Firefox version 4 has been out for last 4 days with a multitude of reviews. This post is not intended to be a point by point comparison of Firefox 4 with other browsers like Chrome, Opera, IE or even with Firefox 3.6. What I am going to review are some special features and settings or tweaks in Firefox to make browsing safer (and how it can be done in other browsers, especially Chrome).
Is the Firefox 4 faster? Mozilla claims that FF 4 is faster than FF 3.6. Although I cannot ‘see’ any such speed improvement, it does ‘feel’ as though it is faster. Perhaps it is only a perception or the speed improvement cannot be experienced due to the limitations of my PC (running WinXP on Celeron 1.7 with 512 MB), only time will tell.
OTOH, it still uses up lots of memory. In my PC it takes up almost 130 MB of RAM and that is without any extension enabled.
Is the Firefox 4 slicker? Definitely, though has been accused of trying to mimic Google Chrome interface. To be frank, I think that all browsers have to adopt something similar as users today and in future do expect less clutter and more viewing area on their screen. Add to it the increasing demand for web access from mobile devices and cloud based computing, the minimalist look is ‘the’ way of future.
Does the Firefox 4 possess new features? Yes, apart from minimalist interface, there are:
1. The Firefox button is a real cute and though it was said that the button would be the default only in Win Vista and 7, it installed without a glitch with the button on my machine. It is also easy to switch to the ‘classic Menu bar’, if you prefer;
The second part of this review explains how to combine the address and the search box and the privacy mode, while the last part looks at http-secure implementation.
Is the Firefox 4 faster? Mozilla claims that FF 4 is faster than FF 3.6. Although I cannot ‘see’ any such speed improvement, it does ‘feel’ as though it is faster. Perhaps it is only a perception or the speed improvement cannot be experienced due to the limitations of my PC (running WinXP on Celeron 1.7 with 512 MB), only time will tell.
OTOH, it still uses up lots of memory. In my PC it takes up almost 130 MB of RAM and that is without any extension enabled.
Is the Firefox 4 slicker? Definitely, though has been accused of trying to mimic Google Chrome interface. To be frank, I think that all browsers have to adopt something similar as users today and in future do expect less clutter and more viewing area on their screen. Add to it the increasing demand for web access from mobile devices and cloud based computing, the minimalist look is ‘the’ way of future.
Does the Firefox 4 possess new features? Yes, apart from minimalist interface, there are:
- plug-ins or extensions running in their own ‘sandbox’ - since FF 3.6 (like Chrome),
- ‘door-hanger’ notifications instead of status bar (like Chrome),
- ‘Panorama’, a user level tab organiser and control,
- redesigned Extensions window, which is a tab now (like Chrome),
- ‘Firefox Sync’ feature as default (like Chrome),
- a dynamic, self aware, ‘stop/refresh/go’ button,
- a Firefox button hiding the ‘Menu’ bar (like Opera),
- Ability to use ‘address bar’ also as ‘search bar’ (like Opera & Chrome) - with a hack,
- Tabs on top of address bar,
- Private Browsing (like Chrome’s incognito) - available since FF 3.5, and
- HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) implementation by default (like Chrome) and ability to add/remove user specified URL (with ForceTLS).
1. The Firefox button is a real cute and though it was said that the button would be the default only in Win Vista and 7, it installed without a glitch with the button on my machine. It is also easy to switch to the ‘classic Menu bar’, if you prefer;
- With Firefox button >> Options >> ‘check mark’ Menu bar.
- Without button View >> Toolbars >> ‘remove mark’ Menu bar.
The second part of this review explains how to combine the address and the search box and the privacy mode, while the last part looks at http-secure implementation.
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