Firefox 4 Beta 1 Shines On HTML5 256
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner takes a first look at Firefox 4 Beta 1 and sees several noteworthy HTML5 integrations that bring Firefox 4 'that much closer to taking over everything on the desktop.' Beyond the Chrome-like UI, Firefox 4 adds several new features that 'open up new opportunities for AJAX and JavaScript programmers to add more razzle-dazzle and catch up with Adobe Flash, Adobe AIR, Microsoft Silverlight, and other plug-ins,' Wayner writes. 'Firefox 4 also adds an implementation of the Websockets API, a tool for enabling the browser and the server to pass data back and forth as needed, making it unnecessary for the browser to keep asking the server if there's anything new to report.'"
Re:Have I missed any? (Score:4, Interesting)
Plugins?
Re:Have I missed any? (Score:1, Interesting)
Have you tried this beta? For me, memory usage has gone down tremendously over previous versions.
Re:Peter Wayner (Score:3, Interesting)
Famous last words.
Well no... okay okay okay... I see what you're saying, there's no way Firefox could possibly take over EVERYTHING on the desktop, there are many things that operate outside of applications.
However, for what most people use a computer for, a web browser does most of it. Email? Who here has an email address and check it using their favourite browser. I know I've got a hotmail and a gmail. Surfing the web? Thats a given. Aside from games, what do most people do on computers? Word processing, spreadsheets, there is some work-y kind of stuff. But more and more stuff is being moved to the cloud (for better or worse, its happening). Eventually, it might reach a point where its standard to have your documents backed up online in a service like Google Docs, and then before you know it your word processor is an Addon or plugin bundled into Firefox.
Firefox has that flexibility in it that allows for more customization, which is one of the areas Internet Explorer lacks most (I'll compare it to IE since IE has a lot of market share). It also has that community behind it, in a way that
1)That there are a lot of people who use it, just for the sake of not being stuck to IE
2)There are a lot of people who develop for it, just because its the most popular alternative out there
3) There are a lot of people who use it, and provide useful feedback to those who develop for it.
All in all, even if you don't always like the course Firefox takes (some people complain its getty bogged down), its at least in the most healthy environment imaginable to change. IE, being in that tough spot of "All these businesses use Internet Explorer, we better not screw up" doesn't have the ability to try things out as much as Firefox does.
So - all in all, don't be surprised if the browser thats best suited for new standards (if Firefox beats IE at HTML5) ends up gaining a lot of momentum in this technological shift we're seeing lately.
Re:Have I missed any? (Score:2, Interesting)
::grumble grumble:: fixing a fucking FACEBOOK flaw instead of focusing on security.
Firefox 4 didn't catch up in canvas speed (Score:5, Interesting)
http://dionyziz.kamibu.com/3d/heli/
Chrome 6: 31 FPS
Opera 10.60: 46 FPS
Safari 5.0: 25 FPS; visually poor results
Internet Explorer 9: 19 FPS
Firefox 4.0 Beta 1: 19 FPS
Re:Horray Websockets! (Score:3, Interesting)
As a developer, sysadmin and end user I would like to tell you that HTTP is not for this there are other ports than 80 and the web browser is not a virtual machine.
Re:Its too bad the UI got messed up (Score:5, Interesting)
Firefox started as the browser that wasn't for your grandma. It had rough edges, pages didn't always display properly, but it was fast and tabbed an light weight with an installer in the single digits. This is how it grew it's user base, Trying to shoehorn it into the browser for grandma is retarded (Chrome already is better for that, by a good margin). Fuck your grandma, I don't want to use the best browser for your grandma. Our requirements are completely different. I want Firefox to be the best browser for me. I want separate url and search fields because I know exactly what I am trying to accomplish. If I want to stick some search terms through google I will, if I want to go to slashdot.com instead of slashdot.org I had a specific reason. I want the url bar to make a best effort at turning what I entered into a working url with as little guessing as possible and run with it.
Let chrome be the browser for grandma, they have the resources and the marketing power behind them. Leave Firefox pure to the roots it came from, and focus on technical aspects. If people want to change the ui, the wonderful extension system lets them do just that.
Re:Peter Wayner (Score:3, Interesting)
But what's the point of installing a word editor as a pluging? Just install OpenOffice.org already, it will do more and run faster than anything firefox can offer(, yes it's Java but firefox is *Javascript* which is slower still).
The beauty of web apps is noth that they can be installed as plugins but that they are accessible from any platform with a browser. From your PC to your phone to your gaming console, to your plane sit, to your toilet, if you live in Japan.
Any web-enabled machine becomes your desktop with just a login.
If an application requires you to install it as a firefox pluging, how are you going to use it in your car's gps?
Re:Peter Wayner (Score:2, Interesting)
That's true, if at all, only of the original, GET-only version of the HTTP protocol as supported by the first WWW prototype implementation ("HTTP 0.9 [w3.org]".)
Its certainly not true of HTTP/1.1 which is a generic distributed object-manipulation-and-access protocol following REST principles.
Re:Acid test still not 100/100? (Score:5, Interesting)
Those remaining 3 points are SVG Fonts.
Opera and Webkit implemented (very brokenly, in at least Opera's case) a small subset of SVG 1.1 Fonts; basicallu just enough to pass Acid 3. We don't particular want to do that small subset in Gecko, since it gives no benefits to authors or users over the existing downloadable font support (beyond the brownie points on Acid3). On the other hand, support for the full specification in a UA that also supports HTML is ... very difficult. SVG fonts are just not designed with integration with HTML in mind. Once you put an in a glyph, all sorts of issues arise (both in terms of the spec being underdefined and in terms of the behavior being very difficult to implement no matter what the spec said).
One of the previous commenters here linked to Robert O'Callahan's post about this, which covers the issues pretty well.
At this point, the SVG working group has decided that SVG Fonts will no longer be a core part of SVG but will be a separate specification, and that it might need some serious work if anyone is ever to implement it in full.
Re:Its too bad the UI got messed up (Score:3, Interesting)
You can't deny its convenience
Watch me.
I am posting this from Safari 4.1, which has two boxes at the top: an address bar, and a search bar. If I want to search Google, I use the search bar. If I want to revisit a page I've been to before, I use the address bar (Apple recently improved this feature in versions 4.1/5.0). Obviously if I want to enter a new URL, I also use the address bar.
Since I know what I'm trying to do (search my bookmarks and browser history, or search Google) I have no trouble choosing which field to use (and, for an additional hint, the former currently contains a URL while the latter says "Google" on it). When I type into the address bar, it auto-populates with a list of matches from my bookmarks and history, and is not cluttered by anything from Google. When I type into the search bar, it auto-populates with popular search terms from Google, which is a great feature that I really appreciate; these suggestions are not cluttered with search results from my bookmarks and history.
Safari's implementation is, therefore, more convenient than Firefox's.