|
|
Firefox 2.0b2 (ick!)
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Cambridge UK
Status:
Offline
|
|
If anyone else is about to download FF2.0b2 I must warn you that it has a pretty ugly, washed out looking theme; I'm thinking this can't possibly be the work of the same guy that has produced the previous two Mac themes.
Otherwise, they seem to have dropped all the notable features from this realease, and added some bizarre fade in/fade out for all of the menus.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: Seattle, WA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
It's an interesting build, definitely. Having been using Minefield (the Cocoa build) more and more recently, this definitely feels like a step back. So in order to be fair, I went out and downloaded the latest stable release, 1.5.0.6. WOW! This new beta is a huge step forward in several ways. Granted, it still lacks native windows, widgets, spell checking, etc... but this is why I have no intention of making Ff my primary browser quite yet.
What it DOES boast is much better performance, both when first opening and when rendering web pages. I love the favicons in the main Bookmarks menu, a feature for which I had been asking for quite a while. I'm not a huge fan of the new default theme, but it may just be me not being used to it (not to mention the fact that there are about 5 bazillion themes out there for the picky user). And the smooth scrolling feels, well, smoother. I don't have my mouse with me, but I think that it reacts to scrolling (esp. acceleration) the same way that Safari and the Finder (plus countless other apps) have for a long time.
My opinion? The changes are welcomed, but not quite enough to tear me away from Safari + Camino. However, only time will tell whether I'll stick with Safari or switch back to Ff when they both hit their 3.0 this spring.
|
Any ramblings are entirely my own, and do not represent those of my employers, coworkers, friends, or species
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dedicated MacNNer
Join Date: May 2001
Status:
Offline
|
|
If you get the Nightly Tester Tools extension:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/958/
it will let you use any extension, even ones that won't normally install because your Firefox is so new.
Anyway, I switched themes easily using this. 2.0b2 is an improvement over b1 in that my theme now looks right-on.
W
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: San Antonio TX USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
I've heard bad things about the newest version of Firefox for Windows too. On the Mac version, is it just a change in the theme that makes it look bad? I don't want to change to the new version (which seems to have some neat new features and improvements) until I'm sure it won't look worse than it does already.
|
Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: FFM
Status:
Offline
|
|
They did away with the rounded search fields. This was only a Mac convention anyway.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Senior User
Join Date: Aug 2002
Status:
Offline
|
|
Aside from the square fields, I actually like this theme better than 1.5.
|
"Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works." - Steve Jobs
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Baninated
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: An asteroid remanent of Tatooine.
Status:
Offline
|
|
I read the final theme is being redone completely by some guy who has a design site.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
Forget that, I'm using 3.0a1.
|
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Senior User
Join Date: Aug 2002
Status:
Offline
|
|
Chuckit, were you able to import your bookmarks into 3.0? I don't use Safari, so I tried to import from a file. But for some reason, I could never get it to work. Even taking a bookmarks.html file from my 1.5 installation and manually moving it into the appropriate directory didn't seem to work. 3.0 just overrides it.
|
"Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works." - Steve Jobs
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
I just downloaded Minefield and it automatically had my old bookmarks.
|
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Forum Regular
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Way up there!
Status:
Offline
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Nov 1999
Status:
Offline
|
|
I was using the 3.0 builds, though I ended up going back to 1.5 because they were too unstable (which I suppose is to be expected for prereleases).
Frankly, though, I'm not a fan of the 2.0 series. I think they've dropped too many of their planned features to justify the version number change, and what they have kept reflects a set of priorities which, for a browser maker, could only be described as warped.
|
You are in Soviet Russia. It is dark. Grue is likely to be eaten by YOU!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
I don't find the 3.0 builds to be less stable than 1.5. It has yet to do that annoying not-crash-but-totally-lock-up thing 1.5 always does.
|
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dedicated MacNNer
Join Date: May 2001
Status:
Offline
|
|
Yeah, it seems this coulda been 1.6... but still nice to have something new
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Forum Regular
Join Date: Jan 2004
Location: Way up there!
Status:
Offline
|
|
I thought Firefox 2 was to be unified... or is that still planned? Flickr Photo Download: Messy
Theres nothing new with the menus though, typical osx menus.
Still ugly checkboxes and such.
(
Last edited by voo; Sep 1, 2006 at 07:36 PM.
)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Apr 2003
Location: Anywhere but here.
Status:
Offline
|
|
The latest nightly builds of Minefield are pretty nice and stable for me. I think I just found a new browser to replace Camino in the dock. For now anyways.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Moderator Emeritus
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: Arizona
Status:
Offline
|
|
I'm still surprised that Firefox is as popular on the Mac as it is.
For starters, Firefox really sticks out like a fish out of water in OS X. It just looks and feels like a really klunky port of a Windows/Linux application. And in my opinion, any rendering speed advantages it does have over the other OS X native browsers are pretty much cancelled out by that generally klunky feel of the UI.
As as for those 'rendering speed advantages' that I always hear so much about; I rarely see them and even when I do I wonder why they're worth using Firefox over something like Camino which is at least as fast on most sites, looks and feels far better, and has processor-specific optimized builds even more readily available then Firefox does.
|
I like chicken
I like liver
Meow Mix, Meow Mix
Please de-liv-er
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
Camino is sloooooow. I cut out a couple of os there for the sake of brevity, but I think you get the idea. I prefer the speed and nicer UI of the Firefox 3 alphas.
|
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Senior User
Join Date: Jul 2006
Status:
Offline
|
|
I am using version 2.0 of Firefox for Windows. My themes and extensions work. One thing I did not like was the arrangement of the search box. They put the icon for the search engine outside of the box. The search box also now is not limited by the space given to it by the theme, but takes as much room as it can. I had to move it to the menu bar to give the URL box enough length.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posting Junkie
Join Date: Dec 2000
Status:
Offline
|
|
Originally Posted by Chuckit
Camino is sloooooow. I cut out a couple of os there for the sake of brevity, but I think you get the idea. I prefer the speed and nicer UI of the Firefox 3 alphas.
Huh? Camino is using the exact same renderer (Gecko) as Firefox.
If you were talking about its UI, it's noticeably faster than Firefox's on my machine.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
Not mine. Particularly when there are animated GIFs or any other sort moving content involved, Camino seems to get overexcited and has to take a break.
|
Chuck
___
"Instead of either 'multi-talented' or 'multitalented' use 'bisexual'."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Moderator
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
Status:
Offline
|
|
Originally Posted by Lateralus
I'm still surprised that Firefox is as popular on the Mac as it is.
For starters, Firefox really sticks out like a fish out of water in OS X. It just looks and feels like a really klunky port of a Windows/Linux application. And in my opinion, any rendering speed advantages it does have over the other OS X native browsers are pretty much cancelled out by that generally klunky feel of the UI.
As as for those 'rendering speed advantages' that I always hear so much about; I rarely see them and even when I do I wonder why they're worth using Firefox over something like Camino which is at least as fast on most sites, looks and feels far better, and has processor-specific optimized builds even more readily available then Firefox does.
I agree about all of this, but you forgot about one feature. The one and only reason I use Firefox on the Mac are the extensions - in particular Flashblock, but there are a few others as well. Get me that in Safari and I'll switch back.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: San Antonio TX USA
Status:
Offline
|
|
There are a lot of nice things in Safari, but I've never had the kind of problems connecting to various sites with Firefox that I did with Safari. And it never mattered how I set the user agent-Safari would NOT connect to some school sites, while Firefox (even the betas) would every time.
I still have some issues with some sites and the way Firefox renders them, but I'm attributing those issues to the sites' coding-probably using some sort of IE-specific stuff.
|
Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Join Date: Sep 2006
Status:
Offline
|
|
(
Last edited by vsmsamples; Sep 26, 2006 at 06:06 PM.
)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: ~/
Status:
Offline
|
|
Originally Posted by vsmsamples
Improves upon several things I didn't like about 1.x, particularly the lack of spell check. Still uses ugly widgets, though.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Join Date: Oct 2002
Status:
Offline
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Forum Rules
|
|
|
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
|
HTML code is Off
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|