Firefox 3.5: World's most popular browser

[Kym]

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=6498&tag=nl.e539

Data released by StatCounter indicates that Firefox 3.5 is the world’s most popular browser, having edged ahead of Internet Explorer 7.

AusPhotography recommend Firefox to all our members for the best site experience.
We only test the site with Firefox and IE.

Both Opera and Safari are also know to work well with AP but we don't formally test with either.
Google Chrome is known to have issues.

[cinvala]

I switched from IE to firefox about 3 months ago. I couldn't believe the improvement in download speed and stabiltiy. I haven't had a "browser has kicked the bucket and needs to shut down" message with firefox.

[pgbphotographytas]

I have been using Firefox for quite a while, I try and get as many people as possible on and using it.

[rookie]

Just downloaded and can't beleive the differance in the speed

[Tannin]

I'm a rusted-on Opera user these days, but there is no doubt about it: all three modern browsers (Firefox, Opera, and Seamonkey) are excellent.

There is no consensus as yet about the two newcomers (Chrome and Safari). Both have their fans, but both have had some very serious criticisms leveled at them too. One assumes that they will mature into quality products over time if their developers keep spending the money it takes to work on therm.

No reputable computer expert has recommended Internet Explorer this century.

[hackcessor]

I am a converted fan of Firefox

I keep IE up to date with an icon on the desktop, but only for dire circumstances

[Kym]

AP for Dec MTD by major versions

[ATABLE]Firefox 3.5|34%
Firefox 3.0|7.2%
Msie 8.0|26.1%
Msie 7.0|14.4%
Msie 6.0|2.6%
Safari|7.3%
Google Chrome|4.9%
Opera|1.4%[/ATABLE]

[seastorm]

I've switched from IE to Firefox a couple of months ago, and it's definitely faster on AP pages

[davesmith]

If you're supporting and testing with IE is it possible something can be done about the time it takes to display the screen? Clicking on, for example, a new post I'm confronted with 5-6 seconds of grey screen before anything is displayed.

[DAdeGroot]

If you're supporting and testing with IE is it possible something can be done about the time it takes to display the screen? Clicking on, for example, a new post I'm confronted with 5-6 seconds of grey screen before anything is displayed.

Solution: Install Firefox and use that :P

[davesmith]

Thanks for the advice, but it doesn't really answer my question

[Kym]

If you're supporting and testing with IE is it possible something can be done about the time it takes to display the screen? Clicking on, for example, a new post I'm confronted with 5-6 seconds of grey screen before anything is displayed.

Sadly no.
It's not our end, it is slow because the IE rendering engine is slow.
The content sent to all browsers is the same, I get slow IE on other sites as well.

W have implemented all possible tuning at our end.
Eg. We have stream compression on (all text is compressed), and we have caching on (all static parts should only load once for a session or longer in some cases).

IE can be tuned - slightly. Google 'tuning internet explorer speed'
Also: Increase the number of simultaneous connections IE makes to a Web server is the #1 fix (google for details).

[fillum]

I started using FF about a week ago after reading some stuff about performance in a thread here. FF was certainly quicker, but other than that I was a bit underwhelmed. Kept getting missing plugin messages and wasn't able to find some config stuff for colour management (in about:config). Tabs weren't as easy to use as IE, etc.

I was running version 1.5.0.3 and the updater wanted to install 1.5.0.12 so I thought I was pretty close to the latest version . Anyhoo now realise that latest is v3.5, so I just downloaded it.
So far it's all good



Cheers.

[Kym]

The missing plugins are usually fixed by installing Flashplayer etc. from www.adobe.com

[davesmith]

Thanks for the info Kym. Interestingly the IE issue has only become a problem since upgrading from IE6 to IE7.

[Kym]

Thanks for the info Kym. Interestingly the IE issue has only become a problem since upgrading from IE6 to IE7.

IE 8 is not much better. MS bloat

[Tannin]

Dave, it really doesn't make a lot of sense to worry about the slowness of Internet Explorer when for zero dollars you could switch to Firefox (which is much faster than IE) or Opera (which is even faster than Firefox). Both are vastly more secure, more compatible with international web code standards, and offer various ease-of-use offer features IE does not.

This site does load a lot of code per page - it's not actually very efficient HTML code - but that is unavoidable with any site powered by vBulletin. There are alternative forum packages, but they tend to be worse, not better. In the context of modern presentation engines, this is actually pretty good. The long and the short of it is - it's time to upgrade to a modern browser.

[davesmith]

Thanks for the advice, but no, it does makes a lot of sense if you don't have the option. I completely understand that FF may be quicker. I know it doesn't cost me a dollar and I use it at home. But when it's said that AP is supported and tested on IE it's a shame that the experience is less than satisfactory now. Having said that, as Kym said though, apparently it's a fault of IE. As I also said though, I never had the same problem on IE6.

I'd be interested to know if I'm the only one having the IE issue though as well.

[etherial]

I love to see Firefox doing well. I have been using it for years, since V1 from memory! With the extensions I like to tweak it to do exactly what I like. It's perfect for my needs.

[Tannin]

Iy's not exactly IE's fault, Dave. It's really just one of those things that we call "progress". Internet connections are much faster than they used to be, web browsers have become vastly more competent than they once were - and actually got faster, which is quite astonishing in a world where software always gets bigger and slower and more complicated over time - look at Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, spreadsheets, or Windows itself for evidence of this.

So we have faster connections, more competent browsers, and significantly more complicated web pages that look better and work better but demand a lot more work from the browser. IE's fault? Well, yes. But then IE (no matter which version it says on the surface) is a very, very old browser. None of the other browsers which were around in the mid to late 1990s (when IE was designed) would be any good today either.

(Well, except for Opera, but Opera never did follow the normal rules about anything.)