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Firefox 2 – Review

October 30th, 2006

The battle of the web browsers rages on.Only days after Microsoft released its latest browser, Internet Explorer 7, the Mozilla Foundation has released its new browser, Firefox 2, ahead of schedule.

Firefox 2Mozilla’s Firefox 2Those who have read our recent article on the importance of adapting your website to comply with Internet Explorer 7 already know that these new browsers can affect the continued usability of your sites. In this article we will explore some of the new features of Firefox 2. First of all, what is the Mozilla Foundation and what is the Mozilla open-source software project? The Mozilla Foundation is a group of developers who, with the help of the programming public, have created free software for public use and public modification, the most famous of these being the Firefox browser. According to the October 2006 numbers, Firefox now represents 28.8% of Internet browser users. That may not sound like much but Internet Explorer in all its versions only accounts for approximately 60% of Internet users. That means that almost 40% of Windows users have actively sought out a replacement for the browser that came with their machine. From January 2004 with only a 5.5% share of the market until now with 28.8%, Mozilla’s browser has done nothing but grow in popularity. This doesn’t mean that you should throw out IE7, as it’s a matter of personal choice which browser you find easier to use. Point Click Media tests our clients’ sites on a variety of browsers, but we choose Mozilla’s Firefox for general browsing and personal use. Why have we made this choice? After having used the Firefox 2 Beta version for the last month or so, here are some of the coolest features that made our decision easy.

Improved Tabbed Browsing

If you haven’t used a browser other then Internet Explorer 6 yet, you’ve been missing out on tabs. Tabs give you the ability to open new web pages in the same browser window, with each tab labelled so you can easily switch between your pages. Gone are the days of four browser windows for four different web pages. Internet Explorer 7 now sports the tabbing feature as well, and did a good job implementing it, but Firefox 2 has much more control over the tabs with the new ability to re-open recently closed tabs in the history, and having individual close buttons for each tab. There is also a tab dropdown menu if you have multiple tabs open. Tabs have just gotten a lot more user-friendly and once you use them you won’t know what you did without them.

Spell Checking

Most word processing programs spell check your text with red lines under the offending words, giving you the ability to right-click and choose the appropriate correctly spelled word. Firefox 2 now has this ability built into the browser, so any hotmail emails you shoot off to friends or family, webmail you send to an important business associate while away from the office, or even that new blog you want to start now has automatic spellchecking. There is now no excuse for bad spelling while on the Internet. Now if only Microsoft would put that in MSN messenger those .

Search Suggestions

Like most internet users, you probably use Yahoo or Google for your web searches, If you do then this feature is for you. While it’s nothing new to browsers in the past year or so to have the search engine built into the browser, If you use Google or Yahoo, Firefox 2 now has the ability to suggest search terms while you type. As you begin typing your desired keywords in the search field, Firefox will give you a drop-down menu of search possibilities. This can be pretty convenient and saves time and typing.

Session Restore

As a company that does a lot of Web Development, Session Restore is probably one of Point Click Media’s favourite new features of Firefox 2. For example when testing new web builds certain things can cause the browser to become unstable and crash, causing us to sometimes lose all the pages we were working on. Not anymore. If for any reason Firefox 2 crashes or is required to close by another program, it can recover your web pages, downloads and any text you had typed in a form. It will ask if you want to restore the last session or start a new one. If you want your stuff back just hit restore and you will be back up and running like nothing happened. Great Feature!

Web Feeds (RSS)

For those who are not familiar with it, RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication which means sites that support this feature can “syndicate” or send news information to your RSS reader without you having to go to the page. Both IE7 and Firefox 2 have these readers built in now, joining the Mac Safari browser which has had RSS capabilities for quite a while. Do you have a favourite sports or news site? It probably has an RSS feed which means you can get sports scores and news headlines right in your browser waiting for you. Once you subscribe to the RSS feed on the site, you will receive automatic updates from your chosen site either in an RSS reader of your choice, or on your browser toolbar or bookmark menu. Firefox 2 has done a good job of organizing this feature to make it easy to use.

Live Titles

In older versions of Firefox you could always put your favourite bookmarks right in the browser interface. Now in Firefox 2 these bookmarks have what are called “live titles”. If the page your bookmark is linked to changes its title, the change will be reflected in the link. To test this I used an Ebay auction where the title changed as the bids and time left changed. This feature allowed me to continue working while watching that item I’ve been trying to find forever.

Old Standards

Firefox 2 kept many of the great things about the original Firefox like live bookmarks, popup blocker, etc. and gave them all an upgrade to run more efficiently. This means that Firefox 2 uses fewer system resources than the older version, which is wonderful when you are busy and have multiple applications open.

Security Features

We all know the Web has a dark side, but both IE7 and Firefox 2 have done a great job in adding security. Firefox 2 has upgraded capabilities such as:
Phishing Protection – Phishing is an attempt to pass off a website as a reputable and secure source for the purpose of obtaining financial information from web users. Firefox 2 will now alert you if it suspects a fraud and will help you find the correct website.
Automated Update – Firefox will automatically detect and download patches from Mozilla for any threats that arise. Another welcome feature returning from the old version which leads to…
Open Source Support – Since Firefox is based on open source code, there are thousands of developers available to quickly fix any holes discovered in the browser software and send the changes to the updater for public distribution. Open source guarantees that developers outnumber hackers for this software.

Add-on Ability

Just like its older brother, Firefox 2 allows you to add new features via its add-on website, . There’s something here for everyone, whether you want to control iTunes from the browser window, see the weather forecast each time you open Firefox, or whether you want to change the look of the browser. Firefox comes with the ability to skin the browser and make it look as different from the way it came as you want.

Final Thoughts

After spending some time using the new browsers, Firefox 2 has really impressed me, and that gets harder and harder to do after all the browsers I’ve had to use over the years. It seems we have a real browser war on our hands like we haven’t seen since the 90′s with Netscape and IE. Microsoft is putting in a very solid effort with Internet Explorer 7, and the new features of Firefox 2 this new war could take quite some time to be decided. Personally, I’m voting for Firefox 2 as it’s simply a better experience and easier to use. The session restore feature is a hands-down game winner. Believe it or not, Mozilla has stated that Firefox 3 should be ready for possible release this time again next year. So who knows what the future of the Internet Browser will be, but certainly it’s not going away anytime soon. To go to the Mozilla site and download Firefox 2 Click Here

Point.Click Media Productions tests its sites in all major browsers. If you don’t know if you are reaching everyone possible with your web investment, don’t hesitate to contact us for a free consultation.

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Posted in Product Reviews on October 30th, 2006

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