Recent criticisms of Firefox missing OS-specific features indicated to me this week that there are a lot of people out there who are missing a fundamental part of the Mozilla project and its goals.
I think it is worth hearkening back to the days of Netscape and Marc Andreessen original concept of the browser. Netscape wasn’t designed as an Internet Explorer killer, it was to be a Windows killer. Part of the reason Microsoft (and now Apple and even Linux’s KDE) includes a browser tightly integrated with the OS is to defend the value of the operating system.
When Firefox began to mature earlier this year, I notes that it provided the best cross-platform browsing experience since its predecessor Netscape. By creating a browser bases platform-within-a-platform, the Mozilla bunch have created a superior browsing experience independent of the OS. Even better, through extensions you can check your calendar, compose email, spell-check text and even play music without leaving your browser.
Now, I am a Mac zealot, and always will be. But the most powerful attribute of Firefox and its email counterpart Thunderbird is their consistent performance across platforms, so it doesn’t matter what OS you are using. This is where the ideals of Marc and Open Source mesh, and where an exciting group of new applications begin.
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November 8th, 2004 at 2:51 pm
FireFox still has a few really annoying bugs with window handling and it lacks a bring all to front command which every other browser has.
Camino is a better Mac browser except for the inability to open a bookmark folder replacing the current window contents the way it works in Safari or FireFox.
Also, the middle button of my BT mouse works in Camino & Safari but not FireFox.