Firefox 0.8 Released
Mozilla Firebird has been renamed to Firefox, due to trademark conflicts, and updated to version 0.8. They’ve filed their own trademark however, so hopefully this will be the last name for the browser. I downloaded it for OSX and am quite impressed. The new theme is beautiful, very minimal and it really looks like a real Mac application now. It seems a little slower to me than Safari, but is still quite speedy. The download manager is nice, as is the bookmark manager.
The Windows version also now has an installer, which should help a lot with people switching to Firefox from IE. Before you had to manually unzip all the files into a directory, find that icon, make your own shortcuts, etc. Now that it has an installer it will be a lot easier for newbies to switch over. Firefox still looks the same on Windows though. I much prefer the OSX version.
Though a very nice browser and much better than IE, I will still be sticking with Safari on OSX for my browser of choice. The main reason being the Bookmark syncing with my .Mac account. I have an eMac and a 12” Powerbook, and use both quite a bit. With iSync and .Mac I can sync my bookmarks, address book, calendars and todo lists, etc with a single click. Before this I never really even bookmarked anything because I would end up reinstalling Windows or use another browser, and I could never keep track of them. But now I always have my bookmarks with me, so I bookmark everything I think I might want in the future. I can even access the bookmarks from any computer with web access by going to mac.com and logging in (though they aren’t integrated into the browser like with Safari, I just see them on the screen like a web page when I view it from a different browser). If there was a method of bookmark syncing that was that easy with Firefox, I might be more inclined to switch, but for now this feature alone will keep me using and loving Safari.
However if you are using Windows, be sure to download Firefox as it is easily the best browser for that operating system.