Browsers pick up the pace (week in review) | Business Tech - CNET News

Browsers pick up the pace (week in review) | Business Tech - CNET News

It might seem like the tech news this week has been all about the new iPad, but speedier browser versions grabbed some big headlines as well.

Google on Tuesday released Chrome 10, endowing its browser with faster JavaScript, password synchronization, and a revamped preferences system. Chrome is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Google announced Chrome 10's stable release on its blog but refrained from mentioning its product number. That's in line with the company's effort to focus on features rather than version numbers, which it calls mere milestones. Google tries to get new versions into users' hands as rapidly as possible and currently passes a new milestone about once every six weeks.

Chrome 10 comes with the "Crankshaft" version of the V8 browser engine that Google pegs as 66 percent faster than the unnamed version in Chrome 9 as measured with Google's V8 Benchmark suite. That's a major speed boost, but be aware there are many other attributes of browser performance, and one of the biggest--hardware acceleration--will hit prime time with the imminent release of Mozilla's Firefox 4 and Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9.

Speaking of IE9, Microsoft will be formally launching the next version of its browser at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival on Monday--an interesting place to launch, given that the Austin, Texas, geek fest is packed full of the hordes who have long since ditched Internet Explorer for the decidedly hipper pastures of Firefox, Safari, or Chrome.

Among the new features in IE9 is a refreshed look with the browser taking up less space than previous versions of IE, as well as a way to pin sites to the Windows task bar. Sites can then program their pages to act more like desktop applications with things like notifications, and the Windows 7 Jump List feature, which can hop users to specific parts of a Web page.

IE9 also brings performance improvements, including faster start times and a new JavaScript engine called Chakra that Microsoft has proven to be faster at the WebKit SunSpider benchmark test than competitors. On the security side, IE9 also adds support for "do not track" through lists that users can subscribe to, as well as a way to filter ActiveX content from pages.

Meanwhile, Mozilla updated the Firefox 4 beta to release candidate status, meaning that the features are locked, and barring the discovery of any major bugs, this version is likely to become the browser's official release. Available to download for Windows, Mac, and Linux, Firefox 4 release candidate 1 contains no major bug fixes, and instead offers a series of stability, compatibility, and performance tweaks.

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Google's Chrome untouched at Pwn2Own hack match | Security | Macworld

Image via WikipediaGoogle's Chrome untouched at Pwn2Own hack match | Security | Macworld

by Gregg Keizer, Computerworld Mar 10, 2011 12:00 pm

Editor's Note: This story is excerpted from Computerworld. For more Mac coverage, visit Computerworld's Macintosh Knowledge Center.

Google's $20,000 was as safe at Pwn2Own Wednesday as if it had been in the bank.

But no one took up Google’s offer.

“The first contestant was a no-show,” said Aaron Portnoy, manager of HP TippingPoint’s security research team, and Pwn2Own’s organizer. “And the other team wanted to work on their BlackBerry vulnerability. So it doesn’t look like anyone will try Chrome.”

Only two entries had pre-registered for Chrome: Moatz Khader and one or more researchers going as “Team Anon.” (Researchers may remain anonymous if they wish.) Based on a random drawing several weeks ago, Khader was to get first shot, with Team Anon second.

Team Anon is also slated to tackle RIM’s BlackBerry OS on Thursday.

Late Wednesday, TippingPoint provided a tentative schedule for Thursday’s Pwn2Own; that schedule doesn't show any planned Chrome exploit.

Even if someone unexpectedly stepped up to take a crack at Chrome and exploited the browser, Google would be on the hook for just $10,000. As part of the deal it struck with TippingPoint, the two will split the $20,000 payment for a successful hack on the second or third days of the contest.

If Chrome comes out unscathed, as it now appears it will, the browser will have survived three consecutive Pwn2Owns, a record.

On Wednesday, researchers successfully exploited Safari and Internet Explorer. A team from French security company Vupen took down Safari 5 running on a MacBook Air notebook in five seconds, and independent researcher Stephen Fewer used a trio of vulnerabilities to hack IE8 on Windows 7.

Portnoy was impressed with Fewer’s work. “The most impressive so far,” said Portnoy. “He used three vulnerabilities to [not only] bypass ASLR and DEP, but also escape Protected Mode. That’s something we've not seen at Pwn2Own before.”

ASLR, for address space layout randomization, and DEP, or data execution prevention, are a pair of technologies baked into Windows that are designed to make it more difficult for exploits to reliably execute. Protected Mode is IE’s “sandbox,” which isolates the browser—and thus any attack code that manages to infiltrate it—from escaping to do damage on the system as a whole.

Pwn2Own continues Thursday and Friday, when Mozilla’s Firefox and four smartphones running Apple’s iOS, Google’s Android, Microsoft’s Windows 7 Phone and RIM's BlackBerry OS will be in researchers’ crosshairs.

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Mozilla Releases Firefox 4.0 Release Candidate - PCWorld

Image via CrunchBaseMozilla Releases Firefox 4.0 Release Candidate - PCWorld

The Mozilla Foundation has issued the first release candidate of Firefox version 4.0, finishing a grueling and ambitious beta development cycle for the browser.

This release candidate represents what the development team feels is a finished browser, said Johnathan Nightingale, director of Firefox development, in an interview.

The quality assurance team will still take feedback from users over the next few weeks, but if no major bugs are found, Mozilla expects to issue the full production release of the browser by the end of the month, he said.

If so, March will be a busy month for the ongoing browser wars. In addition to the pending final release of Firefox 4, Microsoft plans to launch version 9 of its Internet Explorer on March 14. And Google released version 10 of its Chrome browser on Monday.

Version 4 of Firefox is a major upgrade for the open-source browser, and includes a wealth of new features and enhancements.

The user interface has been completely revamped and streamlined, with the menu bar condensed under a single button. The JavaScript Engine has been overhauled for speedier performance. The Add-ons Manager has been upgraded to a full-page interface.

Tab management has also taken a great leap forward. Users can bundle sets of tabs into different groups, under a feature called Panorama. They can add small permanent tabs to the top of the browser, for those pages and applications they continually keep open.

For the first time, Firefox will allow users to synchronize their bookmarks across different computers and even with Android-based mobile phones. This is also the first version of the browser to include the Do Not Track feature, which can alert website owners if the user wishes to opt out of third-party Web tracking.

The release candidate is available for the Windows, Mac and Linux platforms, and supports more than 70 languages. Current users of the beta version will have their browsers automatically updated.

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Internet Explorer falls behind Firefox in Europe for first time, says StatCounter | Technology | guardian.co.uk

Image via CrunchBaseInternet Explorer falls behind Firefox in Europe for first time, says StatCounter | Technology | guardian.co.uk

Microsoft's browser - all versions - now trumped by open source product, with the losses apparently due to rise in use of Google Chrome. But is that because of the 'browser ballot' in Windows?

Firefox has narrowly overtaken Internet Explorer in Europe, according to StatCounter

Statcounter, a web statistics company, says that Firefox has now passed Internet Explorer, for the first time ever, to become the most-used browser in Europe.

The screengrab above (or see it on their web page) shows what happened, with Firefox trundling along at 38% or so, and Internet Explorer falling to about 37.5%.

On which the company remarked, "This is the first time that IE has been dethroned from the number one spot in a major territory," commented Aodhan Cullen, CEO, StatCounter. "This appears to be happening because Google's Chrome is stealing share from Internet Explorer while Firefox is mainly maintaining its existing share."

Indeed, that's what the figures seem to show. Comparing the North American market (see pic) shows a broadly similar trend, but Internet Explorer is miles ahead there.

Internet Explorer share is holding up in North America, StatCounter says

Arguably, one reason why Firefox is so prevalent in Europe might be Germany, where it is streets ahead of anything in market share terms - at least according to StatCounter's numbers.

But another theory I've heard put forward is that IE's decline is due to the browser ballot, launched in March, in which the 200m or so Windows users in Europe were offered a sort of roulette where they could choose to install a different default browser from a randomly shuffled group of 12, with the top 5 (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera) presented first in what turned out to be only a quasi-random order that slightly favoured Chrome, until it was fixed.

So was it the ballot wot won it? Looking at the graphs, it's hard to say that there's any evidence of a sudden upward lurch in Chrome's share, nor a sudden downward one for IE. Nor does Firefox show any dramatic difference, which you might expect if the ballot had really influenced people. True, StatCounter was reported as claiming late in March that the ballot was "already having an effect" (though there's no actual link to that study on its site). But looking at the numbers, it's not so evident; all that seems to be happening is a long-term trend as more and more individuals - and particularly businesses - adopt other browsers.

Even so, the advent of more competition in the browser market does have one good side effect: it increases the pressure for standards, and especially compliance (by browser writers) to standards like CSS2 and CSS3, and to emerging standards such as HTML5. Microsoft hasn't given up there - it's working on IE9 as you read this. But it's quite possible that the days when Internet Explorer was the only browser to code for are gone forever. In the future, the W3C's HTML standard might be what coders develop against.

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Firefox Patched for 'Stability' - PCWorld

Image via WikipediaFirefox Patched for 'Stability' - PCWorld

Mozilla pushed out a patch to all versions of Firefox, including the beta Firefox 4, to repair issues that caused crashes.

Gregg Keizer

Sunday, September 19, 2010 05:00 AM PDT

Mozilla last week updated all versions of Firefox, including the beta of the upcoming Firefox 4, to fix stability problems that crashed the browser.

Artwork: Chip TaylorFirefox 3.6.10 and Firefox 3.5.13, which Mozilla launched late Wednesday, addressed what Mozilla said was "a single stability issue affecting a limited number of users."

A crash problem surfaced last week after Mozilla released Firefox 3.6.9 and Firefox 3.5.12 to patch 15 vulnerabilities . Users of all three editions -- Windows, Mac and Linux -- reported repeated crashes during browser startup after they'd updated to Firefox 3.6.9/3.5.12.

Mozilla halted updates while it investigated. The company has since restarted automatic update delivery.

Mozilla also upgraded Firefox 4's beta this week to deal with a stability bug on that preview.

"We've decided to issue a small beta update in order to fix a stability issue on Windows and some rendering and keyboard/mouse focus issues on OSX related to plug-ins," Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox, said in a message posted to the "mozilla.dev.planning" mailing list.

Like the bug in Firefox 3.6.9/3.5.12, the one in Firefox 4 Beta 5 crashed the Windows browser on or shortly after startup. Mozilla's bug- and code change-tracking Bugzilla database offered more information on the crash bug, which quickly climbed to the top of the crash report chart.

Mozilla pushed the quick fix to users as Firefox 4 Beta 6 on Tuesday.

Because Mozilla had to issue the stability patch, the company also designated Beta 7 as the new feature-frozen version, the one that locks in what will be included and drops what won't. Beta 7 is slated to ship later this month.

"What was known as 'Firefox 4 Beta 6' will now be 'Firefox 4 Beta 7,'" said Beltzner. "We're not adding a beta to our cycle, we're just issuing some fixes for stability and usability to the beta audience, and our numbering system requires that we bump the version number."

Mozilla has already ditched a pair of anticipated features from Firefox 4 to make its deadlines: Account Manager, a beefed-up password manager built into the browser to simplify Web site sign-up; and Inspector, a tool aimed at Web designers and developers who want to drill down for more information on each element in an HTML page.

More...

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Google Boosts Chrome 6 Speed Into Dead Heat With Leaders - PCWorld

Google Boosts Chrome 6 Speed Into Dead Heat With Leaders - PCWorld

Google Boosts Chrome 6 Speed Into Dead Heat With Leaders

The newest version of Chrome 6 is 17% faster, putting it in a virtual dead heat with the speed leaders, Opera and Safari.

Gregg Keizer

Tuesday, September 07, 2010 06:33 AM PDT

Google's Chrome 6 is 17% faster than the version it replaced, putting it in a virtual dead heat with the speed leaders, Opera and Safari, according to benchmark scores.

When Google celebrated the second anniversary of Chrome's launch last week, Brian Rakowski, the browser's director of product management, said: "A lot of things have changed in the last two years [in browsers], but the one thing we've learned is that speed matters."

Tests run by Computerworld support Rakowski's claim that speed matters: Chrome 6 is Google's fastest browser ever at rendering JavaScript.

But although Chrome 6 is nearly 17% faster than May's Chrome 5 , it's still slightly slower than both Opera 10.61 and Safari 5, the No. 1 and No. 2 browsers, respectively.

The speed race is tighter than ever, however; the SunSpider times of Opera, Safari and Chrome are within 12 milliseconds each other.

While that trio was essentially in a photo finish, Mozilla's Firefox remained out of contention for the title of "Fastest Browser." Firefox 3.6.9 beat only Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) in the JavaScript trials, and was two-and-a-half times slower than Chrome 6.

Mozilla will have better luck later this year when it ships Firefox 4. The newest preview, Firefox 4 Beta 4, was much more competitive than its production-level cousin: Chrome 6 was only 29% faster than Firefox Beta 4.

Firefox 4 has already met its JavaScript speed goal, according to Mozilla's public plans. The firm's developers have said they want their new browser to be "near or even to" Chrome 5, and score within 20% of Google's now outdated browser on SunSpider. That's almost exactly where Firefox 4 Beta 4 is: Chrome 5's SunSpider score was 19% faster than Firefox's.

As usual, IE8 brought up the rear, taking between five and 12 times longer to complete the SunSpider JavaScript benchmark suite than its rivals.

Microsoft should be able to get back into the game next week when it releases the first public beta of IE9 on Sept. 15. The four developer previews shipped since March have been competitive with Chrome, Safari and Opera in JavaScript trials.

To peg browser speed, Computerworld ran SunSpider in Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 (SP3) three times for each browser , then averaged the scores.

Chrome 6 is in a dead heat with speed leaders Opera and Safari on Windows. Smaller results are better. IE8 is not shown.

Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld. Follow Gregg on Twitter at @gkeizer or subscribe to Gregg's RSS feed . His e-mail address is gkeizer@ix.netcom.com .

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The Best Web Browser: Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, or Safari? - PCWorld

Image via CrunchBase

The Best Web Browser: Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, or Safari? - PCWorld

Not too long ago the job of a Web browser was simple: Get the text from the Internet and pour it into the window. If a tag like comes along, change the font. Now the challenges are greater because the browser is becoming the home for almost everything we do. Do you have documents to edit? There's a website for that. Did you miss a television show? There's a website for that. Do you want to announce your engagement? There's a website for that too. The Web browser handles all of that and more.

Choosing a best browser is an impossible job. On one hand, the programs are as close to commodities as there are in the computer industry. The core standards are pretty solid and the job of rendering the document is well understood. Most differences can be smoothed over when the Web designers use cross-platform libraries like jQuery. Many websites look the same in all of the major browsers, a testament to the hard work of the developers and their desire to get their information out to the largest audience.

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_______________________________

For me and many others the answer is Google's Chrome 5. Nothing else come close. The worst is easily Internet Explorer. The current versions of Safari and Firefox are good but Chrome 5 is simply better. It is very fast, stable and flexible.

John H. Armwood

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Firefox Falls Further Behind in Browser Wars - PCWorld Business Center

Firefox Falls Further Behind in Browser Wars - PCWorld Business Center

Linux user, how many different Internet browsers do you have on your system? You have Konqueror if you use KDE, Iceweasel or Epiphany if you use GNOME, and optionally, you might have Firefox, Chrome or Opera. You might have all of those.

You need so many browsers because none of them is perfect. And, Chrome comes closer to perfection than Firefox does. Since Google released the Chrome browser, Linux users have converted to it by the hundreds of thousands. Although Firefox claims millions of downloads, you can bet that its usage is not close to the number of downloads.

Maybe you’ve seen stories declaring, as Keir Thomas did on this blog last year, that Firefox is dead while Chrome looks increasingly like a better choice. But why is Firefox taking all this abuse? In short, because its alleged strengths are its greatest weaknesses.

Firefox fans tout the browser’s use of extensions, or add-ons, as one of its many boastworthy features, but if you’ve ever connected to a site that uses some new Web feature that Firefox doesn’t support, you’re out of luck. Those same extensions often break other extensions on the way in during installation.

Further, why should a user constantly download and install extensions for such common Web gadgetry as Flash or PDF? Why aren’t those extensions included by default if their inclusion is necessary for a rich Web experience?

How often has Firefox notified you at startup that there are updates for one or more of your extensions that result in no updates, or that upon updating, you'll have to restart your browser only to find that the extension update broke your browser. This exercise is time-consuming and tedious. It’s almost as bad as patching and rebooting a Windows system. You find that simply opening your browser to check stock prices becomes so involved that you forget why you originally opened it.

But Firefox extensions aren’t the only problem. Firefox is also so notoriously slow that on older systems, it’s almost unusable or it takes so long to open that you find yourself clicking the icon multiple times, thinking that your original launch didn’t take for some reason.

Chrome, however, is usable and responsive. Now you understand why Firefox might not survive the browser wars. Its extension model is annoying to use, it’s slow on older systems, it’s slower than Chrome on any system, and its extensions break other extensions.

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