The Real Firefox-Killer

Linux Journal ^ | 03 January 2007 | Glyn Moody

[ShadowAce]

[frogjerk]

Firefox may die so I'll just move on to the next generation browser...and that ain't IE 7.

[KoRn]

Interesting. I've never even heard of the Maxthon browser until reading this. It would take allot to pull me away from Firefox. I installed IE7 on a PC at the office, and it was just horrible. It's like they wanted to be like Firefox but it's the worst looking interface I've ever seen. Not to mention, by default it's security settings will disrupt your work if you so much as sneeze in front of your computer while the browser is running.

[VastRWCon]

Dang, just when I had everything working in IE6 and Firefox... before I download IE7 if you have downloaded IE7 does my website still look ok?

my website

Thanks for the Freeper "TECH" input!

yes, this opens in a new window so you wont lose FR!

[FoxInSocks]

Yeah, like I'm going to install that ChiCom software on my computer.

[Kewlhand`tek]

ah, This was MYIE it worked pretty good a few years ago till I started useing firefox.

[Anti-Bubba182]

That is what I thought! Who knows what "back doors" etc. may be in that?

[ShadowAce]

Yeah, like I'm going to install that ChiCom software on my computer.

That's the main reason I posted this article. There are several FReepers who use and like it a lot. I'm hoping that once they see where it comes from they'll change their minds.

[ikka]

If it won't run on any Unixes, it won't be very relevant in a few years.

[facedown]

...(Firefox regularly eats up 200-300 Mbytes on my systems).

It only uses 60-80 megs on mine.

[Centurion2000]

Worst of all, perhaps, is that the Maxthon browser is actually better than Firefox. That is, it offers all of the features we have come to know and love on Firefox - tabbed browsing, adblocks, skins, plugins - together with several innovative ideas, such as automatic detection of RSS feeds, built-in Babel Fish translation, quick links to Google's cache, mouse gestures as standard, and plugins for Gmail, Hotmail, Bloglines, and coComment already installed.

And a nice backdoor that will let the Chinese Ministry of State Security and Chinese Red Army InfoWarfare Battalions 0wn your box at will.

[Cicero]

built-in Babel Fish translation, quick links to Google's cache, mouse gestures as standard, and plugins for Gmail, Hotmail, Bloglines, and coComment already installed.

Why is this a plus? Few people would use all of these gadgets, and if they don't, then it's just so much bloatware. You really don't want a bunch of plugins you don't intend to use.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

This new competitor is called Maxthon

Not new. Same old story as "MYIE", "Greenbrowser" and a host of others that are overlays for Internet Explorer.

I have tried them and have tried Maxthon. It is no real competition for Firefox.
I like Greenbrowser better than Maxthon because it is mere an executable with no install necessary, can be run from a flash drive and uses IE on the backend so it is compatible with my company's webpages which require IE.

But I will not give up Firefox.

[JerseyHighlander]

The author is a self admitted idiot. how can you work in the IT field reviewing browsers, know about and explicitly mention firefox's user community bug reporting system, and yet not figure out why you have a memory leak.

Also, everything he said Maxthon has that Firefox doesn;t, well, I'm running firefox 2 and I have everyone of those options.

Worst of all, perhaps, is that the Maxthon browser is actually better than Firefox. That is, it offers all of the features we have come to know and love on Firefox - tabbed browsing, adblocks, skins, plugins - together with several innovative ideas, such as automatic detection of RSS feeds, built-in Babel Fish translation, quick links to Google's cache, mouse gestures as standard, and plugins for Gmail, Hotmail, Bloglines, and coComment already installed.

autdetection of RSS - Live Bookmarks and/or Sage

built in translation - http://backword.gneheix.com or https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/3361/

quick links to google cache - Diggler - use force version compatibility extension first: http://diggler.mozdev.org/

mouse gestures as standard - Firefox2 has several competing gesture extensions

plugin for gmail - that' s a 1 minute change to chrome to make right click go to gmail or yahoo mail or gmail, or use http://www.addonzilla.com/index.php?mod=content&read=5 to put a gmail yahoo or whatevermail icon on a toolbar

Blogging quicklinks - firefox2 has plugins for at least 2 dozen blog sites and backends.

As for working with CoComment this author is straight out lieing, or was hoping so few of his readers use it they wouldn't notice he is pulling shit out of his arse. CoComment and maxthon are simply incompatible at this time. There is a big warning on cocomment.com's compatibility page describing how maxthon doesn't work with cocomment, and how a firefox/flock/netscape greasemonkey script makes it extremely easy to use CoComment with the mozilla forks.

I want to get paid to right total garbage and not have to make coherent commentary.

[Doohickey]

Looks fine on IE7 and Vista.

[WireAndWood]

I tried Maxthon a coule of years ago - just as it was changing to that name. Better than Firefox? No.

I used Firefox for quite a while, although I didn't like the way it handled a few things... and no matter how many times I re-installed (or whatever) it refused to remember my preferences on SOME things.

Recently I discovered K-Meleon. So far, I like it a lot.

[rzeznikj at stout]

It's very possible that it could run on *nixes...

First and foremost would be through Wine and Crossover...

[Professional Engineer]

I received a new computer recently.

IE has been opened and run one time. To download Firefox.

[lrb111]

"Recently I discovered K-Meleon. So far, I like it a lot."

I run K-Meleon off a thumb drive. Very handy for what I do on lots of different computers.