Comments on: With 3.5 launch, Firefox faces new challengers

Mozilla's browser broke Microsoft's IE8 lock on the market. But the new Firefox 3.5 faces other serious alternative-browser contenders.

howdy Stephen Shankland,

your note on the originally _intended_ next version number of firefox is ... wrong. [*grin*] here's what you said ...
"
It began its life as what was intended to be a quick and modest upgrade to Firefox 3.0,
"
... and the previous version was 3.0 and the originally intended next version was 3.1, NOT 3.0 as that [3.0] was already out.

as others have pointed out, your research on this article has been sloppy. the general point of the article is pretty fair, tho.

take care,
lee

crikey! i can't READ!
/start Emily Litella

never mind!

/ end Emily Litella

[empryean]

Yet, none of these browsers incorporate tab browsing like the Avant Browser that sits atop IE. What's up with that? I mean, really, can't they make tab browsing a feature whereby you click and it opens another link without using the center click.

[FF2009]

FF 3.5 has that now :)

[clamenza]

I'm very impressed by the speed of 3.5 compared to 3.0, but I lost two irreplaceable add-ons.

[pepoluan]

You can either 1) wait for the add-on maker to update, 2) find a beta-build of the add-on on the maker's site, or 3) force install using "Nightly Tester Tool"

For example, I use path 1) for my "Evernote web clipper" (I can still 'clip' using Win-A), path 2) for "Tab Mix Plus", and path 3) for "Pingfire"

[angry jubu]

You can also use Mr. Tech Toolkit to override compatibility checking.

[monkeyfun14]

I worry Fx will go down the same road as IE when they gain majority market share.

[xanpyzz]

My favorite I have used Safari and Chrome. Chrome my start faster but FF has the best layout and handles bookmarks the best. Just love it.

[spenb]

I don't think Safari is much of a threat to Firefox right now. This page explains why not more, but less people are choosing Safari, even though its market share is increasing:

http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/archives/2009/05/a_common_browse.html

I think Google Chrome is the browser to watch. It's not currently bundled with anything, but it's gaining market share.

[sar10538]

Is it just a case that the browser with the largest market share is the best so that means a race to that one and only goal! Firefox developers aren't interested in a contest with other browser developers, in fact they are probably delighted in seeing others come into the foray to allow better choice for users. Mozilla is about developing a product that meets the needs of the user in the best way possible. Please get off this contest thing as there will never be a fair contest while most of the worlds PC sales come bundled with a certain companies browser and for the mass of users this is all they will use, they really don't have a clue about the whole matter. Add to that the basic lock-in of IE as it is automatically launched, and required, for certain OS functions, and you might as well call it a monopoly anyway. Of course, if you did a survey of browsers used under Linux or Mac, you might just find that IE does not score well :-)

[lucideer]

I stopped reading after the line that said "according to Net Applications" - honestly, why are people still referencing these guys for statistics. Everyone I ask just says they reference them "because everyone else does" - like using IE "because everyone else does".

For anyone interested, have a look at http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser-ww-yearly-2008-2009 (a more realistic ~30% for Firefox for starters, it also shows large increases for ALL alternatives, Opera included)

[klor5]

Interesting site lucideer.
I see that for the 2008-2009 period the Opera browser had more users than Safari (Which comes bundled with every Mac sold) Googles' Chrome and every other browser make on the planet sans Internet Explorer and Firefox,ie."Others"
I think some of this data may have been corrupted by a simple misunderstanding.

-Message sent: Do you like using the Opera browser?

-Message received: Do you like the colour of Oprahs' blouse?

Reply: YES,YES, I do.Very much.I love tangerine.I love Oprah!...Never miss a show!

[EricTetz]

"it also can be useful to keep your boss from knowing what you've been up to while on company time"

No it can't. Your employer doesn't look at your machine to know what you've been doing online. Your GET requests are all going through the company firewall and the IT department has logs of it all.

[klor5]

Let me start off by saying I've never used Chrome and 90% of the time I use a Mac.
Safari 4 for Mac in my opinion is an excellent browser,uncluttered,very stable,very fast and intuitive,adds Coverflow and Top Sites capabilities to it's wonderful handling of Bookmarks and History.A big step up from Safari 3.x.x.

Compared to Firefox's aesthetic gaudiness and general lack of cohesion,Safari 4 is a dream.Why?
Two things (mainly).

One-I have not come across anything in any other browser that comes close to Safaris' killer feature.
The activity Window.This window allows you to see just about every file that is in your browsers, cache.
This is especially useful when you want to down load videos off the net,especially those videos that the sites' operators don't want you to have a copy of.

Two-This is all well and good,but compared to its potential in terms of speed,Safari 4 on its own doesn't really squash the opposition (apparently).Answer?
Safari 4 + " Webkit nightly build" = Use those Opera Exploring Chrome vulpes to clean your floors.
While to surf the net, install Safari 4.Then go to webkit.org and download the latest "Nightly Build" (yes I know Safari 4 is built around the Webkit engine,Webkit just do the speed part better).

Now with safari 4 closed,install and launch Webkit Nightly Build.It's easy to tell the difference between the two applications' icons-Safari has a silver compass ring,while Webkit has a gold one.
Now control/right click on the Webkit icon in the dock and click on "Keep in Dock".
Now just click the compass with the gold ring in the dock whenever you want to go surfing.

Safari on steroids.Voila.

[Fil0403]

IMO Safari's biggest advantages over the competition are security, stability, and reliability (big progress here, since the 1st Windows version was filled with bugs), but IMO IE8 beats it with its higher Webpage compability and features like Accelerators, inPrivate Browsing, inPrivate Filtering, Protected Mode, and Web Slices.

[Fil0403]

I cannot help to find it humurous that ever since IE got secure with the release of IE7, nobody seems to care about security anymore and speed seems to be all that matters nowadays and all that the media talks about, with each company screaming they are 0,1 s faster than the competition, as if that would make any significant difference to the end user as things like security, stability, and reliability do. That said, IMO FF's biggest advantage over the competition is the customizability and personalization through add-ons, but IMO IE8 beats it with its higher "Webpage compatibility" and features like Accelerators, Protected Mode, and Web Slices.

[sbose64]

got firefox 3.5 within an hour of release,the speed seems overhyped,it is not faster than chrome and safari,in fact a tad slower...

[DiJac]

This update with Firefox 3.5.1 (Which I thought I had) is confusing. Now I'm told to update 3.0.1 version?
What happined to my 3.5.1?