Browser wars

I have quite a list of browsers installed on OS X simply out of curiosity when new announcements arrive. I am a browser hopper using a browser for a couple weeks/months until it gets on my nerves and I switch to something new/old. However, Firefox definitely gets most of the browsing time and this morning I just switched back to it again. Here’s my entirely subjectively speaking rating:

The winner
Firefox – the most innovative and versatile browser. Blocks ads and handles tabs the way I want it. Usually I ground it when it starts to get slow on an older computer, but I keep returning. Currently I am running Firefox 3 Beta 5 absolutely smoothly with no hick-ups at all.

The competitor
Where Firefox is slowing down, Camino comes to save the day. It’s lightweight and has adblock included by default. The price tag for speed, however, is a limited set of functions (e.g. no tab rearrangements). The last time it got grounded for not interacting well with Google Documents, but apparently this has been fixed with the latest release.

The social oldie
Flock is great at handling your accounts on Web 2.0 sites as they are literally one click away. However, as the Flock project is still rather new, they lack the most recent updates and functions. Furthermore, I don’t need to stay connected with all my social sites all the time as webmail is permanently open in a tab of its own and I’m rather selectively visiting other sites. Flock got grounded this morning for not rendering my Webmail.

The boring fundament
There’s nothing really wrong with Safari, but it’s not really exciting either. You get what Apple thinks is best for you which covers most what the average user needs, but nothing more. Annoys me because you can’t force it to open all links as tabs.

The northern competitor
There was a time after the depart of Netscape and before the advent of Firefox when we used Opera on Windows for added security. Every once in a while I still download Opera for the Mac to see how it’s doing, but it always gets quickly boring.

Internet Explorer
Oh yeah, this one exists, too. I once had the completely outdated version for the Mac because the brilliant developers of some router I owned had the router administration render correctly only in IE but not in Mozilla derivates. Well, the router is gone and so is the browser.

Music the way we want it

I disagree with the analysts:

While industry analysts said Apple probably will lose market share in digital downloads as the majors gravitate away from DRM, the resulting increase in online music sales outlets will likely create a larger market for the ubiquitous iPod and emerging iPhone.

Source: Wired magazine

It’s a good decision that all major labels offer their music in DRM free formats. However, I am sceptic that they will achieve to break the dominance of the iTunes Music Store. After all, when you go (went) to a CD store you want to shop for a certain artist or song and don’t bother about the label behind it. Stripping the DRM from the music won’t break the iTunes Music Store’s dominance automatically, there’s only a chance if one builds a new competitor where all music is available as a DRM free purchase. I hardly believe customers will leave the Apple platform and search for their music on a couple other platforms instead.

In other words, most money could be made if all major labels offered their music DRM-free at the iTunes Music Store. And the fee Apple cashes in with every purchase is the penalty to the labels for not having created such a platform earlier.

Update: They are moving to Amazon.

The bitter end

The ultimate reason why Openoffice is better than Microsoft Office:

Microsoft Office Drops Support For Older File Formats

Please note: with free software (“free” as in “freedom”) this can’t happen because open standards permit access to your data anytime. It’s not necessarily a good idea to have a monopolist control your access to your data.

Sometimes, a downgrade is an upgrade

My main desktop computer is my 12″ Powerbook with a G4 processor. Pretty outdated, especially since the G5 processor never made it into Apple laptops. With all the nifty software I installed, my Powerbook kept getting slower and slower until I could barely work with OpenOffice or NeoOffice anymore. That is, my laptop’s speed was okay when I had just freshly booted it, but having several applications open made it painfully slow, especially when I didn’t turn it off for a couple days and had it sleep mode only.

Now one of the sermons you get to hear from Apple fanboys is about how longlasting the hardware is how fast current software still runs on their ancient Mac. I was always a sceptic since applications simply tend to get bigger for numerous reasons.

Either way, last weekend I reformated my Powerbooks harddrive and reinstalled Mac OS 10.3 (Panther) instead of 10.4 (Tiger). I hardly use Spotlight and Widgets anyway. By means of Apple’s software update I get the current versions of most of the software anyway (e.g. iTunes) and most applications don’t require 10.4, so the downgrade brings no cut-back in terms of software. Especially easy was rebuilding my system; making a backup of my Library and all my important files and then paste the relevant folders into my freshly installed system was all it took to bring back my carefully crafted iTunes playlists and photo albums. And yes, it’s fast, a lot faster. I only reinstalled the most useful applications I use on a daily basis to trim the fat in my system and it perfectly worked. I thought about buying a new Mac for my desk soon, but now I feel comfortable with waiting longer – a lot longer. And yes, the propaganda about outdated Macs still doing remarkably well with current software are true.

For those of you who care, here’s my application listing to get the most of your G4 processor:

Mac OS 10.3.9 (Panther)
Adium (instant messaging, current)
Adobe Photoshop CS2 (not so current, but it has more than you need anyway )
Camino (webbrowsing doesn’t get leaner than that)
iTerm (the default Terminal would do the job, but iTerm is prettier)
NeoOffice (why install an outdated Microsoft Office?)
ScummVM (a must for every computer)
Skype (current)
SubEthaEdit (coding doesn’t get better than this)
Transmit (FTP client)
VLC (another must for every computer)

Together with the apps that come preinstalled with OS X there isn’t really anything left uncovered for an ordinary working computer. This one will do another couple years.

Good and not so good sex

Signing up for the iPhone is like being tossed into a menage a trois with Angelina and Rosie O’Donnell. You want the beauty, you have to sleep with the beast.

The Gizmodo “no bullshit” iPhone review (via vowe.net)