Posted on 04/30/2005 6:48:42 AM PDT by r5boston
The Mozilla Foundation's Firefox Web browser passed a significant milestone in adoption on Friday, with more than 50 million copies of the program downloaded, according to its distributors.
To commemorate the moment, the foundation said on its Web site that it would create 50 limited-edition coins, to be distributed to people with stories of spreading the browser online. An additional, a still-unnamed prize will be given to the owner of the Web site responsible for the 50 millionth download.
"It's funny how the counter just blows by 50 million without a care in the world, isn't it?" Mozilla developer Blake Ross wrote on the foundation's Web site. "But it's not just a number to us. It's a validation of half a decade of work, and the beginning of half a decade more."
With its first full-fledged release last November, Firefox has shaken up a Web browser market that most analysts had deemed almost wholly mature. For the first time in years, the market share of Microsoft's Internet Explorer has begun inching downwards as Firefox adoption rises.
Much of the interest in Firefox has been driven by repeated security holes found in Internet Explorer. Some prominent security researchers have even recommended against using IE if possible, a criticism that has stung in Microsoft executive suites.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.com ...
Viruses can also more easily attack IE than Mozilla or Opera because of the difference in how they implement their security models. IE's support for ActiveX controls makes it very easy to write a bonafide virus and drop it into a web page.
As a developer I have come across a number of things Firefox doesn't do well. We're always having to crefully test against Firefox because of its quirks.
The US Navy also tried replacing all of its custom onboard operating systems on its ships with stock Windows NT. Doesn't mean that they knew a damn thing about what they were doing at the time.
"Third, the security model under Windows is, for the most part almost non-existant. The vast majority of users out there login as an administrative user because they don't know any better, and because of the extremely poor design decisions the writers of some software have made that require it."
First, security is a main concern within Windows. Your own two statements show why that security is voided by users, not the OS.
For you to say security is "almost non-existant" means you haven't a clue what you are talking about. I bet you are one of those people that do not know the difference between Windows 9x and Windows NT, aren't you?
"html is html - unless they are scripted to reject IE I don't see the problem."
There are tons of differences between standard HTML and the extensions Netscape and Microsoft have added to their browsers. Netscape also is the most poorly implemented browser in that it is not compeltely standard.
In the case of internet explorer, just about anything else would be better...
And there ya go ... I knew you guys wouldn't dissapoint me.
Predicatable response.
Every once in awhile, something will pop up, but only very rarerly. Firefox is much more secure and just fun.
Make sure to clear your cache. There are also some setting changes you can do to limit how much CPU usage Firefox uses.
Google on that...
I hate to break it to you chum, but you read a lot of wishful thinking into my comment. I happen to personally despise Internet Explorer, but am fairly fond of Visual Studio and some other Microsoft products. In other words, I am hardly an anti-Microsoft person in principle.
Btw I am more of a supporter of Opera rather than Firefox. I guess I could look at you and say that you despise anything that isn't from Microsoft based on your comment...
non-Mozilla Netscape has also been formally dead for several years now. It doesn't even have .5% of the browser market under its control.
I personally don't know anyone that uses anything less than Firefox 1.0, IE 6.0 or Opera 7.0. Nerd and non-nerd, I don't know anyone that uses an old browser anymore.
I have been using Opera 8.0 since it was released and love it. It's quite standards compliant and better IMO than Firefox, especially if you're a Mac user. Any Mac user should switch immediately from Firefox to Opera because it's almost as fast as Safari, but as capable as Firefox.
You could say anything you want, chum. But, you would be wrong. My home PC currently consists of a multi-boot, dual-drive with Win XP and Win 2000 on one drive and Linux Mandrake 10.1 on the other. I use FireFox as my primary browser between both OS's.
My original post claimed that someone will come along and say everything that ANYTHING would be better than Internet Explorer (or Micorosft in general).
And you did. Where was I wrong?
"I don't know anyone that uses an old browser anymore. "
It is still a large customer base for IE 4 and older browsers. I even know of a large corporate customer who refuses to move past Win98.
You were wrong for assuming that you have to be anti-Microsoft to think that IE is a piece of trash that no one in their right mind would use. I happen to primarily a Windows and MacOS X user right now. I had Gentoo installed on my PC for quite a while, but I am waiting for VidaLinux 1.2 which is Gentoo-based to come out before giving Linux another shot.
My post also implied that IE is the bottom of the barrel in terms of quality, rather than it "$uX0rz cuz 1tz fR0m m$" which is what the ABM crowd does.
Okay, but I originally said that someone WILL say it. Anti-Microsoft or not, I knew that the statement "ANYTHING is better than IE" would surface. And, of course, it did. Implying that you are one of the Anti-MS crusaders may have been misplaced, but I was right about the statement.
What is this Gentoo and VidaLinux? Are they Mac specific? I've never heard of either.
Thanks, I'll check that out. It would be nice to have FF work.
Thanks
It's my oldest daughter's creation. I liked it so much it's been my tagline for a while now.
Reminds me of seeing the trailer for the new Star Wars movie the other night when I went to see HHGG. One of the characters was touting the benefits of giving in to the Dark Side and the next cut was of the Emperor with a big toothy grin. I literally LOL when the thought, "Apparently, the Dark Side doesn't have a dental plan" flashed through my mind.
umm people have written viruses for specific cell phones with an install base of less than 100K....
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