Firefox 3.5 Final Released!

[bam23]

nvm, i had to enable it in options. just gotta wait for meh gestures to work again.

 

[FrostedxB]

Is there a way to preview before finally submitting my persona?

You can hit edit and upload images/colors, etc... and apply them to your own firefox before you submit them. Also, Joules rocks for finding these personas! I love this RX8 Drift persona, its dark and cool.

 

[VirusType2]

Speaking of which, have you taken a look into the new personas feature? They're just so totally cool!

www.getpersonas.com

I can barely read the tabs. Is there any way to adjust the opacity or specifically select a text color?

And damn, why don't they skin the title bar too. **** my title bar looks like shit.

About 75% of the time, when switching or previewing a different skin, it will never load.

Also if you untick the 'use text colors' it will stay whatever text color your last skin had forever, or until you tick the box again and select a skin with a different text color.


Buggy bastard child

 

[Dinnesch]

I tried it on my ancient laptop(1GHZ, 512MB), and it was fast as hell, I could hardly notice a difference with my much-faster desktop.
Resource efficiency(correct English?) is clearly the place where FF3.5 is improved.

 

[MuToiD_MaN]

I can barely read the tabs. Is there any way to adjust the opacity or specifically select a text color?

And damn, why don't they skin the title bar too. **** my title bar looks like shit.

About 75% of the time, when switching or previewing a different skin, it will never load.

Also if you untick the 'use text colors' it will stay whatever text color your last skin had forever, or until you tick the box again and select a skin with a different text color.


Buggy bastard child

Dude you're such a friggin' nay-sayer. Who pissed in your cheerios?

 

[Unfocused]

I use the Viva persona now, everything is nice an readable with it.

 

[MuToiD_MaN]

Too furry. I use brushed metal xp.

 

[VirusType2]

Dude you're such a friggin' nay-sayer. Who pissed in your cheerios?

lol. This guy is trying to get some feedback and maybe some advice about a problem he is experiencing. Someone must have urinated in his breakfast cereal.

I use the Viva persona now, everything is nice an readable with it.

I didn't realize that it was mostly the fault of the skin I was using. This one looks pretty clean and readable. I do hope they add some more features to Persona, like the ones I mentioned, because with some skins, the text is about the same color as the skin.

 

[Krynn72]

Dude you're such a friggin' nay-sayer. Who pissed in your cheerios?

You're just upset because Virus pissed in yours.

 

[VirusType2]

That wasn't me. I only piss in low kegs to top them off.

My issues with changing skins seems to have been on my end, a fault of my internet connection. Now it only takes a few moments. And I changed my windows theme so my title bar matches the skin.

Anyone else have part of a letter cut off in parts of Firefox 3.5? For me, the l part of the h is missing from http://

It's also doing it in the tabs. I'm not sure if it's FF3, a font issue, or Persona issue. EDIT: I disabled Persona and the issue went away. Not a big deal, but they will want to fix that.

 

[FrostedxB]

Found an awesome Russian hammer and sickle persona. Tabs are very easy to read and it looks really ****ing cool.:bounce:

 

[PvtRyan]

I don't like 3.5, it's too buggy for me. It hangs up all the time, seemingly when viewing a site with flash videos and randomly consumes an entire core in CPU time for no apparent reason. Seems to consume more memory as well, but haven't actually tested it.

Also, the Distrust addon is superior to private browsing, but it doesn't work in 3.5.

The new Javascript engine is nice, but not yet useful in practice as web applications still have to be programmed for the lowest common denominator (IE) which means the potential is wasted and the difference only shows in synthetic benchmarks, not in real life. The same goes for Chrome, it might be faster but there's no web applications that make the difference apparent because those web applications still have to be fast on IE.

 

[DreamThrall]

The new Javascript engine is nice, but not yet useful in practice as web applications still have to be programmed for the lowest common denominator (IE) which means the potential is wasted and the difference only shows in synthetic benchmarks, not in real life. The same goes for Chrome, it might be faster but there's no web applications that make the difference apparent because those web applications still have to be fast on IE.

Why does that make any sense? Programming for IE is a pain because some of the DOM is implemented differently, which means some methods or objects have different names, which means you sometimes have to write specific code for IE compared to all the other browsers. But it's still basically doing the same thing, and if you write a Javascript engine that's more efficient than IE's, like Chrome's or Firefox 3.5's, it's going to be faster.

 

[PvtRyan]

Why does that make any sense? Programming for IE is a pain because some of the DOM is implemented differently, which means some methods or objects have different names, which means you sometimes have to write specific code for IE compared to all the other browsers. But it's still basically doing the same thing, and if you write a Javascript engine that's more efficient than IE's, like Chrome's or Firefox 3.5's, it's going to be faster.

Yeah, any JS in Chrome will be faster than in IE. However, does it matter in real life? Synthetic benchmarks are one thing, but if you're writing something that makes heavy use of JS, it has to run smooth on IE. This means that it doesn't matter whether or not Chrome is 10x or 100x faster than IE, because there isn't going to be any application where this is noticeable because all applications have to be fast enough for IE. If opening a window takes 100ms in IE, because that's how fast you need it to be, it will take only 20ms in Chrome, but does that matter?

You have to program for the weakest link, especially when the weakest link holds ~70% of the market.

At work, I'm working on a webapplication that makes use of ExtJS, where literally all HTML in the application is generated by the library, and honestly: there's no noticeable difference between Chrome, Firefox and IE. At all.

Fact of the matter is, as long as IE doesn't have a Javascript engine that's in-the-ballpark-of-Chrome fast, all these advancements with Javascript engines are worthless in practice.

One idea that occurred to me recently is that perhaps Microsoft can use the Managed Javascript for the .NET DLR for Javascript acceleration in IE somehow.

 

[Operational]

Been a bit disappointed with FF3.5 so far. I'm getting regular crashes, encountering bugs (admittedly some of these might be due my addons, but they worked fine under FF3) and the whole thing just feels less polished.

For example, I wanted to clear my saved passwords so I went "ctrl-shift-del", checked all the boxes and hit clear just as I would in FF3. Turns out that option no longer exists there, or in any obvious place in the options menu. To clear saved passwords you have to;

Options Menu > Privacy > Use custom settings for history > Check Clear history when Firefox closes > Settings > Check Saved Passwords > Ok > Close Firefox > Open Firefox > Revert settings to what you actually want.

For a standard security feature that is ridiculous.

 

[FrostedxB]

Been a bit disappointed with FF3.5 so far. I'm getting regular crashes, encountering bugs (admittedly some of these might be due my addons, but they worked fine under FF3) and the whole thing just feels less polished.

For example, I wanted to clear my saved passwords so I went "ctrl-shift-del", checked all the boxes and hit clear just as I would in FF3. Turns out that option no longer exists there, or in any obvious place in the options menu. To clear saved passwords you have to;

Options Menu > Privacy > Use custom settings for history > Check Clear history when Firefox closes > Settings > Check Saved Passwords > Ok > Close Firefox > Open Firefox > Revert settings to what you actually want.

For a standard security feature that is ridiculous.

Just go to Tools - Clear recent history

You can clear either your entire history (select everything) or something from the past hour or two.

 

[Operational]

Just go to Tools - Clear recent history

You can clear either your entire history (select everything) or something from the past hour or two.

"ctrl-shift-del" is the shortcut for "Clear recent history"

 

[xcellerate]

The new Javascript engine is nice, but not yet useful in practice as web applications still have to be programmed for the lowest common denominator (IE) which means the potential is wasted and the difference only shows in synthetic benchmarks, not in real life. The same goes for Chrome, it might be faster but there's no web applications that make the difference apparent because those web applications still have to be fast on IE.

One of the sites I use for work feels pretty heavy, there's 3 frames and a lot of java. Some of the index pages have hundreds of linked items in a list, I just opened one in IE8 and it took 12.8 seconds, then chrome took 7.6 seconds.

It's true you probably wont notice a difference browsing digg, but I think there are some instances where a better browser can be noticeable.

That being said I have made a few pages for websites (php forms and stuff, nothing extreme) and every time I've made the page work for chrome/safari 4 it has always worked in IE. But there have been times when I've been editing a page that works fine in IE and barely runs in chrome/safari 4.

 

[FrostedxB]

"ctrl-shift-del" is the shortcut for "Clear recent history"

I cleared the history once and in like 2 steps, your description seems ridiculous and unnecessary.

 

[DreamThrall]

Yeah, any JS in Chrome will be faster than in IE. However, does it matter in real life? Synthetic benchmarks are one thing, but if you're writing something that makes heavy use of JS, it has to run smooth on IE. This means that it doesn't matter whether or not Chrome is 10x or 100x faster than IE, because there isn't going to be any application where this is noticeable because all applications have to be fast enough for IE. If opening a window takes 100ms in IE, because that's how fast you need it to be, it will take only 20ms in Chrome, but does that matter?

You have to program for the weakest link, especially when the weakest link holds ~70% of the market.

At work, I'm working on a webapplication that makes use of ExtJS, where literally all HTML in the application is generated by the library, and honestly: there's no noticeable difference between Chrome, Firefox and IE. At all.

Fact of the matter is, as long as IE doesn't have a Javascript engine that's in-the-ballpark-of-Chrome fast, all these advancements with Javascript engines are worthless in practice.

One idea that occurred to me recently is that perhaps Microsoft can use the Managed Javascript for the .NET DLR for Javascript acceleration in IE somehow.

Yes, you have to sure your stuff runs smoothly in all the commonly used browsers... but making something run smoothly in IE doesn't mean it will run like shit in Chrome or FF3.5 or anything else. It'll run smoothly in IE, and it'll run even better in browsers with better javascript engines. The other thing making competatively performant javascript engines does it up the ante for Microsoft. If all the completing browsers are kicking their ass, they're going to need to get their shit together and make IE better. Developers can foster this by suggesting to their users to change their browser if their app runs better in Chrome or FireFox.

Personally, I'd suggest having a "It is recommended to run this site in FireFox v3.5 or Chrome [why?]" blurb at the bottom, with the [why?] being a hyperlink to a page explaining why the other browsers are faster.

 

[Operational]

I cleared the history once and in like 2 steps, your description seems ridiculous and unnecessary.

For example, I wanted to clear my saved passwords so I went "ctrl-shift-del", checked all the boxes and hit clear just as I would in FF3. Turns out that option no longer exists there, or in any obvious place in the options menu. To clear saved passwords you have to;

Options Menu > Privacy > Use custom settings for history > Check Clear history when Firefox closes > Settings > Check Saved Passwords > Ok > Close Firefox > Open Firefox > Revert settings to what you actually want.

For a standard security feature that is ridiculous.

...:O

 

[FrostedxB]

Ok > Close Firefox > Open Firefox > Revert settings to what you actually want.

Being upfront about it, I do not understand these steps.

 

[PvtRyan]

Yes, you have to sure your stuff runs smoothly in all the commonly used browsers... but making something run smoothly in IE doesn't mean it will run like shit in Chrome or FF3.5 or anything else. It'll run smoothly in IE, and it'll run even better in browsers with better javascript engines. The other thing making competatively performant javascript engines does it up the ante for Microsoft. If all the completing browsers are kicking their ass, they're going to need to get their shit together and make IE better. Developers can foster this by suggesting to their users to change their browser if their app runs better in Chrome or FireFox.

Personally, I'd suggest having a "It is recommended to run this site in FireFox v3.5 or Chrome [why?]" blurb at the bottom, with the [why?] being a hyperlink to a page explaining why the other browsers are faster.

Never said that it would be slower than in IE, in fact: it will be faster in Chrome. It's just that it doesn't make any difference whatsoever.

My whole point is that the advent of faster JS in Chrome/Safari/Firefox is not going to let you build a hugely complex and demanding JS application because then it won't be fast enough in IE. It really doesn't change anything at the moment. Yeah, useless synthetic benchmarks like raytracers.

And yeah, I do hope that this is an incentive to improve JS performance.

 

[Laivasse]

...:O

Doesn't Clear Recent History > Details > 'Active Logins' checkbox clear what you want? Just asking, I genuinely don't know.

 

[DreamThrall]

Never said that it would be slower than in IE, in fact: it will be faster in Chrome. It's just that it doesn't make any difference whatsoever.

My whole point is that the advent of faster JS in Chrome/Safari/Firefox is not going to let you build a hugely complex and demanding JS application because then it won't be fast enough in IE. It really doesn't change anything at the moment. Yeah, useless synthetic benchmarks like raytracers.

And yeah, I do hope that this is an incentive to improve JS performance.

Okay, well I'm saying that it does make a difference.

If IE's performance is the only thing holding you back from making a "hugely complex and demanding JS application", well, sir, I'm afraid you're doing it wrong.

There's a whole word of awesome functionality you can make using JS that will work nicely in all current (and even legacy) browsers, especially if you use a proven JS framework like jQuery. If you need an example, look at basically any web app Google has made - gmail, their office-esque apps, etc.

So, absolutely continue to make your code as lean and efficient as possible. But like I said, encourage your users on IE to use a more performant browser so they can have a better experience in your app.