Been a few days since my last Mozilla related post….
Some great info posted here regarding a neat little easter egg that’s been around for ages. Sure wondering what will be in upcoming Mozilla/Firebird releases.
Asa Dotzler wrote a bombshell on the OS X Browser Market. A real good read if there is anyone who hasn’t read it already.
Lastly my marketing.mozilla.org meta bug has gotten some traffic, but could use more!
Also, still looking for more web badges for Mozilla and Mozilla Firebird. Contribute!!!
I’ve used it before, but today I gave Safari a real go. Despite the fact that some bugs exist, it does a pretty good job. My biggest complement goes to the UI. It’s clean, simple, and totally Apple. It shares the same DNA as Steve Jobs.
I also like the snapback and iSync functionality. Some nice little Apple features make web browsing pleasant. Rendering is pretty good, fast, clean, and pretty compatible.
Still though, I favor Camino. From the pages I tested (including my own) it loaded faster, and had the best rendering of the two browsers (both of which blow Internet Explorer away). The biggest incompatibilities I’ve noted are mainly with JavaScript not functioning properly (especially sites with large complex scripts) or some XHTML pages. All of which Camino and Mozilla do very well.
IMHO the winner is still Camino, and the entire Gecko line of browsers, although Safari gets an honorable mention. It’s UI features are clearly superior.
I don’t think many sites will cater to KHTML browsers though. I think it’s much more likely for them to test in Netscape or other Gecko browsers, than KHTML based browsers. As a result, Gecko based browsers will most likely always have an upper hand in compatibility, unless KHTML manages to really keep up, despite the never ending obstacles that lie in it’s way.
A side note: I’m need to check out OmniWeb (the WebCore version), and give that a go. I haven’t gotten to that yet.
Asa recently has been blogging a ton of opinions from others on Firebird, and Thunderbird. One particular post struck me. He suggests switching to Thunderbird.
I’m getting somewhat close, but I need a few things first:
So I’m leaning towards sticking with Mozilla 1.4 (hopefully released tomorrow). But not quite sure.
Microsoft is slowing pushing IE towards the point where it will no longer be available for anything but Longhorn. They announced the other day that there won’t be builds later than 6.0 SP1 for Windows, and the Mac side would not have new releases but would be supported “for the foreseeable future” (we all know what that means).
To me, this is the greatest news yet. Safari and Mozilla provide much better support than IE ever did. They are a far superior choice in browsers. It’s one less rendering agent that a mac webmaster has to support.
They claim that Office will still continue to be developed for the Mac, and there is already a new version in the works. Finally, Microsoft gets the idea, IE for Mac is crap. The Open source movement won as far as quality goes, long ago. What was lost is the PR war. And hopefully as Mac users learn about alternatives, their Windows friends will wake up as well.
Well… I figured it out (or ironically ended up on Mozillazine during the brief moment the story was prematurely published). I think Mozilla splitting up into multiple apps is a good thing. Read on to see my hopes for the new Mozilla, and check out Asa’s Blog for some more info.
As originally posted on Mozillazine (though disappeared). Not sure if it’s real, or if it’s a April Fools Hoax… anyway, here it is:
The Announcement
PROVISIONAL HEADLINE: Major Roadmap Update Centres Around Phoenix, Thunderbird; 1.4 Branch to Replace 1.0; Changes Planned for Module Ownership ModelLEAD-IN: In the most radical change to the Mozilla project since the late 1998 decision to rewrite much of the code, mozilla.org today announced a major new roadmap revision that will see Phoenix and Thunderbird (also known as Minotaur) becoming the focus of future development. 1.4 is likely to be the last milestone of the traditional Mozilla suite and the 1.4 branch will replace the 1.0 branch as the stable development path. In addition, there will be changes to the ownership model that will see a move towards stronger leadership and the removal of mandatory super-review in some cases.
FULL ARTICLE: In one of a string of changes, mozilla.org today announced that future Mozilla development work will be focussed around the stand-alone Phoenix browser and Thunderbird mail and newsgroups client (also known as Minotaur). Mozilla 1.4 will probably be the last milestone release of the traditional Mozilla browser suite and the 1.4 milestone is slated to replace 1.0 as the stable development path.
Aggressive and ambitious changes will take place during the 1.5 and 1.6 milestones to accomodate the switch to Phoenix and Thunderbird. Mac OS X versions of Phoenix will become available but Camino, a project to create a Mozilla-based browser with a native Mac user interface, will continue to be fully supported.
The Phoenix project started life in Summer 2002 as redesign of the Mozilla browser component known as mozilla/browser. It aims to create a browser for average users with a simplified user interface. The Thunderbird project plans to create a stand-alone mail client using the Phoenix toolkit and following its conventions. The project now incoroprates the work of the Minotaur effort to create a stand-alone version of Mail & Newsgroups. It is anticipated that Thunderbird will be available as both a completely separate application and as an add-on to Phoenix, which will integrate more closely with the browser.
The module ownership system will also be refined. Changes will be made so that all code modules have strong leaders who have the authority to make decisive and final decisions. In some cases, the need for mandatory super-review will be removed, as is the case in Phoenix today.
It was also announced that Gecko developers will be freed to make large architectural changes to make Gecko easier to maintain and more extensible.
mozilla.org is making these changes for many reasons. Moving to a collection of stand-alone programs will address criticisms that the monolithic Mozilla suite is too bloated. Annointing 1.4 as the designated stable branch will answer concerns that the 1.0 branch is too far behind the trunk. The new module ownership model should ensure a greater coherency in many aspects of Mozilla, particularly its user interface, which has often being criticised for lacking direction. Many feel that Mozilla’s two-stage review process is overkill in some places and the removal of mandatory super-review for certain areas will tackle this issue. Finally, rearchitecturing Gecko will ensure that Mozilla’s rendering engine remains world-class and does not further suffer because of excessive modularisation and poor design decisions, criticisms that came to light with Apple’s choice of KHTML for its Safari browser.
More information about this new development process can be found in the updated Mozilla Development Roadmap.