Firefox 19 Launches With Built-In PDF Viewer 288
An anonymous reader writes "Mozilla on Tuesday officially launched Firefox 19 for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. The improvements include a built-in PDF viewer on the desktop and theme support as well as lower CPU requirements on Google's mobile platform. You can see the official changelogs here: desktop and Android."
What about Save As PDF (Score:4, Interesting)
I would be impressed if they included a Save As or Print To PDF File option like Google Chrome browser does.
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Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:5, Informative)
Windows does not have it (at least not XP.) Linux does, as you said. I use that feature more than I actually print.
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Windows does not have it (at least not XP.) Linux does, as you said. I use that feature more than I actually print.
Since the pdf995 printer driver prints to file quite nicely, I don't remember if XP does it natively. But I don't have any reason to care.
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If I recall correctly MS were going to add a save to PDF, or print to PDF I think for Vista, and Adobe threatened to sue them over it.
So in this one case it is not Microsofts fault.
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Well, I could save as PDF in Linux 10 years ago...
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Vista+ doesn't have printing to PDF, but it does have printing to XPS. Which is more limited, but if you just want to "print" it for further viewing by yourself, it does the job.
Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:4, Insightful)
+1
I've been using PDFCreator for years now.
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Windows 7 does not have, too.
They have export to XPS, with a very user unfriendly dialog.
Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:4, Informative)
Windows doesn't have it because Adobe didn't want MS to do it.
This is why MS made XPS [cnet.com]
Stuart Parmenter wrote an extension for firefox after it started using Cairo (FF3) which would let you print pdf - since with Cairo that came pretty much free. It never made it into the default UI (as you say - it's not needed on Linux and Mac) and since the rendering architecture moved again to azure&skia I guess rendering to pdf wasn't free any more, and the extension no longer works.
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That's a Mac thing. Any program that uses Apple's built-in printer dialog can do it. So handy!
It's not Apple's Built-in printer dialog that makes Save As PDF possible. It's the fact that Apple's Display Engine is Display PDF as a replacement to Display Postscript after Adobe wouldn't drop the $10/OS license attributed to NeXTSTEP/Openstep when we merged with Apple. So Grafanino, Barnes and others rewrote the damn thing in Display PDF. They extended services to it via the Preview application and other APIs for 3rd parties to leverage, including the slowly evolving Printer Dialogue UI.
Re:What about Save As PDF (Score:4, Informative)
It would be handy, if you actually wanted to produce pdf. Given that Adobe's pdf tools are what most people use, and that those are absolutely the largest vector for malware IN THE WORLD, I don't want any more pdf around.
Why is anyone using Adobe Reader anymore? There are several very nice alternatives, including Foxit [foxitsoftware.com], PDF-Xchange [tracker-software.com], Sumatra [kowalczyk.info], Slim [investintech.com] and others. I haven't used Adobe on any of my computers for years.
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I would be impressed if they included a Save As or Print To PDF File option like Google Chrome browser does.
I'd be impressed if they included a Save As PDF option that wouldn't botch the PDF file. (The last time I did that with Chrome, there were strange fonts in the file and the top and bottom portions of each page were cropped. But perhaps they've fixed that one already...)
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At least in Debian the "print to file" option has offered PDF support for ages.
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That is based on the OS having a print to pdf driver.
So linux and OSX yes, windows requires a driver to be installed.
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I would be impressed if they included a Save As or Print To PDF File option like Google Chrome browser does.
Oops, I forgot one thing: Anyway, if you convert web pages into PDF with any frequency, you might be better of with using Prince XML - better quality and more control over the process, including slipping in your own style sheet. There's one really nice for Wikipedia, for example.
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It's free for non-commercial purposes. If you make money from converting web pages to PDF then it might just be worth that price - particularly if you need to automate PDF rendering.
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That's what CUPS-PDF is for. Any application that can print, can print to PDF with CUPS.
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CUPS-PDF is a hack. It requires the print server to be able to write files to your home directory.
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How is that any different than the print server writing out to the printer?
Everything is a file.
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But most people don't run a print server for each user account. As a result, the print server user account needs to have write permission in other user's directories. It's not a big deal... just create a ~/CUPS_PDF folder and give it +w or use your favorite method to give CUPS write permission. But it is kind of hacky.
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What else do you expect it to do?
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Print To PDF File option
File, Print, Print To File, select PDF or PostScript. Firefox (on Linux) has had this feature since long before it was named Firefox.
>2013
>Not using GNU/Linux
shiggyshiggy
Not new, and do not want (Score:4, Insightful)
New? That went in a few Firefox versions back, I think at Firefox 16. I turned it off, since I use Sumatra PDF (which is dumb, but safe).
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PDF.js became available a few versions back, but didn't come with by default, you had to install it. At least, I did.
Blogspam! (Score:5, Informative)
TFA links to blogspam, below is the actual release note list from Mozilla
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/19.0/releasenotes/ [mozilla.org]
Come on, guys.
Re:Its quite amusing..... (Score:4, Insightful)
That people are commenting on firefox 19.
Since this is slashdot, I kind of expected everybody to be on firefox 20+ (Aurora channel) or atleast the Beta channel.
Why? It's a fucking web browser, not a fantastic new game. Not everybody regards updating software as their main pleasure in life.
In version 20 Firefox will have built-in Emacs! (Score:5, Insightful)
Are they serious? A built in PDF reader, and this is only the start of things. Meanwhile there are Mozilla bugs that are over half a decade old.
This constant bloat of software, where a program eventually gets filled with so many features that it might as well be Ann entire OS, is one of the most dangerous diseases in the tech world. The irony is that Firefox was originally a lightweight answer to the entire Mozilla suite, because it had grown too bloated.
Every platform out there already has a PDF reader. My operating system has a PDF renderer built in. It works great. Why jam another one in the browser? They're just increasing the attack surface, and if a vulnerability in the PDF format were to crop up now I have to worry about getting patches for yet another thing here.
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Version 20? That's so 45 minutes ago. All the cool kids are already on version 25. This version has a built- in version of The Gimp written in JS.
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How many of you stupid fucks still do not realize that Firefox's release cycle is the same as Chrome's? And that they have an enterprise version with slightly longer time between updates so that if you don't want the new features, you can have the security fixes?
Re:In version 20 Firefox will have built-in Emacs! (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with Firefox's releases is they keep screwing with the UI. Little things here and there - like day I suddenly found muscle memory broken because the awesomebar stopped autocompleting full URLs and only did domains? (It's fine for the most part, but if you have URLs that are fairly deep... or say to get directly to a forum...).
If Mozilla updated firefox like chrome - where they don't mess with UI things at all (or default them to "off" for upgrade installs so it behaves exactly the same as it did pre-update) then a lot less people would care. But they don't. I don't care what version Chrome is at because it works the same today as it did yesterday. But every new update to Firefox brings trepidatoin in the form "what did they screw with now? And can I disable it?"
Ars Technica periodically runs browser wars charts [arstechnica.com] that show how each version of a browser is adopted. Consistently while a large number of people update, a significant number of people don't, much more than Chrome.
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Agree with that, but most posts like these just comment about the version number and nothing else. A lot of them are quite serious about it too.
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That's been at the same place since Firefox 4, right-click one of your active tabs.
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Chrome has a stupid release cycle too. But it's always had a stupid release cycle, the problem with Firefox is that it went from a nice stable development style to the bleeding edge Chrome style without even an apology.
You want an apology? (Score:3)
They should apologize to you for what, pray tell? For updating their *free* web browser more often than you'd like?
Rather than ranting, why don't you go here if the update schedule is keeping you up at night:
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/organizations/all.htm [mozilla.org]
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No, most of them are actually dead serious. And if it makes you mad I don't know what to say.
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It's not so much as a "release cycle" as it is a "oh we got a compile that is somewhat stable, here you go you ignorant hapless uninformed beta testers."
I've quite honestly have had no bugs worth mentioning since about FF4, so I'm sorry I can't change your sentiment on that. I hope you file bug reports though, however long it takes for them to be fixed.
Plus there's no reason for you to be such a cock-sucker. Did somebody take a shit in your corn flakes this morning? Mommy didn't let you have one more puddin pop?
It gets tiring, obviously I don't get literally angry at this. I'm sorry if mommy still feeds you but that's not my case.
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What do you mean "you've" had no bugs "worth mentioning" since FF4? That's a pretty weasel word filled sentence there.
Firefox has had bugs worth mentioning since the beginning, and remote exploits are fairly common. Some bugs are more than 5 years old - critical bugs even! Take a look at their cutesy Bugzilla bug tracker if you don't believe me.
You don't have to waste energy and tire yourself out doing things like white-knighting Firefox anyway, so go down for a nap, have a puddin pop, and get happy!
Re:In version 20 Firefox will have built-in Emacs! (Score:5, Insightful)
The PDF reader in Firefox is actually implemented in JavaScript. It's quite an achievement!
It doesn't bloat the software much; it's just a .js file that gets loaded when needed. I personally think this is the RIGHT way to do it; external binary plugins are much more susceptible to security problems than simply using the already existing JavaScript engine, which has been time tested to be secure.
Worry not, Firefox is in good hands.
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external binary plugins are much more susceptible to security problems
Who said anything about "external binary plugins"? Use the system PDF viewer. Obviously you trust the system you're using, so why not trust the system PDF viewer?
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That's why you apt-get upgrade (or equivalent) frequently. If your OS vendor can't be bothered to patch their packages in a timely fashion, get a different OS.
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Great, a Javascript PDF reader. Somebody has finally devised a way to make Javascript suck more resources than it currently does with Google's APIs, Yahoo's APIs, and so forth all running all the time on almost every web page.
God Damn Javascript to Hell!
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Studies have shown that most computers use less than the full 100% of CPU capacity. This change should help remedy that immense waste of resources.
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That's a solved problem - simply install FF18 on OS X. Playing YouTube videos will then result in 130%+ CPU usage, either using Flash (which itself takes up to 30%+) or HTML5.
Result? Stuttering / looping videos and an unresponsive machine. And yes, that's with a clean install, new profile, no plugins / addons / themes, 32 or 64 bit, etc. Dropped back to FF17esr, & everything is fine.
Somebody should fork FF into a stripped-down browser that runs fast, with the ability to customise it through extensions.
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external binary plugins are much more susceptible to security problems than simply using the already existing JavaScript engine, which has been time tested to be secure.
How does noscript affect this? Am I going to have enable javascript for every site that has a PDF that I want to view?
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How does noscript affect this?
Positively. I have no desire to use a half-baked JS implementation if I have FoxReader (on Windows) that runs natively. Even Chrome's built-in reader often is not sufficient, and it even asks if you want to see the document in a "real" PDF reader. There is no reason to bother with crippled implementations if good ones are available for the same affordable price of $0.
Am I going to have enable javascript for every site that has a PDF that I want to view?
Not required. What
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How does noscript affect this? Am I going to have enable javascript for every site that has a PDF that I want to view?
no, just once for the javascript file.
I've been using it on the previous release (it had to be enabled). It's generally as useful as Google's PDF preview used to be. But fortunately there's a one-click "show me in my system PDF viewer" button at the top for anything with fonts or images that need alignment. So far, I haven't turned it off.
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It's the same thing PDF Viewer [mozilla.org] does... maybe the same project? I don't follow such things. It works well, but I've always been annoyed that Firefox doesn't just dish stuff off to the built-in Mac PDF renderer - which is resident all the time and is necessarily snappy.
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Hmm, it used to be that PDF was secure, since it was render only and no way would anyone be stupid enough to have a PDF engine that could actually munge with your computer. But it happened. Now is this to repeat with JavaScript, which used to be for "light" web work to do some fancy tricks and is now being greatly expanded in order to enable the HTML5 new world order? Yes there will be massive security holes with this approach too.
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Are you fricking kidding me? Why is anything implemented in JavaScript an achievement now? So it's implemented in JavaScript, who cares.
I can't wait that the Mozilla developer offer a JavaScript API to modify the PDF, to offer some "dynamic" content in it.
Now they open the attack vector that had Adope PDF Reader for ages.
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No it doesn't. It has a handful of paid FF devs looking at it, and some folks in the Russian Mafia, and some more folks at the Chinese Cyber-assault brigade.
Just because the source is there, it doesn't follow that people are ACTUALLY looking at it. Sure, billions of people COULD look at the code, but in reality they probably aren't. And beyond this, without knowing the particulars of the entire Firefox code as a whole, how can they figure out if there are memory leaks and security problems anyway?
The "ma
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And how many are there in those other PDF viewers? That's sort of the point, just because one software package is fixing vulnerabilities with that frequency, does not mean that the alternatives are more secure. It just means that there are more vulnerabilities being patched in the first case than in the second case.
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Which is better than the multiple security vulnerabilities that have yet to be encountered in the no name, piece of shit PDF viewers that no one wants to use.
You mean like Adobe Reader? (Score:2)
Is any PDF plugin secure? Certainly there have been a hell of a lot of exploits targeted at Adobe Reader over the years...
Re:In version 20 Firefox will have built-in Emacs! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Don't you get the irony of Phoenix? It's a small and light version of Firefox which was a small and light version of Mozilla. It's turtles all the way down man.
Uh... I think he does. Firefox used to be called Firebird. You know why? Because hey had to change the original name: Phoenix.
Still no TLS1.1 / TLS 1.2 support. (Score:2)
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The technical bits of 1.1 are availaible in the NSS-library (the library created by Netscape at the time I believe and now developed by the people who develop Firefox).
The technical bits for 1.2 exists too, but I don't know if they still need more core, I believe they are under review.
The Firefox parts are almost there:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/showdependencytree.cgi?id=733647&hide_resolved=1 [mozilla.org]
The problem is really with all the webservers which still don't properly work with it.
Which forces a new TCP-c
Page Numbers (Score:3)
Re:Page Numbers (Score:4, Informative)
I hate PDF readers, embedding suckssssss (Score:5, Insightful)
Just let me damn well download the files, never open in a tab and render it.
Yes I know you can set this option but I use 3 damned PC's - and FF updates regularly (or dies and I need to do a clean profile) I'm sick of adjusting things to make things work properly.
Like the ridiculous copy and paste http:/// [http] bug - they strip it from the URL (breaking bloody standards) and I copy and paste it elsewhere. 95% of the time it auto-adds the http:/// [http] as it should, however 5% of the time it doesn't and it's frustrating (because it should never be removed in the damned first place!)
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howdy AbRASiON,
hiding the protocol display is controlled by a pref. you can disable the darned "feature" by setting ... ... to FALSE.
browser.urlbar.trimURLs
take care,
lee
How does it compare to acrobat? (Score:3)
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It is supported and will be patched if there are any vulnerabilities discovered. Adobe Acrobat for Linux was discontinued some time ago and no longer receives patches, and should therefore no longer be used.
Can I disable it, and use my own? (Score:3)
Or is the Firefox dev team still sure that they know better than I do, so that shouldn't be an option?
Great, more bloat (Score:4, Informative)
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Well they are giving everyone a leg up by including a PDF view. Whatcouldpossiblygowrong?
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Well they are giving everyone a leg up by including a PDF view. Whatcouldpossiblygowrong?
Well, it's rendered as HTML5 with some help from JavaScript. Speaking of JavaScript, however, my quick testing suggests that PDFs with JS code are not well supported; they show a yellow bar at the top suggesting you open with another reader.
This, coupled with the fact that it's written using rendering tools Mozilla has already had, suggests that it should be about as secure as their browser in general. More if you exclude Flash and Java.
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Firefox is pretty much the last browser to finally get PDF viewing support.
Although they appear to have got it right (based on my Android phone). Unlike Chromium and Google Chrome on Ubuntu/Xubuntu, where you have to fiddle with the /etc/mozpluggerrc file to get it to work right (and avoid the broken reference to Acrobat Reader).
Here's a hint. In /etc/mozpluggerrc, add the lines:
### This line should go close to the start, near where the current Acrobat Reader macro is defined define(EVINCE, [repeat swallow(evince) fill needs_xembed: evince "$file"])
### this group should g
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### This line should go close to the start, near where
### the current Acrobat Reader macro is defined
define(EVINCE, [repeat swallow(evince) fill needs_xembed: evince "$file"])
### this group should go in the Documents section, possibly
### replacing the defective existing group for PDF
application/pdf:pdf:PDF file
application/x-pdf:pdf:PDF file
text/pdf:pdf:PDF file
text/x-pdf:pdf:PDF file
EVINCE()
Re:Wow! (Score:4, Insightful)
Are they giving everyone a leg up by breaking all the add-ons?
Didn't break any of the 24 I have installed. YMMV, of course.
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The Mozilla PDF viewer is written in javascript, so it *should* be completely sandboxed.
Re:Wow! (Score:5, Interesting)
Definitely faster than PDF plugin. I've been using the pdf.js plugin since it first appeared. I'd never go back to the plugin.
Re:Still exists? (Score:5, Insightful)
1. it's got adblockplus
2. it's the only browser left that isn't directly targeted at marketing interests over my privacy (you worry about holes, but then trust google??)
3. a useful library of plugins. sure other browsers have this now, but not like firefox.
does that excuse the performance issues? hell no.
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I'm surprised more people here don't use Chromium. None of the privacy issues that Chrome has, no Flash plug-in by default, open source and super fast.
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3. a useful library of plugins.
On the desktop. Android, not so much.
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1. it's got adblockplus
2. it's the only browser left that isn't directly targeted at marketing interests over my privacy (you worry about holes, but then trust google??)
3. a useful library of plugins. sure other browsers have this now, but not like firefox.
does that excuse the performance issues? hell no.
Performance? Try loading even a 15MB XML file with moderate hierarchy to be rendered in Chrome (on either Win or OSX). Damn thing keeps falling down on large-ish files (I don't have extensions other than 1password). Firefox and IE handle them well (but I would never use IE to browse anything but our intranet).
Chrome is great, but I use it despite the performance.
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3. Vimperator or similar
None of the chrome plugins offer anything nearly as good. I want the URL bar gone and I want full modality.
Re:Still exists? (Score:4)
Chrome is built on good technology, but since it is proprietary closed source I prefer Firefox.
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3. what important plugins are you missing from Chrome?
For me, the big one is NoScript. There appear to be similar plugins for Chrome, but none seem to widely used or well rated by users.
FWIW, I use both Firefox and Chrome regularly, but for anything other than websites I trust, it's Firefox because of NoScript.
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Big problem with Chrome is all the new Google features that require Chrome. Google wants vendor lock in and Chrome is their tool to do so. Granted, Mozilla is acting very much like corporate vendors as well these days, so maybe it doesn't make any difference. I just want a browser that pays attention to the customer, and prefers listening to customers needs instead of telling customers what they need, and neither Chrome nor Firefox fit this model.
Re:Still exists? (Score:4, Insightful)
Biggest annoyance keeping me from using Chrome more is the lack of a clear address bar plug-in. Linux has this wonderful feature of being able to highlight something then middle clicking to past it. Takes a couple of clicks away from a cut-n-paste action and is real easy to do while surfing around. Without a way to clear the address bar, this is useless. I've been using Linux for over 15 years, don't remember when it was introduced but I've become so accustomed to it, I really can't do without it.
Re:Still exists? (Score:5, Interesting)
Firefox uses less memory than Chrome these days.
Plus, Firefox is just as fast as Chrome, typically.
And, finally and most importantly, Firefox has a zillion useful extensions. Like NoScript and Adblock.
Chrome is fine, but I don't like how it handles tabs (I use TabMixPlus on Firefox), and I *really* hate how hard it makes it to access bookmarks. Yes, you can solve the bookmark issue with extensions, but none of them are *quite* right.
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Chrome is fine,
Chrome is a virus that attaches itself to various other useful programs and hopes that you don't notice the "install Chrome, too" box is checked by default when you are doing something like updating java. It makes itself your default web software without asking. And then when you try to uninstall it, you are left with cruft that breaks how Firefox behaves, like getting an obscure error text about some missing or undefined variable in line X of something displayed instead of a simple 404 failure report.
It
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Who pissed in your Corn Flakes?
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I am dreading the day that my mother calls me up and asks me what this chrome thing is that changed her mozilla.
Re:Still exists? (Score:4, Insightful)
Firefox uses less memory than Chrome these days.
That's not a good thing. For example Firefox doesn't decode images until they are displayed to reduce memory consumption. The result is that it judders as you scroll and switching tabs introduces a noticeable delay.
My laptop has 4GB of RAM. My desktop has 16GB RAM. Even the graphics card has 3GB. I bought lots of RAM because I want performance, not pointless memory saving that slows me down. Memory benchmarks are not a good way to evaluate a browser.
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Noscript and Adblock are not a zillion extensions.
What, did you think he meant a literal zillion?
Zombie compartments, four versions ago (Score:5, Informative)
We banned it from our company after waiting years for various memory leaks to be fixed.
That was fixed. The Firefox memory heap is now divided into "compartments", and Firefox 15 changed memory management to be more aggressive at purging compartments associated with closed pages [mozilla.org].
Re:Zombie compartments, four versions ago (Score:4, Informative)
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Ha, we just implemented it because the IE DOM is too retarded to handle a couple tens (or was it hundreds?) of thousands of objects that are in the BI reports created by OBIEE 11g, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari handle it just fine but of those only FF with the Frontmotion extensions can be centrally managed to the degree we need.
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To all who modded me troll: WHOOOOOSH!
Actually I am in the process of moving to Chrome though. I have a highly customized Firefox profile and it took me a long time to get used to Chrome. I did it by using it full time at work and then on my laptop. Particularly on the laptop Firefox really chuggs. More than that though Chrome's UI just seems to make getting stuff done that much faster, especially the omnibox which works better than Firefox's Awesome Bar for me.
Chrome has some issues, like the lack of a goo
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thats eeevil.