Browsers: Firefox and others

A short discussion about existing browsers is essential before you can decide which one to use.

Compatibility

I have tested the site of La Relinquière in several browsers at my disposal. You will find below a table that sums up the results: numbers 1 (yellow), 2 (orange) and 3 (red) respectively mean that the rendering is in accordance with my expectations, acceptable notwithstanding a few unæsthetical details, and completely messed up; an empty cell means the test has not been performed yet (or that it is irrelevant).

Rendering in different browsers

		Windows	Linux	Macintosh
Internet Explorer	IE 5.01	2	-	3
	IE 5.5	2	-	-
	IE 6	1	-	-
Opera	Opera 5.0.2	2	-	-
	Opera 6.0	2	-	-
	Opera 7.2.3	1	-	-
Netscape	Netscape 4.8	3	-	-
	Netscape 6.2.3	1	-	-
	Netscape 7.1	1	-	-
Mozilla	Firebird 0.7	1	1	-
	Firefox 0.8	1	1	-
	Firefox 1.0	1	1	-
KHTML	Konqueror 3.3.1	-	1	-
Lynx	Lynx 2.8.4	1	1	-
Emacs/W3	Emacs 21.4/W3 4.0	1	1	-

Note to Mac users: since I do not have your favorite machine at hand, I can not fix problems you will run into with Internet Explorer. I will do my best to settle this as soon as possible, though…

A perfect browser?

As we have seen before, all browsers are far from equal. Even if the above table can let you think that is the case, at least in their latest version, it is not. Two browsers that actually pass my tests may render the pages in a slightly different manner—just take a look here to make your own opinion.

There is obviously no perfect browser, everybody has good reasons to prefer one over another. It is nonetheless as obvious that from a strict technical point of view, there is a big looser: Internet Explorer. All of its competitors do a better job; even Lynx, which is a textual browser (no pictures), can be considered more powerful (it can use LINK tags for example).

IE poorly implements standards defined by W3C. Moreover, it is buggy. As if this was not enough, Microsoft does not plan any new version before 2006. Not counting a possible delay, IE users will have to wait two years before they can enjoy—perhaps—functionalities that other browsers provide today. But why wait?

A large selection

There are at least four very good visual browsers for Windows: Netscape, Mozilla, Firefox and Opera. There are a lot more, but these are certainly the most well-known. An other good point over Internet Explorer, they are all free…

I can not recommend Netscape, though, because its development has been stopped: if you switch, then switch to a fully alive product. Opera and Mozilla are both excellent, but I personnally think they are two complex and bulky on a desktop (especially Opera). Now remains my favorite, Firefox: it is actually a light version of Mozilla. Powerful, fast, convenient, here you can make your own idea about how much it can enrich your browsing experience.

If you are still reluctant, if you are afraid not to be able to install it, I can help you out: get in touch with me, I will answer. The procedure is utterly simple.