Firefox
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| Firefox | |
 | |
| Current version | 3.0.5 |
| Published by | Mozilla, open source MPL/GPL/LGPL/Mozilla EULA |
| Binary type | Universal |
| System requirements | Mac OS X 10.4.x and later 128 MB RAM (256 MB recommended) 200 MB free space |
| Website | Firefox |
Firefox is a cross-platform, open source web browser developed by the Mozilla Corporation and uses the Gecko layout engine.
Contents |
Features
- Add-ons including extensions, themes, plug-ins, dictionaries, and language packs. Add-ons can be installed/uninstalled, disabled, and have their preferences changed with the built in add-on manager. Firefox will also check add-ons and disable older add-ons that are not compatible with the current version.
- Automatically updates and installs of new browser versions and add-ons.
- Customizable search bar, support for adding additional ones and a built in search engine manager (Sherlock or OpenSearch plug-ins)
- RSS and Atom feeds via Live Bookmarks
- Inline spellchecker
- Session restore
- Click Favicon to view site info
- Phishing and Malicious website filter
- Full page zoom
- Bookmarks manager uses an SQLite database and supports tags and groups. Firefox also has a bookmarks sidebar for quick access to bookmarks and history. Firefox can also import your Safari bookmarks.
Advantages over Safari
Firefox's main advantages over Safari are compatibility and extensibility. Apple currently has no official way of extending Safari to the level that Firefox does, as it only supports WebKit plug-ins such as Flash Player, and InputManagers which may be depreciated in future versions of Mac OS X. This extensibility also gives Firefox the advantage of being able to integrate with the websites that the user actually uses by installing add-ons such as a Facebook toolbar, or by installing scripts in Greasemonkey to customize the webpage on the client side, and of course this same extensibility can be used to add extensions that integrate directly with Mac OS X services such as the Dictionary.
Criticisms
Firefox is generally criticized for not having a Mac-like interface and not behaving like a native application due to it's cross platform nature. In Firefox 3 Mozilla attempted to remedy this by adding a native theme to all versions of the browser including the Mac OS X version. Firefox 3 still doesn't behave entirely like a native Mac OS X application, but this can be partially remedied through the use of add-ons.
