Whenever Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) integrates features from Mac OS into Windows, the Apple fans cry foul. “It’s a ripoff!” they say. “Apple did it first!”

Likewise, fans of the Opera browser are perpetually claiming Firefox ripped them off.

Nobody but historians and fans care who did it first; users just want to know who does it best. And copying the other guy isn’t cheating. This isn’t high school. Copying the competition is how the free market works. Companies improve their products by stealing ideas from the competition and improving them a little bit. When we see companies doing that, we shouldn’t cry foul — we should pat them on the back and say, “Well done!”

Now, Apple isn’t having its pockets picked — they’re doing the stealing. And they’re slick about it too. The new version of Safari, Version 4, which just shipped beta 1, copies features from Google Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. And Apple does a fine job of it. Well done, Apple!

Taking Safari 4 Beta 1 For A Spin

When you start Safari 4, you’ll notice a couple of big changes right away over the previous version.

Apple moved the tabs. They’re now above the address bar, like on Chrome. Also, the opening screen (as with Google Chrome and Opera) shows a grid of images of your most frequently visited Web pages, which Safari gathers by keeping track of where you’ve surfed to.

The new tab position has a few early adopters ticked off, saying the layout makes it too easy to accidently close a tab by clicking in the wrong place. I didn’t have a problem with it — but I didn’t much see the point, either. I find the change harmless, and easy to get used to.

And the new tab position saves a little screen real estate, replacing the horizontal bar at the top of the application window, which is useful for anyone running Safari on a small-display netbook or notebook.Users who don’t like the new tab bar can switch back — John Gruber tells how at the blog Daring Fireball, adding, “I’m willing to give the new-style tabs at least a week — don’t be a chicken and switch back already.”

The other big change is the Top Sites window. Again, this change proved unpopular with some early adopters; Ars Technica, for example, calls it “frivolous and unnecessary.”

Firefox users who have downloaded the Speed Dial extension will find Top Sites familiar.

I like Top Sites a lot. Safari 4 displays page snapshots on a curving, three-dimensional black wall floating in space. You can click on each image and the page it represents move to the front and fills up your browser in a nifty, 3D animated effect.

You can edit the Top Sites view by clicking the edit button at the bottom left, adding pages manually, blocking some pages from appearing in Top Sites at all, and pinning particular pages so they always appear in the same place.

You can search your browser history from Top Sites by clicking a text window on the bottom right. That brings up the history, with an image of each page showing in Cover Flow, same as you get in iTunes, the iPod software, and in the Leopard Finder. The history searches all the text on all the pages you’ve visited.

Cover Flow is also implemented in the bookmarks manager, so you can flip through images of all your bookmarks, or any folder.

The Top Sites and history searches are a great way to narrow in on your favorite pages. They’re fast and fun to use. However, they have some bugs. My Gmail account, hosted by Google Apps, rarely turned up on Top Sites, even though it’s easily the page I access most often. When it did show up, it showed the login screen, rather than the actual application. Likewise, Google Reader was only partially rendered in Top Sites. Images sometimes took a while to appear, especially in history. And history doesn’t support Boolean searches to narrow results.

Mouse-Intensive Browsing

Top Sites and history need better keyboard integration; in particular, there should be a keyboard shortcut for jumping directly to searching history. There may well be one — if there is, I haven’t found it.

In general, Safari 4 is a mouse-intensive browser. Aggressive keyboard-shortcut users will find Safari 4 wanting.

All in all, the Top Sites and coverflow history are great features, and off to a promising start. Hopefully, all these things will be fixed before the beta becomes a final release. Ars Technica has a useful guide to Top Sites.

Safari 4 offers performance improvements, implementing the Nitro JavaScript engine that’s 4.2 times faster than Safari 3, Apple says, adding that the browser loads HTML web pages three times faster than IE 7 and almost three times faster than Firefox 3. Ars questions the speed comparisons, though, saying Apple used obsolete benchmark tests.

Safari 4′s Firefox-Like Features

Apple’s new browser implements a couple of my favorite features of Firefox. They’re not sexy, but they’re extremely useful.

Safari 4 lets you zoom whole pages, instead of just the text on the page. When you zoom a page, the entire page gets bigger or smaller, with all the elements in the same position and proportion to each other, not just the words.

Firefox still beats Safari in page-zooming, though. Gmail is, once again, a problem; after zooming a couple of steps on Safari 4, you have to sidescroll to see everything in Gmail, whereas in Firefox, Gmail doesn’t get any wider than your browser window, even as the page zooms.

Likewise, Firefox has a feature that remembers your zoom settings on a page whenever you come back to it. If you zoomed Gmail 120%, then log out and come back in the next day, when you go to Gmail, you’ll be zoomed to 120%. Safari 4 could use that feature.

Safari 4 also implements a smart address bar, similar to Firefox’s so-called AwesomeBar, which searches your bookmarks and history as you type. Once again, I prefer the Safari 4 implementation, which searches for text appearing anywhere in the page title, URL, keywords, and tags. Safari 4 only searches for text at the beginning.

For example, if you’re searching for the InformationWeek Blog in Firefox, you can start typing “b-l-o-g” in the AwesomeBar, and the page will come up, assuming it’s in your history or bookmarks. In Safari, you’d have to start typing “InformationWeek” to get the same result. I use the AwesomeBar in Firefox like my own personalGoogle (NSDQ: GOOG); if I remember visiting a page, I just throw a couple of key words into the AwesomeBar and Firefox generally finds it for me. The smart address bar in Safari doesn’t come close to that kind of usefulness.

Of the three major browsers, I prefer Chrome’s smart address bar implementation best of all — it combines history, bookmarks, and Web searches (using Google, natch) in a single text field.

The Safari Web search box also gets some smarts in Version 4; it displays results of Google’s suggested searches, and your search history, as you type.

Apple improved Safari 4 for Windows as well, to make it look more like a native Windows application, with themes for classic Windows, Windows XP Aqua, and the Vista Aero Glass interface. However, the browser doesn’t look too much like a Windows application; the tabs above the address bar gives it a nonstandard appearance.

Also, by default, the Windows menu bar is hidden in Safari 4 on Windows; although that’s easily reconfigured, it’s a bit confusing at first. As with Chrome, the options that would normally show up in the menu bar are instead available by clicking a gear-wheel icon to the right of the address bar.Stability is an issue for this version of Safari — not for me, but for some early adopters. “This thing is very unstable, but very pretty — kind of like your ex,” writes Gina Trapani at the blog SmarterWare, noting that the software crashes frequently. I found it pretty stable, but Gina isn’t alone in finding it unreliable.

I don’t like the way Safari 4 manages tabs and windows. I like all my pages to open in tabs in a single window, unless I manually choose to open a new window. Safari doesn’t work like that; for example, opening a page inGoogle (NSDQ: GOOG) Reader opens the tab in a new window. Pretty soon, my desktop is cluttered with a profusion of browser windows, each of them with one or several open pages in them, sometimes duplicating pages from one window to another. Safari has always worked that way, and I find it annoying. It’s not a flaw in Safari — it’s just how Safari is designed, and many people seem to like it. But it’s not for me.Safari includes support for new standards: HTML 5 with offline storage will allow Web apps like Gmail to work without an Internet connection. Safari supports CSS 3, for reflections, gradients, and precision masks on websites. And Apple says Safari 4 is the first browser to pass the Web Standards Project’s Acid3 rendering test.

Safari Version 4 is off to a great start. I like the improved performance, Top Sites, and the way Cover Flow is implemented in the history and bookmarks. Some existing bugs and design limitations — most notably, the way it handles Gmail — keep me from picking it as my default browser, but I’m eager to see the next iteration.

Source: InformationWeek

]]> http://www.tech-new.net/blog/2009/03/02/safari-4-beta-takes-page-from-google-playbook/feed/ 0 http://www.tech-new.net/blog/2009/01/29/browser-war-ie8-vs-chrome-vs-opera-vs-firefox-3/ http://www.tech-new.net/blog/2009/01/29/browser-war-ie8-vs-chrome-vs-opera-vs-firefox-3/#comments Thu, 29 Jan 2009 10:52:15 +0000 admin http://www.tech-new.net/?p=315

Soon after our first impression on the Internet Explorer 8 RC1, we decided to do the inevitable, a browser comparison with long time rivals Firefox, Opera, and the latest kid on the block, Chrome.

Note that this is not a review to find out which amongst these is the best browser around. It would be unwise to do such a comparison because, eventually, it boils down to personal choices, and for the same reason, there will always be controversy and related chest thumping about how “my” browser betters “yours.” Therefore, this is just a rehash of the features and drawbacks of these four mainstream browsers available as of today.

Internet Explorer 8

Let us talk about the latest release initially, the Internet Explorer 8 RC 1.  While it would be difficult for power users to switch back to something as mundane as IE8, folks over at Microsoft seem to have worked hard to make the browser appealing to users who have long ago ditched it and had switched to the likes of Firefox and Opera. As to how far it has succeeded in bringing back the deserters is anybody’s guess. Features like web slices, accelerators, and visual search have been added, making the browser an attractive option for the average user. IE8 with its beta version was also one of the first to debut the Private Browsing mode, which back then was unavailable on the Firefox and still not available on Opera. Safari was the first to introduce Private Browsing.

However, IE8 still suffers from inherent faults that come to the fore the moment you click download. The installation exe is a mammoth 16MB file – second only to Chrome probably, which incidentally uses an online installer. The installation procedure also involves a couple of instances of restarting the computer making the process look regressive as compared to the faster approach the others have. The installation takes a good part of 10 minutes if your system happens to be up-to-date with all available Windows Updates – you better have a uber fast PC! If you do not frequently update your PC, you might as well end up with irritating messages.

C’mon Microsoft, all I want to do is to just browse the Internet!

Did Microsoft say that they did some tweaking to the rendering engine? Maybe, but most pages are a whole lot slower to load as compared to Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. As mentioned in our first look article, an ACID test performed on the browser gave a dismal score of 20 – the lowest amongst all the others tested here. While these standards may not represent anything, it does show the browser underpinnings. And no, there is still no sign of a download manager anywhere.

So, should or rather will the power users make the switch? No way, until Microsoft rehashes the product ground up! The browser is moving in the right direction and will definitely appeal to average users who still prefer the charm of the good ol’ Internet Explorer. Those used to the likes of Firefox, Chrome, or Opera will be happy to stick to their choices now.

Firefox 3

The world’s second most popular browser is continuing its march to topple the gentle giant from Microsoft and has been successfully eating into IE’s market share for the past few years. Major pluses for Firefox users are the variety of add-ons that make it more of an application, rather than just a browser. The version in question here is the latest stable release – version 3.0.5. The quickness of the installation procedure is evident from the moment you update it. The installation file is just over 7MB in size, making it less than half IE8′s size. An ACID3 test on the browser revealed a decent score of 71/100. Note that the latest beta version, 3.1 Beta2, has added Private Browsing and some other features as well, but we’re not considering it until the final version is out.

Apart from appealing to the advanced user thanks to its customization and add-ons, what makes it the choice for average users is the fast rendering and ease of use. While it might be difficult for many to be weaned away from the default Internet Explorer, most people are hooked once they start using this browser. A vast majority of tech users are Firefox users and we did see a lot of responses praising Firefox for its simplicity, security, ease of use, and not to mention, the add ons. However, Private Browsing has still not found its way in,

Opera 9.63

Another contender for the best browser around is none other than Opera. Although the market share might tell a different story, Opera is still considered by many to be the best browser around. While Mozilla users may swear about the add-ons, Opera users counter the claim by saying that Opera manages to do what most Firefox add-ons can, out of the box. Additionally, if Firefox has add-ons, Opera does come with its widgets and, not to mention, the mouse gestures. The latest stable version managed an Acid 3 score of 85/100. Opera was also touted to be the fastest browser around for the past few years and dedicated Opera fans still swear by the browser. Opera also has features like the speed dial, skins, and an entirely new browser engine.

Google Chrome

Google created a flutter in the browser circles back in September when it announced the release of the Chrome, the company’s first open source browser. Months after its launch, Chrome too has managed to garner a dedicated set of users. Chrome seems to thrive on Google’s concept of simplicity, and the best thing about the browser is its rather large viewing area. It does away with unwanted toolbars taking away the screen real estate. Chrome also managed to graduate to a stable version back in December, barely three months after its beta release. One thing you might not like is the installation procedure

The browser had the Incognito mode (Private mode) right from the beta stage, and has integrated the function quite neatly. The startup and load times are also fast. While Chrome is still very crude for advanced users, its open source pedigree works in its favor. Once the browser starts supporting add-ons, there are a sizable number of people ready to make the switch. There are also some users who use Chrome for its simplicity, as a barebones browser.

What browser do you use? Have you tried the IE8 RC 1 yet? Chrome users: How long have you been using it and is the wait for the first add-on making you impatient? Firefox users might be glad to find the private browsing mode in the latest beta – but couldn’t the feature have arrived a tad earlier? As for the Opera, will it ever be able to shrug off its niche tag -  do you prefer to remain with a niche browser?

Source: TechTree

On the Sunspider JavaScript performance test, despite all the performance improvements Microsoft says it’s making, IE8 finished last by roughly 3,000ms.  It was narrowly bested by Opera 10 alpha, while bunched at the top of the performance ranks and separated by slight margins were Google Chrome 2.0.158.0, WebKit r40220, and Firefox 3.1 beta 1.  WebKit serves as the foundation of Apple’s Safari browser.

ZDNet was not surprised to find that Google’s browser came in first on Google’s own V8 JavaScript Benchmark, while WebKit finished a close second.  Opera and Firefox trailed well behind in third and fourth, while Internet Explorer was a distant last.

Although its appearance is mostly unchanged from IE7, IE8 has received some new features, including a private browsing mode Microsoft calls InPrivate, joining long-present similar features in Safari, Opera, and Chrome.

The new Internet Explorer also has automatic crash recovery, domain highlighting for spotting phishers, and a safety filter.  New plug-ins called Accelerators are designed to speed access to information.  Users can choose from about 80 currently available for download, while pre-installed Accelerators include Windows Live functions like blogging, e-mail, mapping, and translating.

The browser, according to Microsoft, is virtually feature-complete, and users should expect little change between the release candidate and the upcoming final version.

“The ecosystem should expect the final candidate to behave like the release candidate,” said IE General Manager Dean Hachamovitch.

IE8 is compatible with Windows XP SP2 and Vista, but not the Windows 7 beta.  Microsoft says it will build a version of IE8 into the final release of Windows 7 with “unique features and functionality” exclusive to the company’s new operating system that will eventually succeed Vista.

Source: AppleInsider – By Zach Spear