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+--- Thread: What is your favorite Web Browser! (/showthread.php?tid=1391)
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Laser Link - 16th December 2003
Uh, I'm not sure what others there are, so let me know if I'm missing something and it makes you very angry.
My choice is Opera. I was using IE until a couple weeks ago when a friend told me about Opera, and it's fantastic! It's very power-user-friendly as there are tons of really cool options and tweaks for it. It has tabbed browsing which is in fact very cool, but the best part is the moust gestures and keyboard controls.
Mouse gestures are ways to control the web page just with various clicks and mouse motions. You can go back by clicking <right left> anywhere on the page, and forward with <left right>. You can close a page by right clicking and moving the mouse down, then right quickly. It makes it real easy to kill pop-ups. Or you can refresh with Right click, then moving up and down. There are so many different gestures like that, and it does take a little while to get used to it. But once you do you get hooked.
It also has complete keyboard control, so that you can do everything without a mouse! That's pretty extreme, but there are a couple nice keyboard things that speed you up. My favorite is pressing Z to go back and X to go forward- it's even quicker than mouse gestures.
Oh, and one nice thing I've found is that the plug-ins (like flash or java) actually install and work, unlike the Mozilla Firebird ones I've tried.
And of course there are plenty of cool skins, and it's free (with a little banner add at the top right corner of the screen), and very, very fast. Opera is the best browser I've used and I am even considering buying the full version to reward the programmers who made such a fine product.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Weltall - 16th December 2003
I still use Momo. Though, I hear so much about the tabbing, yet it seems rather poorly implemented. There doesn't seem to be a way to default the option to open new windows as tabs.
The popup blocker is 100% foolproof though, which is a major plus.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - OB1 - 16th December 2003
Mozilla. The great pop-up blocker of Netscape but with great anti-spyware features.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Great Rumbler - 16th December 2003
I use Netscape.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 16th December 2003
Netscape. I've used Mozilla before, but it's kind of plain... I like the graphical look of Netscape better, and it's nearly feature-equal. Well, except for the fact that NS integrates AIM into it, which is a program I use so I find that feature useful.
I love tabs. I love the option that has center click open la link into a new tab... I now open links more with centrer click than left click, probably. :)
And Weltall, what do you mean? I don't know of an option that lets you left-click to open a new tab, but there's the one that does that for center-click...
Though, some links can't be opened in new tabs, like buttons or java links that open into new windows or stuff. It's kind of annoying when sites have those java window links where they put parts of the site... sure, it lets them make it all fancy and stuff, but can't the browser people do a way of opening those windows in new tabs as opposed to requiring new windows? And I want to be able to center-click buttons and have them open that link into a new window. :)
What is your favorite Web Browser! - The Former DMiller - 16th December 2003
It took me a while to find a browser I really liked. After Netscape fell apart I was forced to use Internet Explorer for a while which I didn't mind too much. Eventually IE just became bloatware so I moved on to Opera which was pretty good, but it loaded pages just as slow as IE. I wasn't the biggest fan of mouse gestures so that wasn't a big selling point of Opera for me so I moved on to a Mac-only browser called Camino. It was incredibly fast and had a bunch of cool features, but it was a beta (and still is) so it had it's problems. Once Apple released a final version of their web browser, Safari, I was set. The pre-1.0 versions of Safari crashed a lot so I didn't use it much, but since 1.0 I've been in love. It isn't much better than Firebird, but in terms of speed it is much better than Opera, and especially IE, in my opinion.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 16th December 2003
I've never heard of Safari, Galeon, Lynx, or Camino...
Oh, those mouse controls in Opera sound strange and annoying... I frequently for some reason like to highlight text (with left mouse obviously) while I'm reading pages so if things used left mouse I'd constantly be doing things I didn't want to. :)
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Laser Link - 16th December 2003
I think the Opera Mouse Gestures are right-button only, so you shouldn't have to worry about they highliting thing. I do that a lot myself. I think of them as being like the special attacks in a fighting game. :) The only problem comes if you accidentally do the wrong one- like I just did. I tried to open up a new blank tab (rightclick and mouse down) and accidentally closed the current tab (rightclick and mouse down then mouse right). But it's pretty darn addicitive and fun too, for me at least.
I used Firebird for a little while, but then I had to reinstall Windows and never put Firebird back on. It was cool, but I had some trouble with getting plug-ins to work sometimes and it also had some problems with crashing and even starting up sometimes. This is to be expected though, as it is still very much a work in progress.
Galeon is a browser that come with the Gnome desktop environment for Linux. KDE, the other big Linux desktop environment has it's own browser too, called Konqueror. I think both are based off Mozilla, since that is Open Source. As for Camino and Safari- I hadn't heard of either one until I made this poll. I came across both, but just went with Safari since it is the default Mac browser. And Lynx is an old school- text based browser for Unix. It is like going online through DOS. :) No pictures, just text, and it has to be controlled through the keyboard. Obviously not something people use much anymore, but I did play with it once when I was bored.
ABF, Opera does put those Java pop-ups into tabs, so you can navigate them that way.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 16th December 2003
Oh, Gnome... I've barely used that one. My dad has KDE in his Linux install. So I have used Konqueror, a few times... I don't remember it much, except to say that it's not nearly as good as Mozilla. And Firebird has some cool features but yes, has issues because of how its in development like it is.
Right, Lynx... actually I thought I might have heard that somewhere but couldn't remember anything about it... so that's what it was. :)
And those mouse gestures... I don't know, is it so hard to go to the top of the screen and push a button? Not that I use back/forward/reload/stop much anyway, and those are the only buttons there..."
And how about Mosaic? It doesn't get to be in the poll? :D
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Laser Link - 19th December 2003
Quote:And those mouse gestures... I don't know, is it so hard to go to the top of the screen and push a button? Not that I use back/forward/reload/stop much anyway, and those are the only buttons there..."
Yes, it is. :)
Alright, I'll put Mosaic on there too. I had forgotten about that.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 19th December 2003
But who uses those buttons anyway, unless a page is messed up and you want to refresh it... which is a rare enough occurance that using the button doesn't matter...
Oh yeah, and in Netscape they have keyboard shortcuts... 'back' is Alt+Left Arrow, 'Reload' is Control+R, etc... but I've never used them. No point, those buttons aren't especially useful really.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - The Former DMiller - 19th December 2003
Quote:Originally posted by A Black Falcon
And how about Mosaic? It doesn't get to be in the poll? :D
University of Illinois represent! We gave you the web browser, and we can take it away!
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Dark Jaguar - 19th December 2003
I must say mouse gestures just get in the way for me. I accidently activate them far too often in browsers I've used that had them. My main problem is incompatibilities here and there with others that I don't get with IE. Recently, I got AvantBrowser, which is basically just an up to date shell for IE. I get the standard compatibility I want (not just talking plugins here ABF, I'm talking how pages load and work), plus a nice shell with all the features I need that IE doesn't have on it's own. Mainly, the flash plug-in disabler button and the pop-up blocker. The pop-up blocker is the most effective one I've used. Maybe not the best, but I'd say the best free one. Plus, it's built right in.
There's the tabbed browsing thing, but to be honest even though I've been using this for a few weeks now, I still don't see the big deal about it. It's basically just like the task bar, only a little lower down and specifically for web pages. (I keep my task bar at the top of the screen.) The look isn't all that nice, but oh well it's functional and has a VERY small memory footprint. It's all I really need.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 19th December 2003
Does it have the list of sites exempted from the pop-up blocker? A look as nice and integrated as Netscape's? The lists of sites you let put cookies on your system or block from putting cookies on your system?
You don't see how tabbed browsing is good... uh, amazing... unless you're one of those strange people who actually like to have the taskbar on the screen all the time? What an awful waste of screen real estate... autohide is the only way to go. Having it onscreen takes up a big block of the screen. And with autohide you have to go down, make it appear, and find the page you want... but when like usual you're running multiple webpages at once you've got to look through the running programs and remember which are webpage windows and which are programs, etc, and deal with the fact that you've got a limited amount of space due to the systray and start menu, etc... having the webpages on a bar on the screen all the time (integrated into the interface) is a huge timesaver and memory saver (running one program instance instead of five...) and just plain improves ease of use...
Oh yeah, one important point. Center-click opening of links into new tabs. If it had tabs but you had to open things into them the same way as you open links into new windows in IE -- that is, by right-clicking and selecting 'open into new window', tabs would be a fraction of the use that they are. A small fraction. It'd just be a webpages-only taskbar and system-resources-saver.
But with the center-click-into-new-tab... totally changes the way I use webpages, actually. Before, I'd open Tendo City, open the forum, go to the first one... MAYBE open two windows, but often not since having like ten windows open in the taskbar is a real pain... and slowly go through to each next new post after I write the one I'm on. With center-click I do as I've explained before -- open each forum with new posts into a tab, then open each thread with new posts into a tab. it often gets to fifteen tabs, easy... I can't imagine how horrible having to deal with that many things on the taskbar that often would be... but with the tabs it centralizes it and makes it all easy to use. And easy to open windows into a new screen, which is a VERY useful ability.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Weltall - 19th December 2003
Two points, ABF:
One, XP kinda automatically tabs all programs, if you have multiple windows open.
Two, when you run above 800x600, a visible taskbar is hardly a waste of screen space :D
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Dark Jaguar - 20th December 2003
Those features? Well I would have said something if it lacked them wouldn't I?
As for look, you have no idea how little that matters to me at all.
And yes, I do have autohide (and always on top). What's the big deal on just going to the top of the screen to reveal the bar when one has to go up there to click on the buttons anyway?
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 20th December 2003
Quote:Two, when you run above 800x600, a visible taskbar is hardly a waste of screen space
I've used 1024x768 some, and I'd say it's always a waste of screen space. :)
Quote:One, XP kinda automatically tabs all programs, if you have multiple windows open.
How does this work?
Quote:And yes, I do have autohide (and always on top). What's the big deal on just going to the top of the screen to reveal the bar when one has to go up there to click on the buttons anyway?
If you don't understand yet you never will... I mean, isn't being able to open a link into a new screen a huge, huge advance in browser design?
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Weltall - 20th December 2003
Quote:Originally posted by A Black Falcon
How does this work?
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Dark Jaguar - 20th December 2003
Um, I can do that AHYWAY?
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 20th December 2003
Quote: Um, I can do that AHYWAY?
Huh? You can't do that in standard IE!
And Weltall... ah, that does look like a nice improvement over Win9x. Still, definitely not as good as a tabbed browser... harder to get to the list (taskbar submenu vs. on-screen...) and (as I said) a lot harder to open things into new windows.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - The Former DMiller - 20th December 2003
Plus for those of us that like to use the mouse as little as possible (me) I don't think there's an easy keyboard command to use that like there is with tabs.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Dark Jaguar - 20th December 2003
Yes you can, you click and you open in a new window.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 20th December 2003
You mean tab, and center-click, right? Added with that 'enhancement' for IE that you have then...
Oh yeah, I've heard that the next version of IE will finally include tabbed browsing. That's expected, using MS's usual strategy to get behind technology late and crush the people who created and spread that technology with sheer force of money and power...
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Dark Jaguar - 20th December 2003
I just gotta ask? How on EARTH does Netscape make money again?
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 20th December 2003
They are part of AOL, a division of Time Warner, and don't have many developers if any -- most of "Netscape"'s focus is Mozilla, a browser made by another group (not part of AOL I think) and open-source, meaning anyone can modify the source code in projects like the very cool Mozilla Firebird...
So far "Netscape" has kept up with the Mozilla releases in its skin and with its extra integrated features that it has, but I bet sometime down the road it'll be dropped completely.
Oh yeah, and browsers don't make money, IE sure doesn't either... MS can just afford to force its pathetic browser on the public, just like with Windows, Word, Windows Media Player... the list is endless... -- the triumph of substandard software. How nice.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - Laser Link - 22nd December 2003
DJ, it is true that there are some incompatabilities with other browsers compared to IE, but the thing about that is that the other browsers are usually the ones that follow the true standard, while Microsoft makes their own standard. So since IE is the biggest, many people follow MS's way of doing it. Just a little FYI I recently learned at school.
Weltall, I've used the XP tabbing too, but it's not as nice as having it built right into the browser. This way all the browser pages are inside one program, instead of having multiple instances of the same program. It makes a difference because I can cycle through the Opera browser windows with <Ctrl+Tab> and cycle through the open programs with <Alt + Tab>. It's just a convenient way to seperate what I'm working on. And, of course, for more control I use the multiple virtual desktops that you can get with the XP Powertoys. :)
And with Opera, opening a link into a new tab is at easy as a right click on the link, then move the mouse down. No, I will not stop preaching Mouse Gestures. :) I don't have a center button, so this works nicely for me. I'm sure there is a keyboard combo as well.
What is your favorite Web Browser! - A Black Falcon - 23rd December 2003
Yeah, there are definitely some sites out there that don't work quite right in Netscape, but as LL says it's because IE is bad and tries to set its own standards... like MS's version of Java that isn't compatible with real Java, etc... MS just does things its way and makes people use their stuff or else. How nice of them.
And LL... no center button? You don't have a mousewheel? Poor guy... mousewheels are awesome...