Asa Dotzler: Firefox and more

I look forward to the download count of Firefox 2.0 after 4 days. I'm sure 1.5 done better in the download stats than IE7 is doing. Overall we know that eventually the downloads of IE7 will overshadow Firefox but it's interesting to know how each one does before the automatic updates kick in.

But the question on my mind is.... How many of those 3-4 million downloads are developers who NEED to be sure they can view their work in IE 7 but use Firefox for regular browsing?

Devon, that's what I've been wondering too.

It looks like Firefox 2 already has clocked up about two million downloads (in less than 24 hrs) which is pretty good, but don't quote me on it.

Don't forget to review how IE7 makes webdesigners use character entities instead of the HTML4 Q element. Every time I write it I still can't believe I am saying it: IE doesn't support HTML, the most basic web standard.

Hi, Asa! Did you see the browser usage stats at http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp ? Firefox jumped from 27.3 in September to 28.8 usage share in October. IE7 also went up, but cannibalized IE6 instead of attacking Firefox.

I still prefer Firefox over IE7 in several regards as a Web Developer.

That said, I just upgraded to Firefox 2.0 and to my horror, there was a regression bug.

If you view the source of a page (again, VERY important for developers), you can do a quick find ("/"), BUT the "Next", "Previous", "Highlight All", "Match Case" and the Close (X) are missing!!!!!

Please, please, please put these back in ASAP! I can't do a find Next... I can't find case sensitive, and I can't even highlight all the occurances!

(PS I'm entering a bug in bugzilla, but I hope someone can look into this soon.

I've submitted a bug as mentioned.
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=358220

Thanks for hearing me rant.

Steve, it's not a bug. It was an intentional change. The / is for quickfind which doesn't expose previous and next buttons. Use ctrl+f or F3 to bring up the full search bar with those features.

- A

What's the use of this quickfind thing over the 'full' search bar, if you don't mind me asking?
Except the absense of buttons, it behaves exactly the same way. You could at least close it after search, or something.

one feature that should been worked on is the download manager, opera is miles ahead with their download manager.. i know, i know.. it can be extended with third party extensions but i believe the download manager should be updated, but i'm only a user so how am i to suggest such a thing.

Expect IE7 downloads to soar, because MS intends to push it out via the Windows Update service. (It *can* be considered a Critical Security patch...)

I got email from MS about it. It's an "opt out". If you are an enterprise that *doesn't* want it to happen, you must install an MS tool. I sent email to my IT counterparts about it, since as far as I knew, we hadn't tested any betas of IE7, and have some mission critical stuff (like our timecard system) that relies on IE. I can just imagine the fun if folks can't get paid because electronic timesheets can't be precessed, because IE7 broke something...

We're blocking it at our local WSUS server till we can test things. Meanwhile, I've been using Firefox as my default browser at the office because I'm an IT staffer and I *can*.
______
Dennis

Expect IE7 downloads to soar, because MS intends to push it out via the Windows Update service. (It *can* be considered a Critical Security patch...)

I got email from MS about it. It's an "opt out". If you are an enterprise that *doesn't* want it to happen, you must install an MS tool. I sent email to my IT counterparts about it, since as far as I knew, we hadn't tested any betas of IE7, and have some mission critical stuff (like our timecard system) that relies on IE. I can just imagine the fun if folks can't get paid because electronic timesheets can't be precessed, because IE7 broke something...

We're blocking it at our local WSUS server till we can test things. Meanwhile, I've been using Firefox as my default browser at the office because I'm an IT staffer and I *can*.
______
Dennis