, 2 min read
I have had it with Firefox under MacOS
I have been a Firefox user for at least 4 years now. I generally enjoy the unrivaled flexibility Firefox offers. Firefox can be tweaked in so many ways. As far as I can tell, for standard-based web development, it is the best browser around. It also does pretty well on standard compliance, while Opera can give it a run for its money.
However, at least under MacOS, Firefox has becoming too annoying to use, so I have switched to Safari for the time being. I think that Firefox supports a wider range of sites and features than Safari, but here are some things that I cannot live with:
- Firefox, presumably because of its spellchecker, can’t keep up with my typing. I type fast. I type all day. I will not tolerate any noticeable delay between the moment I type a letter and the moment it appears on my screen. Sorry. I have crazily fast CPUs, there is no way a good programmer can’t get rid of these delays unless the application is bloated. In fact, I have noticed that several modern applications can’t keep up with my typing. Am I the only one who types too fast for Firefox?
- Downloading a PDF or Word file is a pain. Some dialog box appears and there is a long delay while Firefox does something, before I get to see my file. No good. I am a busy fellow, do not make me wait for a dialog box 3 seconds 50 times a day.
What I’ll miss the most? Firefox has customized search boxes, so that you can quickly search wikipedia, for example. Thankfully, it is possible to have similar feature with Sogudi under Safari. Not quite as nice, but close enough.
And Safari is fast. Oh yes, very fast.
Now, if someone could take the bloat out of NeoOffice, I’d be a happy fellow.
(This should not be seen as a vote against open source. I was a Konqueror user when Apple came in, took Konqueror and made Safari out of it. To a large extend, Safari is open source software. We just do not notice as much.)