RockMelt: Google Chrome, only better

Friday, April 22nd, 2011

When we last looked at the alternatives to the well-known web browsers, we weren’t particularly impressed by any of them. Now there’s a new kid on the block, RockMelt, that’s coming mighty close to replacing Google Chrome as my default web browser.

When I say replacing Google Chrome, that’s a little disingenuous, because RockMelt is built on the same Chromium browser core as Chrome. It’s Google Chrome with knobs on. But for social networking and news-feed fiends, they are very useful knobs indeed.

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Android App of the Week: Miren Browser

Friday, December 3rd, 2010

Miren Browser isn’t exactly a unique proposition – after all, Android’s Market boasts dozens of third-party browsers – but this new contender boasts a shedload of features alongside one of the slickest interfaces we’ve seen.

It’s much easier to use than many of its rivals, which are feature-packed but often fiddly. Open a page in Miren and it’ll default to its full-screen view – which automatically hides Android’s status bar, too – so you can take advantage of every one of your device’s precious pixels.

Navigation options are both useful and unobtrusive, hidden in the corners of the screen and fading from view if they’re not in use. The right-hand corner houses a button to open Miren’s address bar as well as a handy loading dial, and the bottom-left corner provides a back button. The top of the screen provides links to your tabs alongside a small symbol to open a new page.

Desktop-style features are present elsewhere to make life easier. Chrome users will be familiar with the eight thumbnail images of your favourite sites that appear on boot, and they’re present here, too, alongside links to your bookmarks, history and downloads. Those eight thumbnails can also be customised with links to either a selection of bookmarks or simply the sites you visit most. (more…)

Is Google Chrome the new Internet Explorer?

Wednesday, December 1st, 2010

For years, we’ve been wondering how long it will take Firefox to overtake Internet Explorer. The latest figures suggest that it’s Google Chrome that actually poses the biggest long-term threat to Microsoft.

The TechCrunch blog is today reporting that Chrome has overtaken Firefox as the most used browser to visit its site. In November, 27.8% of the visitors to TechCrunch used Chrome, with 27.7% running Firefox, 20.4% on Safari and Internet Explorer in fourth place with only 15.7%.

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Why Mozilla needs to pick a new fight

Monday, October 25th, 2010

One of my very first gigs when I started at PC Pro in 2007 was to interview Tristan Nitot, the president of Mozilla Europe. He was an affable chap, full of engaging answers to questions he’d no doubt heard a hundred times before. The interview practically wrote itself – though for the sake of appearances I held the pen.

Safari for Windows had just been released and I asked Tristan what he thought of it. “I want Safari to have a significant market share. We want choice, we want innovation, as a company that’s what we stand for,” he told me.

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iPhone App of the Week: Firefox Home

Friday, July 16th, 2010

A few of us in the PC Pro office, myself included, have replaced Firefox with Google Chrome as our default browser. Firefox Home is an innovative reason to consider going back.

Mozilla claims Apple’s App Store guidelines prevent it from bringing a full version of Firefox to the iPhone, but Firefox Home is the next best thing.

It sucks up all the Firefox bookmarks and web history stored on your desktop computer and makes them accessible from the phone’s default browser. Better still, it knows what tabs you have open on your desktop browser and makes them available on the iPhone, meaning you can continue browsing where you left off if you suddenly have to rush out of the office, for example.

The iPhone app also includes a search facility, so you can tap in the name of that site you visited last week without having to remember its URL.

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In defence of Mozilla Firefox

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

Barry Collins just asked me to take a read over his “Mozilla founder is right: Firefox has lost it” blog, and while I’ve pressed the Publish button I absolutely disagree with his views.

It takes 30 seconds to fire up the browser, Barry says. Well perhaps it does, but it’s still much faster than Internet Explorer, and in general my homepages – pcpro.co.uk and google.co.uk – are ready and waiting for me within ten seconds.

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Mozilla founder is right: Firefox has lost it

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

I’ve written in the past about my defection from Firefox to Chrome as my default browser, and was called everything from a “troll” to a “little bitch” for moaning about its increasingly slovenly performance and constant nagging.

Now, it appears even Mozilla’s friends are turning on Firefox. The browser’s co-founder, Blake Ross, was reportedly asked on a web forum whether he felt Firefox could maintain even double-digit market share over the next five years (it currently has around 25% of the worldwide market, according to Net Applications). He replied:

“I’m pretty sceptical. I think the Mozilla Organisation has gradually reverted back to its old ways of being too timid, passive and consensus-driven to release breakthrough products quickly.”

I make him right. It gives me no pleasure to lay into Mozilla – Firefox was my default browser for the best part of the last decade, and Mozilla engineers are among the smartest and nicest people I’ve ever had the pleasure to interview. But Firefox has lost it.

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Is Firefox turning into the ultimate nagware?

Monday, September 7th, 2009

Firefox, it must be said, is beginning to get on my Bristols. Like a death by a thousand cuts, the accumulation of minor irritations is pushing me desperately close to permanently decamping to Google Chrome.

From the irritating freeze that seems to temporarily paralyse the address bar about 30 seconds after it has first booted, to the mystery disappearance of the close button when you’ve got nine or more tabs open, to the clumsy implementation of the new Private Browsing mode, to the way the browser refuses to reboot for about 30 seconds after it (increasingly frequently) crashes… Firefox is heading for a fall.

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Porn collection put people off upgrading to Firefox 3

Wednesday, August 26th, 2009

Mozilla’s Security team has disclosed a very interesting piece of research which suggests people refused to upgrade to the latest version of Firefox because they were afraid the browser would expose their, ahem, private collection of websites.

In May, the company decided to have one last attempt at persuading the people on Firefox 2 to move up to Firefox 3, by hitting users of the old version with a pop-up that prompted them to upgrade. Those who declined were invited to fill out a questionnaire, asking them to reveal why they didn’t want the latest software.

The number one reason for not upgrading was the new location bar, and the fact that it delved into people’s bookmark collections to suggest sites as they typed. No fewer than 25% of Firefox 3 refuseniks cited this as the reason they wouldn’t upgrade. In fact, almost all of the people who provided feedback had tried Firefox 3, didn’t like what they saw, and headed back to Firefox 2.

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Firefox 4 looks awfully familiar…

Tuesday, July 28th, 2009

Firefox 3.5 is still fresh, but Mozilla has been busy mocking up its early concepts for the big move to version 4. Now, these images come with a great big disclaimer that “These are NOT FINAL! THEY ARE ONLY FOR BRAINSTORMING/EXPLORATION!“, but it’s interesting to see which direction Firefox could be taking. Take a look for yourself and form your own opinions, but from where I’m sitting it looks like a certain other browser seems to have had an influence on Mozilla’s designs.

The first design is fairly typical Firefox, with the tabs beneath the address bar (click to enlarge):

The Aero effect looks nice, and it’s a very clean interface, with only minor changes from the Firefox 3.7 concept images which Mozilla recently released. But there’s also a mockup with the tabs – unusually for Firefox – moved above the address bar: (more…)