PC Pals Forum
Technical Help & Discussion => Broadband, Networking, PC Security, Internet & ISPs => Topic started by: Adept on May 18, 2003, 22:48
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http://www.mozilla.org/projects/firebird/why/
Mozilla, the open source browser, has another new version.
Mozilla Firebird v0.6 is designed to eliminate a lot of the clutter and produce a more streamlined browser.
I'm a confirmed Opera (http://www.opera.com)-user, but anyone who uses Internet Explorer really should give Mozilla a try. You can download it from here (http://www.mozilla.org/projects/firebird/) :)
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Hi Adept.
Have you (or anyone else) tried Mozilla? I too am an Opera freak, but might give it a try if I here some positive comments about it.
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I'm just about to install it ;)
I'll let you know ...
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Ok but maybe ive missed something but why are you all ont using internet explorer. :-[
Why should i make the change ;)
Boss
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First impressions are favourable chorleydave :)
The Mozillia UI is far cleaner than Opera and pages seem to load much more quickly.
The default font size appears a little small to me. I'm sure there will be a way of tweaking it, but I haven't found it yet.
You will need to install the flash plug-in to see Pals in all its glory. Unfortunately it isn't an automatic process - the Flash installer recognised Opera but not Mozilla, so I had to install it manually :(
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Why should i make the change ;)
I think some people just dont like using Mr.Gates stuff BB ;)
Also they like showing off ::)
If it aint broke,why fix it ???
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Well ive just installed it, and it seems ok to me. Ill have a fiddle about with it and see what the speed/settings are like :)
Boss
Always love tweaking stuff ;D
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:believe: I played with Mozilla some time ago, and was told by a 'prominent' person not a million miles away to "get a proper browser"! ;)
If it's the same version I tried a couple of weeks ago, I would be very intereted to hear if anyone else finds that some of our smilies don't display.
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Always love tweaking stuff ;D
See, you've answered your question yourself BB ;) ;D
Mozilla
Ok here's the downside chorleydave :(
There are no mouse gestures :(
You can't set pages to auto-reload :(
New pages don't load up as tabs like they do on Opera :(
But Mozilla is very, very fast ... :)
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:believe: I played with Mozilla some time ago, and was told by a 'prominent' person not a million miles away to "get a proper browser"! ;)
If it's the same version I tried a couple of weeks ago, I would be very intereted to hear if anyone else finds that some of our smilies don't display.
But this is a new version Simon. No-one can ever accuse me of not being open-minded ;) ;D ;D :shuddup:
You are right though - in another black mark against Mozilla - it doesn't show the advanced smileys on Pals.
Get a proper browser here (http://www.opera.com) Mozilla has left the building!
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Well, I can't even get the Flash plug-in to install. :( I will say it does look nice, and I like the less cluttered approach. This version is also more of an XP look. If only it worked properly! ::)
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If you still have a interest in Mozilla, and want some extra toys, like mouse gestures, etc (na na na na na Opera!) you might find youself spending a while here (http://texturizer.net/firebird/extensions.html).
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Thanks Adept and Simon. I think I'll stay with Opera for now!
Why should i make the change
I use Opera for several reasons:
First, I am one of those nutters who formats my Hard Drives and reinstalls everything about every six months. When I used Internet Explorer, I had to reinstall cookie managers, popup managers, Google Toolbars etc. Then I discovered that the 3MB Opera download had all these features built-in, hence less hassle.
Secondly, Opera can be customised exactly as you want it by simply editing several .ini files in Notepad, and then saving your masterpieces to floppy disk ready for the next install. For example, the default Google search engine in the Opera search toolbar is the USA version, but I have edited search.ini so that it uses the UK version of Google. I have done the same with Ebay, and deleted those I never use such as AllTheWeb etc. Therefore, Opera is MY browser and not something that Bill Gates thinks I should have.
Finally, pages definitely load faster in Opera and the mouse gestures etc. that Adept mentioned make browsing much simpler, once you have learned them.
All in all, I feel in control using Opera, whereas Internet Explorer tends to call the shots - if you get my drift.
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Well im going to try Opera aswell and further broaden my browser experience ;D.
Ill report back ;)
Boss
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Welcome to the PC-Pals Opera society B_B :D I'm sure you've made the right choice. Opera is so good, I've actually considered [cough] paying [cough] the US$40 or whatever to get rid of the ads [cough] [cough] [cough]
Here's a quote I found on cnet:
"Nice effort for the Moz team. But seriously, Phoenix is twice the size of Opera and has less than half the features. Go figure! Tried it... keeping Opera 7 as my primary browser, Moz 1.3 for testing and IE6 for laughs!"
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Well, I thought I'd have one more try with Opera, as it's reckoned to be so good, but it won't even install! I/O Error - corrupt installation file, or something, so taking that as an omen, I'll stick with IE. ::) ;D
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Got it now. Must have been the wrong version. ::) It's better without the ads! (https://www.pc-pals.com/smf/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.apax34.dsl.pipex.com%2Fsmileys%2Fhee-hee.gif&hash=c67e3b8b3e856c9641942fbba17c755937428ab9)
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Yeah im using Opera the now too. Its pretty good ;D
And fast too! :o
Boss
P.S Can you get skins for it?
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P.S Can you get skins for it?
Loads BB :) Try View | Skins | Get Skins ;)
Stick with it Simon. Apart from a few very badly behaved (mostly Microsoft) sites, you'll not want to use anything other than Opera.
Try using "Search New" with the "Reload Every.." option on. You won't want to use IE again!
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P.S Can you get skins for it?
Loads BB :) Try View | Skins | Get Skins ;)
Thanks, got a really nice looking one now :)
Boss
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I'm using Metal Blue Small
(https://www.pc-pals.com/smf/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmy.opera.com%2Fcustomize%2Fskins%2Fimg%2F149.png&hash=2e7bccc7870716d09bf3a2afe7ca3bd9259b40c6)
Which looks quite nice and uses a small amount of space ;)
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OK, well I'll use it for a while, but at the moment I'm still finding my way round it.
A couple of questions for our Opera Expert ::) Is is possible to adjust how the mouse wheel works (i.e. how many lines it moves per 'click'), how can you get it to automatically dial up to go online, and (for Chorley Dave), how do you do that Google UK thing exactly??
It still doesn't display pages as I would like, i.e., as nicely as IE does, and some of the text, particularly on here looks a bit odd.
I don't like too many toolbars cluttering up the screen, so I have stripped it right down to a few essential buttons (small), with the address and search bars along side, leaving a nice big area for the page.
I have to say that the toys alone are not going to sell this to me, and the speed is nothing special, in fact the Mozilla Firebird was the quickest I've seen so far - what a shame it's incompatible with Pals, otherwise I would be more inclined to give it another outing.
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Not sure how you change the mouse wheel clicks. Isn't it set via the control panel mouse icon?
Presumably if you set Opera as your default browser it will dial out automatically.
I'm not sure why Pals is showing different on IE than Opera. I've taken great pains to make sure it shows identically on both browsers apart from a few minor centering differences. You might want to try File | Quick Preferences | Identify as Opera and make sure that View | Zoom is set to 100%. What View | Text Size value do you have set in IE. It should be set on Medium to display Pals as it is meant to be viewed ;) :P
I agree with you about Firebird - it is far faster than both Opera and IE6. Unfortunately (for Mozilla) the lack of auto reload, mouse gestures and some of the other toys makes me want to stick with Opera.
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What View | Text Size value do you have set in IE. It should be set on Medium to display Pals as it is meant to be viewed ;) :P
I have it set to Small in IE, as that's the way it looks best with my screen resolution. (I know - trust me to be different) ::)
As far as the mouse wheel clicks, there's usually a browser setting somewhere, but I can't find it at the moment. I don't want to change the settings in the mouse software, as that will then affect other things.
I'll give it another thourough going over. ;)
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and (for Chorley Dave), how do you do that Google UK thing exactly??
Hi Simon.
Look in your Opera directory for the file search.ini and open it in Notepad, or another txt editor. The first search engine listed should be Google. All you need to do is change the URL from .com to .co.uk. I've copied mine below:
[Search Engine 1]
Name=&Google UK
URL=http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%s&sourceid=opera&num=%i&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
Query=
Key=g
Is post=0
Has endseparator=0
Encoding=utf-8
Search Type=0
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Hi Dave,
Yeah, that's what I did but it didn't seem to make any difference. The address still comes up as google.com, even though I changed it like you said. :-\
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Opera 7.11 for XP stores the search.ini file in the users' private area.
Use the Windows file search to find it Simon. It'll be somewhere in "Documents and Settings"
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Err, mine is Opera 7.02, I believe.
I did find the / a search.ini in the application folder, and the thing Dave said about was definitely in there, and I definitely changed it, but I'll have a look and see if there's another one somewhere.
I've had to go back to IE on at least 2 occasions so far tonight, when Opera failed to display webpages. I'm not convinced yet.
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Having realised I seem to be using an older version, I've tried to update it, but keep getting instawwation ewwors (as Elmer would say). Slowly losing patience. :-\
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Hi again, Simon.
Sorry your having problems. I've never used XP, having once tried WinME and hated it so much that I reformatted and went back to 98SE within the day. Whenever I have upgraded my Opera browser to a newer version (as Opera does not write anything to the registry AFAIK) I have simply deleted the Opera directory and downloaded the newer version without any problem.
Hope you get it sorted one way or the other.
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Having realised I seem to be using an older version, I've tried to update it, but keep getting instawwation ewwors (as Elmer would say). Slowly losing patience. :-\
I'd have that broadband connection of yours looked at Simon ::)
I must have downloaded Opera 5 or six times in the last few months to get the latest update and never had a problem re-installing. Something must be wrong if you are getting that many corruptions.
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Well, everything else downloads and installs OK. I could have blamed the *cough* 'licence' but this was happening when I first tried to download it off the Opera site. I managed to find a copy I had downloaded ages ago, which was the only one I could get to install correctly, but, of course, it's an older version.
I suppose the only way might be to totally purge it from my PC and start again - just when I was starting to get it set up to my liking. ::)
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OK, I'm back on Firebird! It really is a lot faster than both IE and Opera. It's also extremely highly configurable, once you have downloaded the Advanced Preferences plug-in. The only thing is, I don't understand what most of the available tweaks actually do!
I'm sure there must be a way to get our advanced smilies to display - any ideas Sean?
By the way, I did get Opera to install. Must have had a dodgy download. ;)