Firefox 3

[Aristotle]

So, how do you like it so far?

Frankly, I have yet to see anything about it that is better or a real improvement over previous versions. I imagine/hope it runs better "under the hood", but who knows.

I have already had to find a few hacks to fix some weird behaviors.

1) cntrl+mouse wheel behaves in the OPPOSITE manner as before. Wheel down used to zoom/increase text size, and up was to decrease. They switched this for some reason. You can fix this by browsing to "about:config" and making the change described here:

mousewheel.withcontrolkey.action = 3
mousewheel.withcontrolkey.numlines = -1

2) The bookmark window is TINY and cannot be resized or moved. I imagine this will need a core change or a nifty add on to entirely replace the bookmarking system. In the meantime, I at least found a hack for making it bigger. Link here.

Go to your profile folder for Firefox (most likely something like C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Mozilla\Profiles\SOME_WEIRD_RANDOM_ASS_KEY\ch rome\).

Copy the userChrome-example.css file to userChrome.csss

Then open userChrome.css and add this to the end:

/* Increase initial size of bookmarks panel */
#editBookmarkPanelContent
{
min-width:410px !important;

}

/* Increase size of the expanded bookmarks panel */
#editBMPanel_folderTree
{
min-width:400px !important;
min-height:400px !important; 
}

3) Something is really, really strange with the auto-completion when you type addresses into the address pane. I think I prefer it only looking through my history. Right now it makes all sorts of crazy guesses that I really don't need.

[Gadiantor]

I had issues getting tabs to load in the background. I had to uninstall 3, install 2 and get it working the way I wanted and then install 3 over the top. After I did that everything was working fine.

I don't use the bookmark window, so I didn't realize there was an issue there, and I'm on a laptop, so the scroll wheel thing has never been an issue for me. The only issue I had was with tab behavior and I managed to get that to cooperate with me.

The only improvement I've noticed is that some pages didn't work in 2, which had me looking for an alternative, and so far they all work for me in 3.

[Leshrak]

I read an article in some PC mag (though it wasn't PC Mag), that did an evaluation of FF 3 Beta 5 (official release wasn't out yet), comparing it to the other "top" browsers that are out, including Opera 9.5, IE7, Safari, etc.

Overall, they rated FF a 5/5. I don't remember the exact details but I remember a mention of its memory management being a huge improvement over 2.0.

Here's a similar article: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2317304,00.asp

It looks like a solid improvement pver v2, but Opera is still my preferred

[Kerrida]

Originally posted by Aristotle

3) Something is really, really strange with the auto-completion when you type addresses into the address pane. I think I prefer it only looking through my history. Right now it makes all sorts of crazy guesses that I really don't need.

From what I have been able to tell, it looks like it is starting to do the DNS lookups for you based on what you are typing in. As you enter the addy, it narrows it down, and since DNS queries are already going on, results are returned much faster.

I know I've noticed an improvement in load times over v2 and any other browser I've used to date.

[Talsek]

Originally posted by Kerrida
From what I have been able to tell, it looks like it is starting to do the DNS lookups for you based on what you are typing in. As you enter the addy, it narrows it down, and since DNS queries are already going on, results are returned much faster.

I know I've noticed an improvement in load times over v2 and any other browser I've used to date.

I love how the new auto-complete searches bookmarks as well as history. I'd rather use auto-complete to hit a bookmark than navigate through a menu tree. I also clear history each time I exit the browser, so auto-complete based on history alone isn't very useful.

Obviously not everyone likes the new functionality, and there was supposed to be an option to use the old way. It was pulled for the current Firefox version, but this link might be useful for those who want the old behavior:

http://mozillalinks.org/wp/2008/06/9...-location-bar/

[Aristotle]

Originally posted by Aristotle

1) cntrl+mouse wheel behaves in the OPPOSITE manner as before. Wheel down used to zoom/increase text size, and up was to decrease. They switched this for some reason. You can fix this by browsing to "about:config" and making the change described here:

I finally updated up my desktop, and then I did this fix.

The thing is, this does ZOOM, whereas before it did text size. Anyone know if it is possible to make mouse whel scrolling do text size? The zooming in is making graphics and such look really messed up.

[Rosuav]

Originally posted by Aristotle
I finally updated up my desktop, and then I did this fix.

The thing is, this does ZOOM, whereas before it did text size. Anyone know if it is possible to make mouse whel scrolling do text size? The zooming in is making graphics and such look really messed up.

It's an option. View|Zoom|Zoom text only.

http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Text+Zoom

[Aristotle]

Yeah I found it soon after posting. So far I don't see any benefits from Firefox 3 and a whole lot of annoyances.

[Deokoria]

It seems like things may be loading a little faster, but maybe I'm giving it too much credit. Right now, I'm not liking it over all because it's trying to be too smart. And does anyone really need a GIGANTIC back button?

[Khaosai]

Not sure if it was available on Firefox 2, but the Fire Gestures Add-on is my new love.