Now that I have been using OS X for a couple months I want to do a comparison of the two major browsers for OS X, Mozilla Firefox and Safari. I will start out by saying that they are both great browsers and they each have thier own benefits. With that said …
Firefox
I have been using this browser since before version 1.0 back in my gentoo days and absolutely loved it despite its issues. Was an obvious addition to my new iBook when i got it.
Pros
- Extensions
- Huge user community
- Extensions
- Standards compliant
- On the forefront of browser innovation
- Full open source development
- Oh, and did I mention extensions?
Cons
- Slow
- Interface is a bit lacking compared to Safari
- Crashes on occasion
Safari
As the browser comes with OS X and is written by apple it is an obvious choice to at least check out if not be your first choice browser.
Pros
- Very clean interface, it IS an Apple application
- Standards compliant
- Also on the forefront of browser innovation, supporting lots of new technologies such as RSS
- Very easy to use
Cons
- Does not support extensions
As you can see my main focus on Firefox is the available extensions. It turns it into so much more than your typical browser. I use the Tabbrowser Extensions, SessionSaver, and, most importantly, the greasemonkey extions. The first two can be covered by the Saft Plugin for Safari. But the last, and most important extension does not have anything on par for Safari.
For those not in the know, greasemonkey is an extension that lets you automatically apply any DHTML script to a page based on its URL. For instance there is a script that loads on any URL that matches *mail.google.com/mail*(gmail) and rewrites the URL to use googles secure server instead of the standard for gmail which is unsecure. There is also a script that changes the mailto: links on every page to use gmail instead, a plugin to enhance flickr photo pages by adding additional information and links on each photo page. There is a script to add a link to rent a movie on netflix for each movie page on IMDB and vice versa.
After all is said and done, I *love* Safari, but the greasemonkey extension is enough to keep me from switching over from Firefox just yet.
For a greasemonkey replacement, try PithHelmet: http://culater.net/software/PithHelmet/PithHelmet.php. You can apply custom .js and .css per site - the only restriction is Safari’s DOM support not being as good as Firefox. The guy that made PithHelmet shared some of his code with the Greasemonkey guy!
There are more extensions are here : http://pimpmysafari.com/
How did you get it to add apply a .js file? I have run accross this before but could not get it to work, if you are using this and it is working for you, i beg you, get in contact with me and help me set it up :-D
Just out of curiousity, does Safari render CSS/HTML exactly like Firefox or are there some differences?
There is some difference, but it is very slight. You will notice it however when it does happen. Also Safari has certain ‘Apple’ things it does, like with buttons it takes over styling on those and makes them look like rounded apple buttons.
I like firefox, but I keep coming back to safari for one simple feature: its shortcut to send the link or page of the current website via Mail. (Apple-I or Apple-Shift-I) For some reason, people haven’t been able to mimic this feature on any other browser (must be something wrong or closed about the API to enable this functionality.
I would also like something to send the current url to an external bookmark manager, or any application for that matter. It should be a configurable option and the application should accept just standard URL arguments. That would be the very nice. And honestly I would prefer it was Safari, one of the main problems I have been having with firefox lately is that its slow. I am going to fully reboot this thing and not use firefox at all and see how it goes over the course of a few days.
Hello Everybody,
I am having one problem with Safari..The Site I am referring is http://www.topblinds.com/index.html
please visit this site.. and proceed with any product and add it to the shopping cart….then click on the checkout button.. you will be taken to the checkout page there you have one button at the bottom called “Place Order”.. now when you click on this button it should take you to the payment gateway.. and this works fine in Mozilla Firefox and IE… but in Safari it is taking me back to the index topblinds page… i.e. It is not working properly..
This is the code I had written for that “Place Order” button..
Is it due to the “javascript:document.submit();” or any thing else… please let me know about this ASAP.. I will be very much thankfull to you all ..
With Regards
D Nagesh.
I often copy and paste web pages (or portions thereof) to Apple mail to send to others. When I copy a page using Safari, the page is almost exact ( a few colors might be missing) but I get the same text/fonts and images. When I try the same using Firefox (2.0+), I get only text with changed size and fonts and no images. Anyone know why?
Dan, that is because Safari supports a rich text clipboard, meaning it copy’s the markup with it as well as the content. Firefox does not support that.
There are FireFox plugins that take care of emailing links to people. CoolIris is amazing as it stands (preview any link within the firefox page without opening a separate window) and happens to do that too. There is also a plugin called something like MailThis or something similar.
how come safari doesn’t have skins and themes like firefox?
B: Apple is very strict on maintaining a conformist user environment. They want it to look and feel like the rest of their applications. Although they have been slacking on that lately with several different looks, this has always been their goal.
So, basically we have concluded that, with the exception of the option of utilizing skins (which is a moot point), Safari functions better, runs faster and is a more efficient browser. And in order to accomplish in FireFox what I do in Safari, I have to download a bunch of plug-ins. No thanks. I’ll stick with Safari.
Rob: No need to sound bitter about it. I was simply trying to point out the differences between them. A lot of the features provided by extensions in firefox are not available in Safari at all. At the time greasemonkey was not available at all, since then some plugins have popped up for safari, none that are as widely supported or as good as greasemonkey in my opinion. To each their own I say.
Personally i think Safari is the better than firefox. Simply becouse its 3x Faster and easier to use. Where as secure wise.. safari and mozila are equal.
Overall Safari has been rated best browser of the year.. and i 100% agree :D