
 |
|
May 13, 2013
David G. Savage: Church-state, literally? Supreme Court weighing public school graduation in a church
May 10, 2013
Rabbi Berel Wein: Be all that you should be
May 8, 2013
Peter Ford: Why China is welcoming both Israel's Netanyahu and Palestinians' Abbas
Warren Richey: Obama administration quietly backs out of appeal over new contraceptive mandate
Fred Weir: At Kerry-Putin meeting, US-Russia relations thaw --- a tad
The Kosher Gourmet by Leela Cyd Ross : Almost too pretty to eat, this colorful salad with Sicilian inspiration will tickle the taste buds and delight your visual sensibility
May 6, 2013
May 3, 2013
Kids, kittens the Same? With employee perks at struggling Internet pioneer Yahoo! it's hard to tell
Sandy Kleffman: Artificial kidney offers hope to patients tethered to a dialysis machine
April 29, 2013
Roy Gutman: Poland's new Jewish museum celebrates life, doesn't revisit Holocaust
Mark Clayton: Terrorism in America: Is US missing a chance to learn from failed plots?
Kim Murphy: Boston Bomber's 'Svengali' Revealed
Pete Spotts: Tiny satellites + cellphones = cheaper 'eyes in the sky' for NASA
April 26, 2013
Clifford D. May: Defense in the Age of Jihadist Terrorism
Sharon Palmer, R.D.: How to feel your best -- with plenty of energy, a healthy weight and optimal mental and physical function -- without driving yourself batty
April 24, 2013
|
| |
Jewish World Review
July 10, 2009
/ 18 Tamuz 5769
Firefox, Safari illustrate why browsers matter
By
Mark Kellner
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
The recent arrival of updated versions of two popular Web browsers Mozilla.org's
Firefox 3.5 and Apple, Inc.'s Safari 4.0 are perhaps more noteworthy than might
first be imagined.
In the course of trying to meet the deadline for this column, I've bounced between
Firefox 3.5, which comes in Windows, Mac and Linux flavors, and Safari 4.0.1, for
Mac and Windows. Both are solid, versatile and fast browsers.
Speed thrills on the Internet, as any aficionado will attest. I don't have a
stopwatch, but Firefox seems as fast as Safari, if not slightly faster, in some page
loading situations. While some of that depends on one's Internet connection, there
are also other factors that make browsing fast or slow. However they've architected
it, the Safari and Firefox teams have created browsers that work WITH the 'Net and
not against it.
Why do I believe browsers continue to be important? Because in the
not-too-distant-future, that's where we're likely going to do more and more of our
work. With all due respect to my friends at Microsoft, FileMaker and other
applications developers, the move toward thin-and-ultralight computers will mean
less disc space and memory for software and more demand for "cloud" computing
applications that can be accessed from anywhere, at any time, along with my securely
held data.
Thus, the kind of Web browser you have becomes important: the choice you make might
determine which online applications you can work with easily. I'm writing these
words using Adobe's online word processor, Buzzword, via the Firefox browser. But it
could just as easily be Safari or, on Windows, Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8.
Any of these browsers would take up less space on a computer than an applications
suite, of course, and you can then move data from the "cloud" to others via e-mail
or a file-sharing link. Work problem solved.
Which of the two new browsers is right for you? Windows and Mac users have the best
choices since, as mentioned, Safari and Firefox are published for both platforms.
Linux devotees are kinda stuck with Firefox, which isn't at all bad.
In Safari's favor is utterly flawless integration on the Mac side with the operation
system no surprise there and with other Mac applications such as Mail.app. But Windows-based Safari users won't suffer much, either: the program plays
well in the Windows sandbox.
Firefox's strengths are not only its cross-platform-ness, but also the huge quantity
of add-ins, add-ons, extensions and what-have-you that developers have come up with.
There are plug-ins to let you read PDF files "inline" while browsing, to magnify Web
photos, and do all sorts of things, including block Web page ads if you desire.
There are also idiosyncratic features in each browser that you'll either like or
yawn at. Firefox this time adds a "new tab" button just above the current, open,
browser screen. It's a great way to add viewable space without opening tons of
separate windows. In Safari, I really like the "Top Sites" view, which showcases a
range of your most-viewed Web pages and lets you know which of these have added or
changed content since you last visited. I still think it's super-cool.
Not that all this is without pitfalls: a wrong click on an RSS feed in Firefox will
obliterate your current screen in favor of the RSS page; do it in Safari and the
default option will, on Macs, launch the e-mail program and ask you to add the RSS
items there.
But these are quibbles. Both Safari (www.apple.com/safari) and Firefox
(www.getfirefox.org) are free products, and each seems guaranteed to free up time
and worries for you as you surf the Web.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Mark Kellner has reported on technology for industry newspapers and magazines since 1983, and has been the computer columnist for The Washington Times since 1991.Comment by clicking here.
Archives
© 2008, News World Communications, Inc. Reprinted with permission of The Washington Times. Visit the paper at http://www.washingtontimes.com
|
|

Arnold Ahlert
Mitch Albom
Jay Ambrose
Michael Barone
Barrywood
Lori Borgman
Stratfor Briefing
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Richard Z. Chesnoff
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Suzanne Fields
Christine Flowers
Frank J. Gaffney
Bernie Goldberg
Jonah Goldberg
Julia Gorin
Jonathan Gurwitz
Paul Greenberg
Argus Hamilton
Victor Davis Hanson
Betsy Hart
Ron Hart
Nat Hentoff
A. Barton Hinkle
Jeff Jacoby
Paul Johnson
Jack Kelly
Ch. Krauthammer
David Limbaugh
Kathryn Lopez
Rich Lowry
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Ann McFeatters
Dale McFeatters
Dana Milbank
Jeanne Moos
Dick Morris
Jim Mullen
Deroy Murdock
Judge A. Napolitano
Bill O'Reilly
Clarence Page
Kathleen Parker
Star Parker
Dennis Prager
Wesley Pruden
Tom Purcell
Sharon Randall
Robert Robb
Cokie & Steve Roberts
Heather Robinson
Debra J. Saunders
Martin Schram
Greg Schwem
Culture Shlock
David Shribman
Roger Simon
Lenore Skenazy
Michael Smerconish
Thomas Sowell
Ben Stein
Mark Steyn
John Stossel
Cal Thomas
Dan Thomasson
Bob Tyrrell
Diana West
Dave Weinbaum
George Will
Walter Williams
Byron York
ZeitGeist
Mort Zuckerman

Robert Arial
Chuck Asay
Baloo
Lisa Benson
Chip Bok
Dry Bones
John Branch
John Cole
J. D. Crowe
Matt Davies
John Deering
Brian Duffy
Everything's Relative
Mallard Fillmore
Glenn Foden
Jake Fuller
Bob Gorrel
Walt Handelsman
Joe Heller
David Hitch
Jerry Holbert
David Horsey
Lee Judge
Steve Kelley
Jeff Koterba
Dick Locher
Chan Lowe
Jimmy Margulies
Jack Ohman
Michael Ramirez
Rob Rogers
Drew Sheneman
Kevin Siers
Jeff Stahler
Scott Stantis
Danna Summers
Gary Varvel
Kirk Walters
Dan Wasserman

Tech Q&A
Mr. Know-It-All
Ask Doctor K
Richard Lederer
Frugal Living
On Nutrition
Bookmark These
Bruce Williams
|