Till date Firefox along with FEBE satisfied all my needs, but doing backups using FEBE wasn’t easy and had its own share of disadvantages. Also over the years Chrome, Safari also have started to contribute quite a lot to my browser share. So what do I do?

I download and run the portable app FavBackup on my machine. In short this is what FavBackup does:

FavBackup is a simple solution for you to backup and restore web browser settings and other data on Windows 7/Vista/XP/2000 systems. No installation required.

FavBackup supports IE 6-8, Firefox 2-3.5, Opera9 or 10, Safari 3 or 4, Google Chrome 1-4, Flock 2.0-2.5.

Here are some screenshots of FavBackup in action :

See how simple FavBackup makes the process of doing browser backups? So the next time you reinstall Windows, or accidently delete some data, FavBackup will always be there for you. In its current incarnation here are some of the known bugs in FavBackup.

• General: Restoring backups directly from DVD/CD drive can give error. Copy backup to your PC first.
• Windows XP: When using low screen resolution, scrollbars might appear.

Download FavBackup | Image Credit : John Loo | Via HowtoGeek

The world of Internet is constantly changing every minute, and the tools that we use currently can not stand up to our requirements in the future. Which means this is the right time to make some drastic changes in the way we interact with the web and prepare ourselves for the future.

Mozilla labs has put forward a call to anyone in the world to share their vision of how they would like to see the browser or the web in general in the future. Called The Concept Series, the project will track down and share future web concepts submitted through a very simple process. What would you like the web to look like in the future?

UI is very Important

For any application the User Interface is of the utmost importance. A poorly designed software however powerful it is, will turn out to be unusable. With today’s standards, there is so much of untapped potential in User Interface design.

Interface is not all about being pretty and good to look at. Case in point is the iPhone Software design. While the iPhone uses dell and subtle colors in its designs and hardly is good to look at, but is tremendous ease of use and fast response is what sets it apart from the others. I wouldn’t put the HTC touch in the same category as the iPhone even though it has a very pretty interface.

First Round of Concepts

As you would expect, Mozilla began the Concept series on a high note. Three concepts have been submitted so far. All of the three videos are produced by Mozilla, but that shouldn’t stop you from submitting your own concepts, including mockups, prototypes or ideas expressed in any way you feel is best. If you want to submit your own concept follow the  instructions in the Concept Series announcement or just tag an image "mozconcept" on Flickr.

Here are the first round of concepts :

• Aurora Concept Video

Aurora is a concept video presenting one possible future user experience for the Web, created by Adaptive Path as part of the Mozilla Labs concept browser series. Aurora explores new ways people could interact with the Web in the future based on projected technological trends and real-world scenarios. Here is the concept from Adaptive Path

• Bookmarking and History Concept Video

An investigation into a better way of visualizing and interacting with bookmarks, your history, and the browser in general. Here is the concept from Wei Zhou

• Firefox Mobile Concept Video

Firefox is coming to mobile. The innovation, usability, and extensibility that has propelled Firefox to 200 million users is set to do the same for Firefox in a mobile setting. Here is the concept from Aza Raskin

What Would You Like to See ?

Those were some really interesting concepts right? I am making something complex in my mind as I write this, meanwhile what are your thoughts on this initiative? What do you want to see in the Browser of tomorrow?

Feel free to link to your own mockups or ideas in the comments.

Well not everything went good for Mozilla on its planned download day to celebrate the release of Firefox 3. Mozilla had declared today as Download Day, in an effort to set a Guinness World Record for most software downloads in one day. Somehow the plans did not work out that well. The Servers were almost down till 1PM PST, while the event was scheduled to begin at 10AM PST.

Looks like Mozilla didn’t plan well in advance, as one by one their servers went off with the huge number of people hitting the server every minute. Everything is running smooth now, so you can download Firefox 3 right away.

However a question needs to be asked.. Did Mozilla really have to gun for a world record of most software downloads in a day rather than focusing on its natural download/release cycle. Why all this PR? They could have done it the simple way, even if they had done that, we would have seen huge number of downloads today..

Early hiccups aside, Firefox 3 has now set the standard for web browsers. At the moment Firefox 3 is the fastest and safest browser out there.

I’ve detailed review of Firefox 3 coming up, highlighting all the hits and misses Mozilla put together for this awesome release.

I have it installed right now, and it has crashed on me once so far . A couple of my addons didn’t work as well, but they were critical for my daily routine so that didn’t make much of a difference.

Are you using Firefox 3? How has been your experience with it so far? Do all your addons work with it?

Meanwhile keep the download counter moving while everyone keeps downloading Firefox 3.

Firefox 3 is all set to reach new territories, and on the way to its glory it aims to create a world record for the most number of software downloads in a single day. Mozilla is surely on its way to create the record and its asking everyone including me and you to pledge to download Firefox 3 when its available for public download..

Well the dates for the release haven’t been announced as yet but looking at the recent Release Candidate builds Firefox looks like a solid improvement over Firefox 2. I’d say go ahead and make a pledge to help Firefox create this new world record…

To help Mozilla set the world record, they recommend the following:

• Sign up to get the final copy of Firefox 3 on Download Day.
• Host a Download Day Fest on Firefox 3 launch day at your school, office, or anywhere with an Internet connection.
• Become a Firefox campus representative and collect pledges from fellow students.
• Add Mozilla buttons and banners to your site, blog, or profile.

Nearly 120,000 people have already pledged, but I can imagine this number will grow significantly in the following days. You can even see how many people have pledged from each individual country on a nifty world map, as pictured below. As of now the United States is in the lead but I’d like to see my home country India be a bigger part of this initiative.

So what are you waiting for? lets get moving and stab IE in the face. Come on people, Firefox rocks doesn’t it?

Put in your pledge right now!!

Mozilla has finally lifted the curtains off Mozilla Addons  that has a completely has a shiny new look and is simply amazing at the first sight. I’ve played around with the new site and it is a vast improvement over the previous version.

The most important achievement is that Mozilla Addons is now available in 24 languages, but it is another thing that I won’t be needing them. The newest addition into the site is the Sandbox feature wherein the addons are in sort of beta until Mozilla approves them. The nice thing is that when you search for addons, the addons in the sandbox are marked with a experimental tag. But there’s a catch, you still need to login to be able to download addons in the sandbox.

Well there are two things that disappoint me with the new addons site. The first is that searching isn’t that easy. Say if you searched for wikipedia select the search tools category, you’ll be presented with addons that belong to all the other categories as well. Also there is no way to group the results in a particular fashion.

The other thing is that from now on the site automatically detects the version of Firefox you are using and you can install only those addons that are compatible with your version of Firefox. Surely Mozilla is trying to make things easier for end users, but then we have to depend on plugin authors to test their addons on different versions. This isn’t a good idea, atleast there should be an option for power users to modify this behavior to download and test addons not compatible with the current version of Firefox.

I’m currently using Firefox beta 3 and there are many addons that I know work with Firefox 3 but I can’t install them. Mozilla needs to work a little bit more on Sandbox and the search features and I’m sure the new site will be a hit with users worldwide..

What do you think about the new Mozilla Addons site?

Looks like the browser wars are on again in full force. At the moment the latest builds of Webkit and an internal build of Opera have managed to score a full 100/100 in Acid3 test. The Webkit team has pushed itself hard to defeat Acid3 and have released a public nightly build that passes the test.It was Opera that achieved the perfect 100 first but Webkit followed up nicely helping fixing some bugs in Acid3.

The animation isn’t smooth at the moment but Webkit team is working hard to resolve the bugs. Here’s what they said on their blog

We have a slight glitch in the text rendering that is likely to be fixed soon (patch in progress). Also, the animation is required to be smooth. On typical machines, if you look really closely, you can see a small glitch in the animation on test 26 because 26 is designed to be a performance test. However, we think we are faster than all other browsers on test 26. What constitutes a smooth animation is somewhat subjective.

Looks like Apple is currently in the drivers seat with the Acid3 tests and it might have the first public release of Safari that achieves 100/100 but Opera isn’t far behind. They plan to release their private internal built later next week. Who do you think will win this race?

At the moment IE is struggling to find its feet in Acid3 while Firefox 3 is doing pretty well. Lets see how this turns out. Do you really care which browser comes out on top, because its after all the real world performance that matters right?

Opera Announcement | Webkit Announcement

Well the Whole Blogosphere has been talking about IE8 Clearing the Acid2 test. Lets hear to what the IE8 team has to say about the milestone :

As a team, we’ve spent the last year heads down working hard on IE8. Last week, we achieved an important milestone that should interest web developers. IE8 now renders the “Acid2 Face” correctly in IE8 standards mode.

Before I answer the question that I raised in the title of this post, let me tell you what the Acid2 test is all about :

Acid2 is designed to determine how compliant a given web browser is with published HTML. A fully compliant browser displays a smiling yellow face. However, non-compliant browsers show varying degrees of garbage.

Now coming to the announcement regarding IE8 clearing the Acid2 test. Let me tell you IE8 cleared the test when all other standards compliant browsers like Firefox 3, Opera, Safari failed to clear the test. Yes doesn’t that sound suspicious enough.. Yes it does, the Web Standards team has made some changes to Acid2 Test Page, that has made the test to fail for most Standards compliant browsers.

• What changed that broke the test?

It looks like an object element that’s pointing to a non-existent page (http://webstandards.org/404/) should be falling through, but that page is now returning a response status of 200 (success) instead of 404. Was it previously correctly returning a 404 response?

Perhaps this test should be hosted on a separate server, instead of coexisting with a live site like WebStandards.org, so that future mishaps like this don’t happen.

Well that is it, the Acid2 test page is broken at the moment, so I’m not entirely sure if the Microsoft team was a little too early with the announcement. They’d probably try out the alternate test page over at http://www.hixie.ch/tests/evil/acid/002/ and see if IE8 passes the test.

Right now, I’m not entirely convinced about the announcement from the IE8 team. While adherence to Web Standards is a good thing, it wouldn’t be nice if Microsoft announced now that IE8 clears Acid2 only to later discover that it doesn’t.

While Microsoft lovers will hate me for writing this. But I’d love IE8 to stick to Web Standards when it is released. All the best to the Microsoft team with the IE8 project, atleast I’m sticking out with Firefox so I’ve nothing to worry.

For more details see the discussion over at BugZilla.

Well that was how Firefox 3 would look on Windows Vista. If you wondering what Firefox would look on Mac OSX then read on….

Well Mozilla team seems to have major plans, here is what Firefox developer Faaborg talked about plans for OS X on his blog:

For OS X we are following the new unified style that is used consistently throughout all applications on Leopard. Firefox will look the same on 10.4 as it does on 10.5, similar to iTunes, and iLife 08.

I am amazed by the amount of Work that is being put in to develop Firefox 3. I am eagerly waiting for Firefox 3 will offer Internet users worldwide, and I am pretty sure Firefox 3 will be the first step in making a big dent in the market share of Internet Explorer.

For More screenshots of Firefox 3 head over to Faaborg‘s blog.

The IE7 Browser will be available from today on Windows Update for Windows XPSP2, x64 Server and Windows 2003 Server.

Microsoft has made up a pretty good reason for the removal of WGA Validation, and here is what the official statement from the IE7 blog reads :

Because Microsoft takes its commitment to help protect the entire Windows ecosystem seriously, we’re updating the IE7 installation experience to make it available as broadly as possible to all Windows users. With today’s “Installation and Availability Update,” Internet Explorer 7 installation will no longer require Windows Genuine Advantage validation and will be available to all Windows XP users.

I am sure that can’t be justifiable enough. I feel Microsoft is trying to regain lost users of the IE platform who have now shifted to free alternatives like Firefox and Opera who left IE mainly because it didn’t feature Tabbed Browsing, a major point of highlight in IE7.

I am pretty sure, you can expect IE7 to climb browser ratings starting next week.

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