OStatic reports that the latest build of Google's Chrome browser outpaces Firefox 3 beta 4, with up to 30 percent faster performance than its Chrome predecessor, but this report overlooks a speedier Firefox alternative (Firefox 3 beta 5 is zippier), but it also misses arguably the biggest advantage Firefox has over every other browser:
A massive, growing, deeply involved add-on community, one that is only going to get stronger with the release of Jetpack.
Google has talked about getting Firefox-like extensions for Chrome but it, like Microsoft's Internet Explore and Apple's Safari, woefully underdeliver on community.
Before you cry 'Foul!', recalling that I dubbed the value of community "overhyped" in software, let me quickly suggest Firefox as an exception to the general rule, and a significant one, at that. John Lilly, Mozilla's CEO, reminded me on Twitter that 40 percent of Mozilla's development comes from outside contributors.
This makes sense, as Mozilla's Firefox fits all the parameters I outlined to hit the open core, open complement, open community box on my "openness grid."
So, fast as Firefox is, forget speed for a minute. Or two, because you really do have time, especially when the benefits of the Firefox add-on development community dramatically outpace whatever JavaScript improvements Google, Apple, or Microsoft may manufacture into their browsers.
Jetpack, as CNET reports, makes building and maintaining add-ons much easier for developers. InformationWeek notes that Firefox already sports more than 7,000 add-ons/extensions. Imagine what happens once the bar to creating and maintaining those add-ons/extensions gets better with Jetpack....
Mozilla is also proposing new rules for commit access to the core Firefox code, which could further open up the development process and encourage even more community involvement. Firefox, in other words, is going from strength to strength while its proprietary peers (which does not include open-source Google Chrome) struggle to be all things for all people.
In a product like the browser, which has so many disparate uses and users, this is an exercise in futility. Horizontal technologies like browsers and operating systems are best developed by communities, not individual organizations. They can be shepherded by a single organization - be it a for-profit corporation or a non-profit - but unless they break through the walls of their own office complex, they will struggle.
Dave Neary has suggested different ways to calculate the size of an open-source project's community. By any measure, Mozilla's Firefox community is large and growing.
This, and not JavaScript enhancements (of which Firefox will continue to do plenty), is what sets Firefox apart, and ensures that it's the browser to beat. Even though its 22-percent market share, growing 5 percent each year, still trails IE's dwindling 68-percent market share, declining 5 percent each year, Firefox has community, and that community is the decisive factor in the browser battle.
Follow me on Twitter @mjasay.
Reports (like this one on The Apple Blog) persist that beta releases of the Mozilla Firefox 3 browser have rendered it a "perplexingly sluggish performer" on the Mac. Despite Mozilla's speed improvements in Minefield, those tweaks haven't seemed to make it into beta releases of Firefox 3.
Until now.
As an open-source Web browser, Firefox is, of course, open to community tinkering. One member of that Firefox community, Chris Latko, has developed his own version of Firefox 3.5 beta, dubbed Shiretoko, and my informal tests confirm what The Apple Blog and others have been saying: it's mucho fast.
What it's not, however, is compatible with all the add-ons/extensions I use with my latest production release of Firefox (3.0.10): AdBlock Plus, Fasterfox, etc. This, however, is to be expected: Shireteoko is beta software, after all.
At any rate, if you have an Intel-based Mac and you've been disturbed by the sluggishness of Mozilla's Firefox 3 beta releases, and were persuaded by CNET's Stephen Shankland's suggestion that Google's Chrome-on-Mac blows Firefox 3 beta 4 out of the water in speed tests, try Shiretoko.
It may keep you patiently waiting for the next great release from the Mozilla Firefox team, rather than looking for Google's allegedly greener Chrome grass.
Follow me on Twitter @mjasay.
ZDNet Australia on Tuesday released updated browser speeds, as measured by the industry-standard SunSpider JavaScript test, and the results should give pause to proprietary-browser makers Microsoft and Opera Software:
Every open-source browser completely obliterated the proprietary browsers in terms of performance, and by a huge margin.
The test compared Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 Release Candidate 1, Opera 10.00 Alpha, Firefox 3.1b1, Chrome 2.0.158.0, and the WebKit r40220 developer project included in Chrome and Apple's Safari.
Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox (along with WebKit) left the proprietary competition in the dust:
Open source browsers leave IE and Opera in the dust
(Credit: Alex Serpo/ZDNet Austraia)Maybe there's something in the open-source water, after all, that makes those open-source browsers grow up big and strong. IE 8? Well, let's just say that it has a lot of work to do to catch up.
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Mozilla's Firefox has long breezed past Internet Explorer, which is fast becoming the Buick of browsers: comfortable, safe, but little pizazz.
Google has upped the ante, as ExtremeTech discovers, blowing past Firefox 3, Apple's Safari, Opera, and IE in a recent performance test.
Given that ExtremeTech didn't review Mozilla's cutting-edge Minefield (Firefox alpha) browser release, which has been pegged as 10 percent faster than Chrome, Mozilla may still be the speed champion, but Google Chrome does push past its Firefox 3 browser.
Importantly, ExtremeTech didn't do a one-dimensional drag race between the browsers:
When you see speed tests for (a) browser that claim "Chrome loads faster," it's important to ask a few questions: loaded when, over what broadband speed, with what other apps running, on what machine?
With this in mind, ExtremeTech put the browsers through a battery of tests, including how the browsers performed with Flash, compatibility, JavaScript, and more. The conclusion?
Based on our arbitrary score assignments, Google Chrome is the speed king...Google uses its own knowledge of search and browsing habits to optimize Chrome, but Chrome is still in early development. It's also clear from our testing that Microsoft really needs to get IE 8 out the door--IE 7 not only has compatibility issues, but is substantially slower in many ways. Firefox 3.1 should also improve Firefox's scores.
What does it all really mean? For one thing, take a close look at your browser usage. Are you still using the default browser that came with your system? You may want to re-examine that. The end result may be a much more pleasant and productive Web experience.
Interestingly, IE 7 and Safari didn't even place in the competition, with only Firefox and Chrome really competing across the board. Microsoft needs to step up--big time--with IE 8, and Mozilla will, of course, continue to improve Firefox in its more iterative approach to innovation.
But for now, with Google Chrome expected to ship preinstalled on some desktops, Microsoft and Mozilla have a real fight on their hands. Who has the advantage? Consumers.
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