Safari is fast on Macs, and that's that.
Internet Explorer just plain out sucks.
Firefox is ok, for some people.
Google Chrome is simple, and therefore fast.
I've tried out a couple others, but they just weren't notable.

I like Firefox, but everything is just too "bulky" if you know what I mean. It has extra customization options, and more styles. I don't like how downloading works, I personally *hides* like IE's method better then Firefox.

I use Chrome because there are no toolbars, or annoying extra stuff, but only the tabs and the one bar. It always renders correctly, and speed is great. My only Google problem is sometimes the extensions don't work properly. But this isn't Google's fault, as they are 3rd party.

I like Firefox, but it is my 2nd browser of choice.

Of course, there's a certain Firefox that is aiming themselves to also become the multiprocess nastiness. The only good thing with doing that is that I can kill Flash anytime with "pkill -f flash", and maybe some problematic page loading. But that's all - it's cluttery and annoying to see in a process list.

Kllrnohj: XUL is terrifying, and is certainly Mozilla's weakness. It definitely is nice.... for creating addons and such. But other than that, it more or less serves as something to be removed and replaced with a compatible, efficient toolkit. The sad thing is that Mozilla hates that, and even thinks that everyone would use it! (For anything else besides web development, aka as a toolkit) I recall the wxMozilla project, in which the devs asked for help with it (basically, a browser widget control). They didn't get any help, and were pretty much coldly rejected, since there was "competition". Guess where that project went? WebKit, of course! wxWebKit is the new project, and it works nicely. XUL and Mozilla's sillyness? Down the drain - the only thing(s) supporting it are Mozilla apps, and even they are having a hard time staying relevant.

I love Firefox, and I love their awesome addons. But I hate Mozilla's attitude, and their insistence on using their flawed toolkit, XUL.

[/rant]

EDIT: I've just tested out Fennec, and all I can say is: SLOW, HORRIFYINGLY SLOW, MORE HORRIFYING THAN XUL ITSELF.
Interaction is very sluggish, and nothing even renders correctly. Mind you, this is not even on a mobile device - a LAPTOP. 2.2 ish GHz, and they expect this to run on a slower 1.0 GHz mobile device? They even called this abomination a BETA. Beta quality software isn't this kind. If Mozilla thinks that way, they really need to wake up.

And a screenshot for your terrified viewing pleasure:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1016340/PublicPictures/SlowFennec/BadRendering.png

No wonder people aren't really excited about Fennec...

The new firefox is running plugins in a separate process. Probably a good idea, everyone hates it when a plugin crashes and takes the browser with it (*cough, flash, cough*), or when a plugin takes for bloody ever to load thus making appear as though the browser hung (*cough, adobe reader, cough*)

Do you have any actual *technical* reasons to back that up? No, of course you don't (because XUL is actually pretty cool, perhaps even a head of its time), you just want to rant on it because it's the "cool" thing to do.

Also, wxMozilla wasn't replaced with wxWebKit, it was replaced with wxWebConnect, which, surprise surprise, uses Mozilla's Gecko Engine, aka XULRunner. http://www.kirix.com/labs/wxwebconnect.html

Fennec isn't being built for x86 you idiot. Fennec for desktop is for developers to do tests, it isn't for anyone to actually use.

Fennec 2 is also still in Alpha 1, it's not a beta yet. You are bitching that their are bugs in an ALPHA 1. Well no shit there are bugs in an alpha. What the fuck is wrong with you?

Also, don't confuse a beta with Google's definition of a beta. Betas often are buggy, especially the first couple of beta releases.

They have a VERY strange way of doing things, which IMO is way too much for a simple application, nor an advanced one. Why would I toss Javascript in an application? It's the weirdest, niche kind of toolkit. (And yes, I know there's XPCom to actually play with C/C++.)

Oh, and a fun plus: You get to toss an XULRunner on it too!

The point is this: XUL is not for serious application development, although Mozilla likes to think that way.

And wxWidgets is 1000x higher than you. Quite a few FOSS projects (and commercial ones too) use wxWidgets. Stop competing and start making your flagship web browser faster!

wxMozilla IS replaced with wxWebKit, much to your dismay it seems.

You sound more like a Firefox (Mozilla) fanboy, eh?

Back on topic - Fennec wasn't build specifically for x86, but so what? The only difference is the interface, that's all. If they have some random ARM ASM code in there, then yes, it's really for the mobile devices.

And alpha? Come on, I've seen MUCH better with Fennec ONE. And working from there, I certainly am not comforted that they just throw the code around and act like that's a good idea. Alpha from a solid product should be something that is like the first, but has more features and some GUI changes, NOT something that can't render nor run fast.

FYI, more applications than you might think have scripting languages in them. It is very powerful for GUI work. Case in point: The whole goddamn internet. Clearly a markup language + a scripting language is an extremely powerful and flexible combination (which, oddly enough, is what a *lot* of GUI libraries are moving to).

Again, do you have any actual *technical* reasons to back that up? Yet again, of course you don't.

wxWidgets is awesome, but even the still relatively new WPF has far more apps using it - and guess what? WPF has a *lot* in common with XUL.

And actually wxWidgets has allowed you to create GUIs via XML for years and years now.

No, it wasn't. Did the community move away from wxMozilla to wxWebKit? Maybe, I don't know, I haven't been following wxWidgets for a long time. Was wxMozilla replaced with wxWebKit? Not at all, as I already pointed out and as you admit.

No, actually, I'm just annoyed with idiots that rant simply because they've seen other people rant about similar things without actually understanding or comprehending the complaints.

So it's not a tested platform. Bugs that exist for x86 builds will automatically have a lower priority than bugs for the supported platforms. Also, the interface is what will have the fewest differences, it is the actual engine code where differences will be found, which will have a *huge* impact.

Someone clearly doesn't have any idea how software development actually works. Yet again, you are just highlighting that you don't know jack shit and just want to rant.

Again, fanboy-ish response. Again, I'll say this: "can't you take ONE criticism about Mozilla?" And I have plenty more criticisms where that came from, some which you probably can't even defend. If you tried, you'd look pretty foolish. Heck, you already made yourself look foolish! (You'll find out as you continue reading.)

Haha, very interesting. So I guess I should begin porting Audacity to HTML, JS, and CSS? Or how about Blender? Maybe TiLP* too! /sarcasm

The internet is an entirely different thing from application development. Sure, I can create an awesome pretty webpage with HTML/CSS/JS. But an application to look up databases, do image editing, etc.? NOT going to happen with HTML/JS/CSS. (...or at least without tons of suffering, pain, and slowness)

Glade and XRC are XML, and they're awesome. wxGlade uses XML for data storage. XML is even used in Apple's files (which is a bit too much, IMO). XML is certainly not bad at all.

But JS? No, not now, not ever. It's designed for web use, and it should stay that way. Unless there's a sudden rewrite for it, it belongs and should stay there. There are VERY FEW apps that I know of that uses XUL and/or Gecko. Why don't you name some, since you have such a kinship for Mozilla dev tools?

I tested it out around the time when FF3.0 was released. Sadly, just from skimming the docs, it's still the same old sillyness. I can't remember all, but here were few:
- Insanely hard to set up things correctly
- Strangely abundant use of URLs to handle things
- C++, Javascript, and XUL are required = too much things to do to get an app working
- Extra build tools to build any app

Err, you're still not getting the point why XUL sucks. I don't hate XML - plenty of toolkits like GLADE, GUIBuilder (both GTK+ based), and as you mentioned, WPF, use XML. (Heck, TiLP uses .glade files for its GUI too!) But XUL is, unfortunately, stuck to itself. Javascript only, and if you want to move to C++, play with complex XPCOM. XML is certainly nice, and fun to use. But XUL's lack of a serious, productive interface is what makes it suck. How many apps have you seen use XUL, other than the addons, and the browsers? Very few, if not none at all. Why don't you list some XUL apps too?

And wxWebConnect sucks, doesn't work, and is more or less abandoned.

You're funny. You already made yourself look like an idiot. I've never seen anybody who wanted to code their app in HTML/JS/whatever. And I followed their dev for a long time, starting with 2.0. I faced and felt those complaints, and looked in to understand them too. How do I not know what I'm debating about? I just don't know if you know anything you're saying at all!

What's the difference between Fennec on x86 and Fennec on ARM? Nothing, if at all anything. Maybe different toolkit, maybe different bindings here and there for specific platforms. But as far as I can see, the rendering engine is the same. Any type of hardware acceleration is OpenGL, maybe ES for mobiles. My boring GFX card can handle it. Unless I see the render code have ARM ASM, I'm not convinced that they're much different at all.

For the record, my only purpose for starting this topic is to get a debate started, and to see why people liked what they liked. I didn't start this to get a debate with a fanboy...

That's probably why I was hired by Google, because I'm an idiot. Good call.

I haven't defended valid criticisms against Mozilla, I've called you an idiot for baseless attacks.

That's because you haven't actually provided any reasons why XUL sucks. Now you are talking about its market share as if that mattered at all. Hint: It doesn't. It was also built to use with Mozilla's applications, which, in case you don't know, use XPCOM.

Also, do you have any actual technical complaints about Javascript? I'm guessing not, since everything being discussed is *waaaay* over your head already.

Ah, so the problem is you don't understand what XUL is and isn't. XUL is for GUIs, it is not for the application code. You make pretty GUIs with XUL, that's it. The actual work behind the app is done in a different language.

Also, since when did I claim any kinship for Mozilla dev tools? Likewise, adoption rate is a retarded metric for anything. Java is used by a ton of programs - but it's still a horrible language. Or if you want another example, Win32 is quite possibly the worst graphics and platform API ever created - and yet it is also the most widely used API in the history of forever. Adoption != technical merit.

This, again, points to you not having a clue what you're doing or what the purpose of XUL is. You also don't need to know C++ at all. If you want something more powerful than JavaScript, you can use something like PyXPCOM and use Python.

Uh no, not abandoned. The newest version is targeting the newest version of XULRunner and the newest stable version of wxWidgets. That really doesn't qualify as abandoned - not even remotely. That's pretty much the exact opposite of abandoned.

Ah yes, when you've been called out on your complete lack of technical knowledge, just resort to calling the other guy a fanboy. Works every time.

There isn't a facepalm image big enough for this pile of fail.

Tell me some code here that is directed at ARM. From what I can see, nothing much. Fennec 1 works nicely on my laptop, why not Fennec 2?

From what I've heard from you, you make it sound like that you would write a web browser in HTML.

I'm not going to make 1000 videos or benchmarks or create some random PPT going through every single weakness, sillyness, slowness, etc. of Firefox or XUL. I don't have time for that kind of stuff; there's better things to do in the day besides that. I've provided enough info; go try some yourself if you want a taste of the aforementioned complaints.

Since you work at Google, you should know better to go and google the discussions, benchmarks, etc. of Firefox/XUL.

Market share matters, silly. There's a reason why it's not widely adopted, and it's not because it's by Mozilla.

Javascript is not for designing local apps.

I do know XUL is the XML GUI design, like Glade, but when I said XUL, I was referring to the entire Mozilla framework in general. Sure, it's not the official way, but most of the world calls it XUL instead of something like MF.

And adoption doesn't always mean technical merit, but adoption does (most of the time) indicate efficiency and usability. Why do people use GTK+, QT, or wxWidgets instead of XUL? Probably because it's more efficient or usable in some way.

If I ever mention XUL on any dev forum, they instantly say YUCK.

Yeah, it's that infamous. (And Gecko in general is considered complex - KHTML/WebKit in comparison was considered much better in terms of understanding the code and developing for it.)

Wow, that's a nice retort. I was calling you one due to your persistence to defending Mozilla without any significant, solid ideas to back it up. Lack of technical knowledge? I might not know every single programming language in the world, but I know enough about the topic in general to get a good idea of what I'm talking about.

Fennec 1 works nicely on my laptop, why not Fennec 2 [alpha]?

o.0

...what?

I literally am at a loss for words, I don't know how to respond to something so profoundly stupid.

What would have possibly given you the idea that I would write a web browser in HTML? (Ignoring the fact that such a feat is impossible, of course)

I didn't ask you to. I have repeatedly asked for *technical* reasons behind your complaints. You have repeatedly provided not a single one.

Really isn't my job to debate for you, now is it?

No, in this case it really doesn't. Mozilla primarily made XUL for Mozilla's apps. As far as that goes, it seems to be working pretty darn well for them.

Says who? You? What argument do you have for that?

Glade has nothing to do with XML GUI design. Glade is a RAD tool. And I can't read your mind, I was going off of the silly assumption that you were saying what you meant. Seems that that isn't true, and you're just messing up all your terminology.

People use GTK+ because it's the defacto standard for Gnome. People use QT because it's the defacto standard for KDE, and now Symbian (in addition to being a darn good API that, oddly enough, has scripting support as well as CSS). Not many people use wxWidgets at all.

Well that seals it. If some random forum people say "YUCK" at something they've never used or learned anything about whatsoever, it must be horrible.

True, but KHTML/WebKit is also much simpler. Again, Firefox's spectacular extension supports comes from having it's UI built with XUL. You can't have both a simple engine and such amazing extension support. You get one or the other, not both.

No, I'm defending Mozilla from *your* persistence to flame them without any reasons.

And FYI, I haven't even said that XUL was good, so yeah, you're jumping straight to calling me a fanboy because you can't actually come up with any actual complaints about the technology.

No, wait, this needs the giant facepalm image.

This is so much fun to read, it's like an Al Franken book had a love child with a technical manual...

when was this topic hijacked by killer and alberthro?

0x5

This is so much fun to read, it's like an Al Franken book had a love child with a technical manual...

One of my biggest complaints with Opera is that it's turning into the emacs of browsers. It wants to be everything: your FTP client, your IRC client, your browser, etc. I want my browser to just be my browser, with maybe a weather forecast and a custom skin at the most. I'll use a dedicated FTP client, IRC client, etc, thank you very much.