All 11 entries tagged Firefox

It's Firefox 3 Download Day

Follow-up to Get a fantastic web browser, and set a Guinness World Record from The randomness of tomorrow, today!

Writing about web page http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/

Firefox 3 should be released about now.

For the next 24 hours, all full downloads (updates do not count) should count towards their world record attempt. So what are you waiting for?

: 17 Jun 2008 18:00 |  Tags: Download Firefox Guinness World Record Randomness Record |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

What could be better than a padlock?

Follow-up to Get a fantastic web browser, and set a Guinness World Record from The randomness of tomorrow, today!

Writing about web page http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/

Firefox 3 really builds on the archaic padlock; the little icon that shows the connection is encrypted. In Firefox 2, it is located at the right of the address bar and looks like this:

All this tells you is that the connection is encrypted; it doesn't tell you who's at the other end. You can be sure that the data probably won't be intercepted, but you can't be sure it's going to who you think it is.

Firefox 3, however, not only supports the more recent certificates that can prove the identity, but it also presents them in a much more user-friendly manner.

Unencrypted websites look like this:

A grey background to the favicon area, and a popup when you click on it that informs you my website is unencrypted.

If the website is using the older type of certificate, the ones without identity information, you see this:

A blue background, and a popup that tells you the connection is encypted but that Firefox doesn't know who's in control.

Finaly, the new certificates look like this:

A green background, and a popup that can tell you who's on the other end. Plus, it also put the identity in the favicon area. so isn't as obvious

A secondary advantage of this is that fake sites that try to trick you with padlock favicons shouldn't work, because they can't change the background and FF3 doesn't use padlocks.

This is much more useful than just a padlock, especially since you might think the padlock meant "safe", when all it really meant was "encrypted"; it didn't protect you against fake sites with encryption.

Opera has a similar system; is displays the ID, but since it doesn't use colours it isn't quite as obvious what level you're at. It also doesn't appear to have quite as readable an explanation as Firefox.

Apparently Firefox 3 also has a warning that uses the guy on a yellow background for invalid certificates, and the guy on a red background for reported phishing sites... but I don't know any URLs that will trigger them for a screenshot. There are more details, and screenshots of these other two, at this blog entry.

: 07 Jun 2008 01:10 |  Tags: Encryption Firefox Information Padlock Randomness Security |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Get a fantastic web browser, and set a Guinness World Record

Writing about web page http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/

If you download Firefox 3 within its first 24 hours (the release date hasn't been announced yet) then you could help set the Guinness World Record for the most software downloads in 24 hours.

Full details of the attempt can be found at the link above. It's important to note that it has to be a proper download; updates apparently won't count.

Sounds like a laugh...

: 31 May 2008 05:08 |  Tags: Download Firefox Guinness World Record Randomness Record |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Internet Explorer, or a browser that actually works?

Follow-up to Internet Explorer of Firefox from The randomness of tomorrow, today!

Writing about web page http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=pHtXzcM6CuvXNF92VcwHzGA

I know I've already done this one, but this time the poll includes Opera, Safari, and "Other"...

If you go for "Other", feel free to leave a comment giving its name.

So please fill in the form, and enjoy the pretty graph:

: 04 May 2008 13:06 |  Tags: Browser Chart Firefox Google Docs Graph Internet Explorer New Poll Opera Poll Result Safari Web Browser |  Comments (16) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

TROTT's Theory of Browser Theology

(Disclaimer: I am using the Abrahamic Religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - a wonderfully useful term I came across on Wikipedia) as the primary analogues because the UK is officially Christian. It isn't a commentary on other religions, except one which you'll see at the end...)

Firefox is a lot like one of the Abrahamic Religions. Opera, which is just as good but with some extras and some omissions compared to Firefox, is like one of the other two (it doesn't really matter which you assign; I'm classing all three as being at the same level as each other).

Safari is like an Eastern religion; theoretically just as likely to get you in the good books of however many gods you believe in, but significantly different to the "western browsers".

Internet Explorer, on the other hand, is most definitely Scientology...

: 21 Sep 2007 03:42 |  Tags: Christianity Firefox Hinduism Internet Explorer Islam Judaism Opera Randomness Religion Safari Scientology Trott |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Safari

Writing about web page http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6742439.stm

Well it's alright, I suppose, but I still prefer Firefox...

: 12 Jun 2007 00:34 |  Tags: Apple Firefox Randomness Safari |  Comments (12) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Whee!

Follow-up to Why Firefox Is So Great from The randomness of tomorrow, today!

More evidence for Firefox’s greatness…

: 06 Nov 2006 13:00 |  Tags: Firefox Firefox Flicks Randomness Video |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Why Firefox Is So Great

Everyone thinks Firefox is great, even Eskimos…

: 31 Oct 2006 13:00 |  Tags: Firefox Firefox Flicks Randomness Video |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Cerco I.T. Training and Recruitment

Writing about web page http://www.cercotraining.co.uk/test.asp

I saw an advert tonight for Cerco I.T. Training and Recruitment, and couldn't resist the IT test they mentioned, so decided to investigate.
I love irony of a practice test for a "Best–of–the–Best" IT Training organisation that is completely and totally incompatible and impossible to use in Mozilla Firefox; the javascript they use appears to kill the page – the buttons they mention do not appear, all the questions are visible when they should appear one–by–one (I checked in IE), and the page cannot scroll.

: 31 Mar 2006 02:15 |  Tags: Firefox IT IT Training Javascript Randomness Test |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

The perfect web browser

Writing about web page http://www.ie7.com/

If this website is anything to go by, Internet Explorer 7 looks to be a fantastic browser…

: 10 Mar 2006 21:07 |  Tags: Firefox Ie7 Internet Explorer Randomness |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem