6 ms·

Firefox 3.5 - dreaming about the future of the web.

41 points by chanux 17y ago

TweedHeads 17y ago
I hope they implement WebSockets, that sole feature will change the way we know the web. The real-time web, the next "wave".
- megaduck 17y ago
  Hear, hear! The sooner we can ditch elaborate long-polling hacks, the happier I'll be. We've got a lot of features on the drawing board that would be enormously simplified by WebSockets.
  - TweedHeads 17y ago
    Oh absolutely, I've been struggling with java, ajax, comet and flash sockets for a multiplayer game. But imagine all the possibilities for IM, Email, web alerts, twitter, etc.
  - omouse 17y ago
    Or uh, you could use Java or an easily installed desktop client.
    - theBobMcCormick 17y ago
      Users are much less likely to use a service that requires a desktop client. There are a few exceptions to that rule of course; IM, twitter, and Skype come to mind. But I think it holds as a general rule. For example, if YouTube required a desktop client instead of working entirely through the browser, would you still use YouTube? I doubt that I would.
      - nopassrecover 17y ago
        Not that you are wrong (convenience always wins) but if a desktop client gave the only or the best experience I would imagine you'd pick it.
      - omouse 17y ago
        I have 4-5 different video players installed. I wish I could use just one of them to view videos instead of using Flash (which hiccups and crashes Firefox sometimes and doesn't even work properly on Linux for me).
mseebach 17y ago
I've been running 3.5b4 for a while. I've seen the future, and it looks a lot like the current version of the web, just a bit faster.
- jakozaur 17y ago
  It is pointed that the features of Firefox 3.5 are mainly for developers not users. So we will have to wait a bit longer before websites will make use of them.
ryanvm 17y ago
A bit sad how Firefox is now chasing IE and Chrome for features and speed. Oh well, were it not for Firefox we'd all still be running IE6. The King is dead. Love live the King.
- boundlessdreamz 17y ago
  It is definitely not chasing IE for speed. AFAIK firefox is faster than IE in JS and rendering and is also more standards compliant
- edave 17y ago
  Glad to see I'm not the only that finds it ironic how Firefox only took 2 versions to abandon the original reasoning (lightweight, fast, better UI) that made them so much better than anything else. It's not like in the last few years people have suddenly wanted heavier, slower, harder.
  - johnnybgoode 17y ago
    I never thought they did such a great job of that anyway. For example, the early versions of Firefox were about twice as big as Opera (in download size) and had a fraction of the features.
    - ZeroGravitas 17y ago
      Yeah, they basically switched off a bunch of stuff in the full Mozilla suite (now Seamonkey) but it was only later (for certain things much later) that they actually removed unused code and focused on speed and memory. So anyone who thinks that Firefox had "Features", "Speed" or "Lightweight" as original killer features is deluded. They did on the other hand have a fairly stripped down and therefore non-threatening usable UI (now leapfrogged in that regard by Chrome and Safari), extensions, being both open source and free of cost (without being ad supported), faking native Windows UI reasonably well, and not being IE6 in their favor.
      - edave 17y ago
enomar 17y ago
Anyone know what their Javascript threading model will look like? I am both excited and scared.
- niels 17y ago
  I think they are referring to html5 web workers http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-workers/current-work/ http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-workers/current-work/
lamnk 17y ago
I have just two requests for Mozilla: please make Firefox faster on Linux, and troubleshoot its memory leak problem. Even Firefox on my Virtualbox windows machine runs a lot more responsiver than on Linux host machine ...
- boucher 17y ago
  Firefox on Linux has never really compared to the Windows version. I hear that Chrome on Linux is working pretty well though.

41 points by chanux 17y ago

I hope they implement WebSockets, that sole feature will change the way we know the web. The real-time web, the next "wave".

megaduck 17y ago
Hear, hear! The sooner we can ditch elaborate long-polling hacks, the happier I'll be. We've got a lot of features on the drawing board that would be enormously simplified by WebSockets.
- TweedHeads 17y ago
  Oh absolutely, I've been struggling with java, ajax, comet and flash sockets for a multiplayer game. But imagine all the possibilities for IM, Email, web alerts, twitter, etc.
- omouse 17y ago
  Or uh, you could use Java or an easily installed desktop client.
  - theBobMcCormick 17y ago
    Users are much less likely to use a service that requires a desktop client. There are a few exceptions to that rule of course; IM, twitter, and Skype come to mind. But I think it holds as a general rule. For example, if YouTube required a desktop client instead of working entirely through the browser, would you still use YouTube? I doubt that I would.
    - nopassrecover 17y ago
      Not that you are wrong (convenience always wins) but if a desktop client gave the only or the best experience I would imagine you'd pick it.
    - omouse 17y ago
      I have 4-5 different video players installed. I wish I could use just one of them to view videos instead of using Flash (which hiccups and crashes Firefox sometimes and doesn't even work properly on Linux for me).

mseebach 17y ago

I've been running 3.5b4 for a while. I've seen the future, and it looks a lot like the current version of the web, just a bit faster.

jakozaur 17y ago
It is pointed that the features of Firefox 3.5 are mainly for developers not users. So we will have to wait a bit longer before websites will make use of them.

ryanvm 17y ago

A bit sad how Firefox is now chasing IE and Chrome for features and speed. Oh well, were it not for Firefox we'd all still be running IE6. The King is dead. Love live the King.

boundlessdreamz 17y ago
It is definitely not chasing IE for speed. AFAIK firefox is faster than IE in JS and rendering and is also more standards compliant
edave 17y ago
Glad to see I'm not the only that finds it ironic how Firefox only took 2 versions to abandon the original reasoning (lightweight, fast, better UI) that made them so much better than anything else. It's not like in the last few years people have suddenly wanted heavier, slower, harder.
- johnnybgoode 17y ago
  I never thought they did such a great job of that anyway. For example, the early versions of Firefox were about twice as big as Opera (in download size) and had a fraction of the features.
  - ZeroGravitas 17y ago
    Yeah, they basically switched off a bunch of stuff in the full Mozilla suite (now Seamonkey) but it was only later (for certain things much later) that they actually removed unused code and focused on speed and memory. So anyone who thinks that Firefox had "Features", "Speed" or "Lightweight" as original killer features is deluded. They did on the other hand have a fairly stripped down and therefore non-threatening usable UI (now leapfrogged in that regard by Chrome and Safari), extensions, being both open source and free of cost (without being ad supported), faking native Windows UI reasonably well, and not being IE6 in their favor.
    - edave 17y ago

enomar 17y ago

Anyone know what their Javascript threading model will look like? I am both excited and scared.

niels 17y ago
I think they are referring to html5 web workers http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-workers/current-work/ http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-workers/current-work/

lamnk 17y ago

I have just two requests for Mozilla: please make Firefox faster on Linux, and troubleshoot its memory leak problem. Even Firefox on my Virtualbox windows machine runs a lot more responsiver than on Linux host machine ...

boucher 17y ago
Firefox on Linux has never really compared to the Windows version. I hear that Chrome on Linux is working pretty well though.