and then the zero day exploit opportunities will begin to surface. There is never enough real world testing of an RC candidate to feel that complacent.

Paris, because apparently Firefox 3 is capable of being fast and slick too.

I detest the new address dropdown in ff3 and (at least at the time this clearly labled for testing purposes only version was forced on us by some ubuntu packaging muppett who decided to use a beta in the stable distro) to disable it so went back to ff2 and have no intention of moving away form it until security issues force me to.

After all if I wanted it to suggest a load of crap results instead of just showing places I have been, I would just goto msn search

Source?

Just out of interest.

until the first exploit is tested.

RC candidate? Is that like a PIN number and an ATM machine?

Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha....

Oh, the arrogance. There is no such thing as bug free software. Stable releases with known issues resolved, yes, but I defy you to find something that can be classed as bug free from the outset and which never goes wrong and hasn't needed updating in some way.

That said, good luck to them - not keen on FF myself but it' alwasy good to stimulate the competition with a new version. Who knows - if they've made the user interface less annoying then I might even use it once in a while.

Well, at least until Opera 9.5 is out fo beta and released properly.

I'm pretty sure nobody is claiming that Firefox 3.0 RC2 is "bug free". We all know better, there are plenty of outstanding bugs that just didn't make this release. What has been said is that all of the bugs deemed blocking Firefox 3 have been resolved, and thus we're free to ship this release candidate.

If a page re-sizes images a lot then it's actually slower than IE.

Firefox 2 was much faster.

There's no way they're going to achieve the massive downloads they expect until addons such as Google Toolbar and Google Browser Sync are ready to work in FF3. Having just done a reinstall I put FF3 on for a test, but had to revert back to FF2 within a day due to the lack of these 2 addons. I'm sure I;m not the only one!

1 comment posted — Post a new comment

"Give it about 5 minutes...Posted one hour and 5 minutes ago"

"Oh, the arrogance. There is no such thing as bug free software. Stable releases with known issues resolved, yes, but I defy you to find something that can be classed as bug free from the outset and which never goes wrong and hasn't needed updating in some way."

Did you read the article, Steve?

"By bugs developers mean issues that they are aware of rather than every single problem with the application."

Do you really want all your info with google? OK I use gmail cos it's feature-set is fantastic, but I use foxmarks to keep my bookmarks synchronised, hosting the bookmarks archive on my own webspace :)

Only Just downladed release candidate 2 but it seams so much faster than RC1 and makes Firefox 2 seem like a dinasoar!

I was reluctant to make a permanent switch to FF3 (actually from Flock), despite its speediness, mainly because of the lack of Google Toolbar, but then I discovered that Googlebar Lite (http://www.borngeek.com/firefox/googlebarlite/) has already been upgraded for FF3 and has every feature of the real thing I ever use (site search, I'm Feeling Lucky, the little buttons to find your search terms on et page,...)

Downloaded update via Firefox's auto update thingy.

Installed.

Restarted.

App locked up, forcing one core to 100%.

Memory usage at 565Mb and climbing.

Reverting back to RC1 does not fix issue.

Suggest developer's comments are "steaming heap of bullshit that make a politician look a paragon of honesty".

Incidentally, I had to manually delete sessionStore.js just to get it working again.

-- Richard

The RC2 is unable to access the login page of my router, it worked fine in RC1 and works fine from IE7. With RC2 I can view the login page, but when I try to login it pops up a dialog to say the network connection is down, which it is not correct.

This is the only extension I could never do without it would be such a show stopper for all us here in the office, It’s like my right arm I have 4 desktops that I sync, although its always a good laugh when back at work on a Monday morning and it restores my colleagues Sunday night session on his 24" Monitors. Paris because I see her most Monday Mornings.

still doesn't pass the acid3 test so in my book it has bugs, at least 29 of them

"After all if I wanted it to suggest a load of crap results instead of just showing places I have been, I would just goto msn search"

Just shows that you have been visiting crap then :) all it does it keep track of what sites you have already visited, it's not a search bar (I checked) - thats the job of the text box just to the right of it, maybe you were typing addresses in there? *chuckle*

Either disable it in about:config or install the old bar plugin (which I haven't used so YMMV) - https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6227

Went to my bank's site, and it wouldn't allow FF3. Until they do, I stick with 2. And maybe longer, as I hate that irritatingly verbose address bar dropdown!

Perhaps with any new software release (not just Firefox) they should add to the list of features something like this:

1. Improved saving speed

2. Editing Window can be resized

3. New bugs added

Perhaps number 3 is a given...

"There is never enough real world testing of an RC candidate"

That'll be a candidate for the Department for Redundancy Department then?

Should be more reliable.

Firefox may have only 20% of the market, but that's pretty good considering that most of the other 80% are merely running with "whatever happened to be installed by the OS" and unaware that there's an alternative.

My guess is that of the people who have actually CHOSEN a browser rather than just accepting the default, firefox is a very substantial majority.

And likely to get BIGGER next month, probably.

or Redundant Acronym Syndrome syndrome as it is known - a common affliction, like PIN numbers & HIV virus etc etc

I guess this just comes down to the definition of a "Blocker". There are bugs that the developers are aware of they just don't consider them to be enough to block the release.

For many people using offline html/js applications, forgetting security settings and prompting to allow certain actions with every session is a blocker. For some, it's enough to block download and use of FF3.

Geoff Johnson: "Firefox 2 was much faster."

Evidence? Nah, thought not.

no safari view though

Every PC that I work on gets firefox put on and the customer is told to use that instead of ie and as IE7 is pitiful most tend to use it.

I like the total page zoom in FF3 seems plenty fast to me

I think that FF3 tries to be too clever and ends up just being a nuisance, I was so pissed off at its bizarre little antics that I had to dump it because I found IE8 Beta to be less intrusive and less buggy. It galls me to admit that, I detest IE, however, version 8 looks like it might fulfil at least some of its promise.

I won't be rushing to install this RC2 candidate.

"Oh, the arrogance. There is no such thing as bug free software. Stable releases with known issues resolved, yes, but I defy you to find something that can be classed as bug free from the outset and which never goes wrong and hasn't needed updating in some way."

Hold your horses there, my "Hello World" distro's have always been bug free, and never needed updating. The first one I did in Turbo Pascal 3 over 15 years ago is still running to this day just as well as the one written in MS C#

It's already been mentioned, but:

1. The new location bar only shows you places you've already been to. The only difference is that what you type is matched against the whole page title rather than just the URL. If it showed you nothing but crap, stop going to those sites!

2. Also, if you don't like it, FFS just disable it! Remember that's one of the advantages of FF against IE - you have complete control. 5 seconds of Google searching gave me this URL with muppet-proof instructions:

http://onlyubuntu.blogspot.com/2008/05/how-to-disable-smarter-address-bar-in.html

So, stop yer whining. You could have fixed this minor issue in less time that it too to reinstall FF2.

and others who won't be rushing to install it.

If you don't at least try the final release version, then how on earth will you know whether or not you will like it? Any version released prior to the final release must be considered as a test version. As such it may not resemble the final end product.

Personally I would never return to using any version of IE. The only time I ever use it now is when I have to instal windows updates for people.

So still using FF 1.5 as FF 2 was a mess and while FF 3 RC 1 was slightly better than 2, it is still painfully slow.

This is atleast with the way I browse as I have dozens of tabs open at any given time and keep some open for weeks.

Both FF 2 and 3 just freeze for several seconds every now and then without a rhyme and reason. Also middle clicking quickly to open about a dozen tabs only half open as the opening of a tab freezes everything for a good fraction of a second. Also FF 1 line does a bit of this but there the pause only happens after 2-3 tabs and is way shorter.

But Reg, *Windows* freezes for several seconds every so often, without rhyme ot reason.

It tries to hold your attention by blanking and re-drawing all the icons on your desktop, sometimes, but I don't count that as rhyme or reason, just diversionary tactics.

Firefox 3... really looking forward to it. Not, however, on day one.

'Smarter' address search? that usually means it does something the developers want, rather than something you want. Or maybe that's just MS

Because you're a fool if you use Internet Explorer.

If you really understand Windows, you'd understand that Explorer is the backbone of the OS. Internet Explorer is Explorer which is Windows. IE just uses a different skin. Compromise it and you have the entire machine at your mercy.

Think of it this way. If I sit down at your computer and run Explorer - but nothing else - how much damage could I do? What could I access? What could I run? Gaining control of IE through a vulnerability gives me Explorer.

What is 'My Computer'? A shortcut to Explorer home paged at the root of your computer. What is 'Network Neighbourhood'? A shortcut to Explorer home paged at the root of your network. What is IE? A shortcut to Explorer with a blue icon and a user defined homepage.

Now you might be able to execute some code if you can make use of a vulnerability in other browsers or software, but you'd have to be a fairly decent programmer and write something fairly complex to do anything useful. By useful I mean something other than just damage and mayhem.

With an IE vulnerability you'd need no such software. You are now at the Linux equivalent of root, and the machine is your oyster so to speak. You'll have access to every file the current user has access to - which is usually every file on the hard disk. You can install what you like, copy what you like, delete what you like, execute what you like and open what you like. If it isn't on the computer, you can just ftp to your own and copy it. Life is so much easier for a hacker if you use IE.

That doesn't mean I advocate Firefox over any other alternative browser. I don't mean I think it's without flaws of its own and can't be compromised.

I'm just telling people a simple fact. Using IE is suicidal if you value the contents of your hard disk, because once compromised, your entire machine is at the disposal of the blagger - he has as much access as if he were sitting in your chair and using your mouse and keyboard.

> If you really understand Windows....

Then we'd clearly know an awful lot more than you do.

Your comment is, perhaps, [and obviously after excluding deliberate jokes etc], the biggest pile of crap ever written in a comment on the reg. Well done. I don't know if there's a prize or anything.

"Full of crap", "Absolute waste of time".

Well why did you bother? Not like you had to pay for it is it? If you don't like it, say I didn't like it because X and Y failed, so I will now be looking at Safari/Opera/IE.

Me, I love the new FF3, faster, leaner and better looking, although I have to find that URL address auto-fill-from-bookmarks bugger and turn it off!

It's free, take it or leave it, pick one of the other great browser choices ( good luck on that one, gaffaw! ) if your not happy with it, stop downloading it, then hopefully it will die a death and you will one less thing to have to "get over yourself" about!

Try:

#!/usr/bin/perl

print "Hello World!";

Seems bug free to me: perhaps you mean code thats complex and written by multiple people? Are you even sure then that its impossible for anything to be written well from the off?

Or maybe you felt like a big man in some sort of pseudo-selfesteem driven 'higher intelligence' sort of way?

RC2 works really well for me (I've been using the release candidates for months). It's quick, the new address bar is great (i no longer have to search through my history), and the new bookmarking features are also great.

> If you really understand Windows....

Laughable comment, based on seriously flawed and incorrect assumptions. I suggest you contact Netscapes lawyers....

#!/usr/bin/perl

print "Hello World!";

Seems bug free to me:

Nah - there's a "missing comma" bug between "Hello" and "World!" ;-)

And what about those who have perl somewhere else in the filesystem?

"If you really understand Windows, you'd understand that Explorer is the backbone of the OS. Internet Explorer is Explorer which is Windows. IE just uses a different skin."

Ah, that really takes me back. That old "Internet Explorer is an integral part of Windows 98" or whatever.

It was a lie then...

is it just me, or did anyone else get some feeling of deja Vu?

Reading these comments, it seems everyone else has gone back to a year or so ago, and having the sort of reaction I did when opera9 came out.

If you want to know what will be in firefox 3.5 or whatever, a year or two down the line, just take a look at opera 9.5. Seems to go that way anyway, with firefox taking a year or two to copy opera.

It is funny to see the self-proclaimed experts, though, going on as if Firefox was doing something new and revolutionary. Those who actually test, and don't just drink the advertising kool-aid, will know that it's just bringing it up to the standard opera was at a year or more ago. What exactly is the news angle on this, Reg, except that there's a new version of a buggy browser, popular with the poorly educated and fanboy segments, comming soon. (and it's not like we don't all know firefox is buggy anyway, I mean 2.x still has 3 secunia advisories unpatched. (http://secunia.com/product/12434/)

Oh dear.

I installed FF3 and it wasn't to block my local bus service's website.

"What is the current listing status for www.cota.com/?

Site is listed as suspicious - visiting this web site may harm your computer.

Part of this site was listed for suspicious activity 1 time(s) over the past 90 days.

What happened when Google visited this site?

Of the 3 pages we tested on the site over the past 90 days, 0 page(s) resulted in malicious software being downloaded and installed without user consent. The last time Google visited this site was on 06/02/2008, and suspicious content was never found on this site within the past 90 days.

Has this site acted as an intermediary resulting in further distribution of malware?

Over the past 90 days, www.cota.com/ did not appear to function as an intermediary for the infection of any sites.

Has this site hosted malware?

No, this site has not hosted malicious software over the past 90 days."

Your problem is Perl. Here's a much better approach: create a BASIC app.

10 PRINT "Hello world!"

20 GOTO 10

"And what about those who have perl somewhere else in the filesystem?"

One feature of James's version is that in addition to printing a friendly greeting to all the earth it also tests to see if perl is in /usr/bin/perl. Bug free.

Paris, because she would have known that.

@Andrew Norton

Andrew, you like many here are ill-informed Trolls

Is Opera's Interface extensible with XML

No

Can I arbitrarily replace Opera's interface with other components

No

Can XML/XHTML be rebound with a standard W3C language (XBL)

No

Can I wite C++ code in Opera and expose it to a Python Script

No

No can I write a C++ DLL and expose it to a Javascript

No

Can I contribute to Opera as a product

No

Is Opera Open Source

Err.... No

"firefox taking a year or two to copy opera"

http://dev.opera.com/articles/view/introduction-to-opera-dragonfly/

vs

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/venkman/

OMG - That's soooooo innovative, aren't these little people at Opera awfully clever

http://dev.opera.com/libraries/

vs

http://www.xulplanet.com/references/xpcomref/

OMG - That's soooooo innovative, aren't these little people at Opera awfully clever

http://dev.opera.com/libraries/widgetobject/

vs

http://www.xulplanet.com/references/elemref/

OMG - That's soooooo innovative, aren't these little people at Opera awfully clever

Use whatever browser you choose, but at least make it an educated one.

Been using FF3 since beta5, and have grown to like it very much! It's now my permanent browser of choice, and RC2 has been very fast and stable for me.

I would like to use Opera 9.5 though, as it looks eye-candylicious (I'm shallow like that), but Opera STILL does not have drag and go for links (yes I know you can use mouse gestures, but I'm to ingrained with using the left mouse button for dragging links and letting to to open a new tab - which works with the Easy Drag to Go extension in FF and IE7Pro in IE).

Opera people, give me drag and go, and I will regrettably leave FF.

Paris, because I'd like to drag her and let go (off the side of a tall building)

After posting my previous comment about FF3 being fast and stable, it crashed on my for the 1st time EVER! What's up with that? So, it's DOES have a bug!

Murphy's Law strikes again!

Alien bug, cos I found a bug....

firefox 3 is miles ahead of anything windows has to offer. give these guys credit they aint as big as Microsoft but the stuff rhwy write is definitely more stable. firefox under linux is far more stable.