 March 2008, 00:02:07
I use both FireFox and IE7 on all my PCs.

FireFox is faster and more stable, and the one I prefer to use. I use it for OOF, BTW.

IE7 however has better compatibility with websites, especially those that need multimedia pluggins etc. But it is slow keeps crashing every now and then...

However, being in IT, we only officially support IE7 and we do not recommend to customers to install FireFox. Company policy...


Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 00:07:20
Quote
I use both FireFox and IE7 on all my PCs.

FireFox is faster and more stable, and the one I prefer to use. I use it for OOF, BTW.

IE7 however has better compatibility with websites, especially those that need multimedia pluggins etc. But it is slow keeps crashing every now and then...

However, being in IT, we only officially support IE7 and we do not recommend to customers to install FireFox. Company policy...


I find IE7 really stable.  Only crashes seem to be in the flash player (as affected IE6).  Trouble is, as its ActiveX hosted within IE, it wipes out the browser when it dies :(
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Vamps on 08 March 2008, 00:09:15
I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about  :o :o :o
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: Bacon Butty Man on 08 March 2008, 01:28:22
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 09:04:02
Quote
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
I'm interested in your findings regarding speed.  The Gecko engine its based on is not considered to be the fastest by a long shot.  IE slows down with all the add-ons that people don't need/want but never disable, but in my experience, still ends up being quicker to retrieve and render a page, moreso with slower links.

The security bit made me chuckle. Firefox has not a good reputation in this area.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: waspy on 08 March 2008, 09:51:39
I've installed Firefox Beta 3 as a trial.
It's faster than IE 7, so i'll see how i get on with it  :-/
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: tunnie on 08 March 2008, 09:57:37
Quote
Quote
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
I'm interested in your findings regarding speed.  The Gecko engine its based on is not considered to be the fastest by a long shot.  IE slows down with all the add-ons that people don't need/want but never disable, but in my experience, still ends up being quicker to retrieve and render a page, moreso with slower links.

The security bit made me chuckle. Firefox has not a good reputation in this area.

IE is faster in my experiance, but then again i do have a shed ton of extensions installed on firefox.

I find firefox much more customisable, and despite what the boy says, a lot more stable!

It runs like a dog sometimes, but thats usually cause i have 48 tabs open  ::)

I will admit that IE is more secure.... but better? no  ;)

Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: humbucker on 08 March 2008, 10:36:06
Firefox is way more standards compliant than IE. IE6 is just about the worst, and many users still use it. IE7 made headway in trying to adhere to the same standards other browsers use but still fell short of the mark. With the release of IE8 there is to be more of a standards compliant framework for code and class interpretation.

Firefox is also the better browser for developers;  the range of open source add-ons for programmers / designers / developers is fantastic and really helps with debugging and building of websites.

IE, however, is in my opinion more user-intuitive. And that's why it's still so popular. And let's not forget it's bundled with every copy of Windows.

The reality of the situation is that all the main browsers (IE, Firefox, Safari) interpret things slightly differently and so developers and designers have to test websites in each browser and code accordingly. It's a bitch but stems back to the lack of any adhering to web standards when the IE / Netscape browser wars started. Companies like Netscape and Microsoft were focussed on developing new features so that their browser didn't look like it was 'falling behind'. The downside to this was that less time was spent on fixing bugs.

Microsoft and Netscape were also very keen to introduce their own proprietary code (such as the awful 'font' / 'marquee' tags etc) without seeking approval from W3C or any other committe, and so didn't concern themselves with alignment with any web standards specifications. In most cases this proved harmful as far as general web standards are concerned and so you now find the web littered with websites that do not validate properly and appear differently in different browsers, and often in the case of IE6 and IE7 different versions of the same browser!!

The sad truth is that we're still a way off all browsers behaving the same way. I'm not talking about 'features' but I mean the core interpretation of code and presentation style. As Microsoft release new versions of their IE browser websites that have displayed properly for a long time suddenly appear broken. It's no fault of the designers, its just the browser companies changing the way their product interprets the data it's fed.

And then you have to ensure it looks the same on all the Mac browsers...

 :o
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: humbucker on 08 March 2008, 10:40:09
More on the browser wars here for anyone that's interested in the history of this stuff:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_wars
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 11:12:22
Quote
Quote
Quote
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
I'm interested in your findings regarding speed.  The Gecko engine its based on is not considered to be the fastest by a long shot.  IE slows down with all the add-ons that people don't need/want but never disable, but in my experience, still ends up being quicker to retrieve and render a page, moreso with slower links.

The security bit made me chuckle. Firefox has not a good reputation in this area.

IE is faster in my experiance, but then again i do have a shed ton of extensions installed on firefox.

I find firefox much more customisable, and despite what the boy says, a lot more stable!

It runs like a dog sometimes, but thats usually cause i have 48 tabs open  ::)

I will admit that IE is more secure.... but better? no  ;)

Only crashes I've had in IE in recent times is with the Flash ActiveX.  Bloody annoying as it closes all 20 open windows (work - have to use IE6) or 20,000,000 tabs in IE7 if I'm at home.

The variety of browsers is an advantage of Windows - pick one that you like.  Most browsers will render reasonably well most pages.  Just don't get sucked in to the 'Firefox is more secure than IE' (or Linux is more secure than Windows) type hype, coz it aint.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 11:20:19
Quote
Firefox is way more standards compliant than IE. IE6 is just about the worst, and many users still use it. IE7 made headway in trying to adhere to the same standards other browsers use but still fell short of the mark. With the release of IE8 there is to be more of a standards compliant framework for code and class interpretation.

Firefox is also the better browser for developers;  the range of open source add-ons for programmers / designers / developers is fantastic and really helps with debugging and building of websites.

IE, however, is in my opinion more user-intuitive. And that's why it's still so popular. And let's not forget it's bundled with every copy of Windows.

The reality of the situation is that all the main browsers (IE, Firefox, Safari) interpret things slightly differently and so developers and designers have to test websites in each browser and code accordingly. It's a bitch but stems back to the lack of any adhering to web standards when the IE / Netscape browser wars started. Companies like Netscape and Microsoft were focussed on developing new features so that their browser didn't look like it was 'falling behind'. The downside to this was that less time was spent on fixing bugs.

Microsoft and Netscape were also very keen to introduce their own proprietary code (such as the awful 'font' / 'marquee' tags etc) without seeking approval from W3C or any other committe, and so didn't concern themselves with alignment with any web standards specifications. In most cases this proved harmful as far as general web standards are concerned and so you now find the web littered with websites that do not validate properly and appear differently in different browsers, and often in the case of IE6 and IE7 different versions of the same browser!!

The sad truth is that we're still a way off all browsers behaving the same way. I'm not talking about 'features' but I mean the core interpretation of code and presentation style. As Microsoft release new versions of their IE browser websites that have displayed properly for a long time suddenly appear broken. It's no fault of the designers, its just the browser companies changing the way their product interprets the data it's fed.

And then you have to ensure it looks the same on all the Mac browsers...

 :o
I don't blame Netscape or Microsoft - these self appointed beaurocrats were stiffling any developments.  Its not just W3C, but many of the early 'overseers' such as ICANN.

However 'standard' IE8 will be, developers will still have to develop for all browsers.  Every browser will render slightly differently, so tweaking still required. Hopefully will do away with the big bodges though.

But seeing as most sites now are created with CMS, its not a big issue if there are differences.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: cem_devecioglu on 08 March 2008, 11:30:38
Quote
Quote
Quote
Quote
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
I'm interested in your findings regarding speed.  The Gecko engine its based on is not considered to be the fastest by a long shot.  IE slows down with all the add-ons that people don't need/want but never disable, but in my experience, still ends up being quicker to retrieve and render a page, moreso with slower links.

The security bit made me chuckle. Firefox has not a good reputation in this area.

IE is faster in my experiance, but then again i do have a shed ton of extensions installed on firefox.

I find firefox much more customisable, and despite what the boy says, a lot more stable!

It runs like a dog sometimes, but thats usually cause i have 48 tabs open  ::)

I will admit that IE is more secure.... but better? no  ;)

Only crashes I've had in IE in recent times is with the Flash ActiveX.  Bloody annoying as it closes all 20 open windows (work - have to use IE6) or 20,000,000 tabs in IE7 if I'm at home.

The variety of browsers is an advantage of Windows - pick one that you like.  Most browsers will render reasonably well most pages.  Just don't get sucked in to the 'Firefox is more secure than IE' (or Linux is more secure than Windows) type hype, coz it aint.

 ;D this the reason why I left IE7 behind !!
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 11:32:10
Quote
Quote
Quote
Quote
Quote
firefox is faster, more secure, better, faster, securererer, nicer to use quicker, foxier nicer, oh and its faster ;D
i like firefox, mr gates . please please please dont buy mozilla. ;)
I'm interested in your findings regarding speed.  The Gecko engine its based on is not considered to be the fastest by a long shot.  IE slows down with all the add-ons that people don't need/want but never disable, but in my experience, still ends up being quicker to retrieve and render a page, moreso with slower links.

The security bit made me chuckle. Firefox has not a good reputation in this area.

IE is faster in my experiance, but then again i do have a shed ton of extensions installed on firefox.

I find firefox much more customisable, and despite what the boy says, a lot more stable!

It runs like a dog sometimes, but thats usually cause i have 48 tabs open  ::)

I will admit that IE is more secure.... but better? no  ;)

Only crashes I've had in IE in recent times is with the Flash ActiveX.  Bloody annoying as it closes all 20 open windows (work - have to use IE6) or 20,000,000 tabs in IE7 if I'm at home.

The variety of browsers is an advantage of Windows - pick one that you like.  Most browsers will render reasonably well most pages.  Just don't get sucked in to the 'Firefox is more secure than IE' (or Linux is more secure than Windows) type hype, coz it aint.

 ;D this the reason why I left IE7 behind !!
Yup, it annoys me. Can hardly blame IE for a poorly written 3rd party add-in though  :'(
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: cem_devecioglu on 08 March 2008, 11:34:01
problem is HTML,DHTML and all these stuff in coding sucks, they are standards of ancient times with very slow internet connections..

I hope all browser firms agree with a new fast , ready built in object

model interfaces like windows.. Otherwise programmers will continue

to suffer  >:(
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 11:39:13
Quote
problem is HTML,DHTML and all these stuff in coding sucks, they are standards of ancient times with very slow internet connections..

I hope all browser firms agree with a new fast , ready built in object

model interfaces like windows.. Otherwise programmers will continue

to suffer  >:(
.NET and AJAX is the way forward.  Of course, that ties you to MS servers, and often, MS servers don't scale as well as unix style ones.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: brett1408 on 08 March 2008, 12:33:17
looks like i've come in quite late on this one but yes fire fox is much better ! used it for ages now and on vista it seems even bettger still !
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: humbucker on 08 March 2008, 12:39:43
Quote
Only crashes I've had in IE in recent times is with the Flash ActiveX.  

Do you mean the 'click to activate' nonsense since MS got sued? If so, then there are a couple of javascript workarounds available that work perfectly for any Active X content you want to put into your site.

And you mention a lot of sites being built using a CMS, which is true as more clients become technically-savvy, but you're still faced with the same problems when building a CMS and the corresponding website to house it in the first place.
Title: Re: Firefox or Explorer
Post by: TheBoy on 08 March 2008, 13:02:06
Quote
Quote
Only crashes I've had in IE in recent times is with the Flash ActiveX.  

Do you mean the 'click to activate' nonsense since MS got sued? If so, then there are a couple of javascript workarounds available that work perfectly for any Active X content you want to put into your site.

And you mention a lot of sites being built using a CMS, which is true as more clients become technically-savvy, but you're still faced with the same problems when building a CMS and the corresponding website to house it in the first place.
The problems with flash are actually withing the .swf files - its eas to crash any flash player.

Yes, the CMS vendor (or in house developer) still has to code for all browsers, but only has to do it once, not per page, or even per site ;)