Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Safari vs Firefox

Safari menusFirefox menus

See the differences in these two screen grabs?

On the left is the way this part of my sidebar appears to me when viewed on my beloved Mac using Mac's Safari browser. Note the lovely rounded drop-down menu buttons and the yellow banner underneath, which is like a ticker tape than runs from right to left with clickable text. All very snazzy, I thought, in my "I'm struggling to get my head around a bit of html every now and again" naivety.

The pic on the right is how the same bit of my sidebar looks when using the current people's darling Firefox, again on my Mac. Gone are the lovely rounded buttons, to be replaced with godawful square things that look like they've come straight off a ZX81. And the ticker tape? Yep, that's gone, too. Instead there is just a thick yellow line.

And there was I thinking we all had the same online experience, and that my splendid buttons looked equally dashing to you guys, too.

So, a teeny survey of my readers: What does it look like when you view it? Like one of these, or different again -- in IE, for example. (When I view my page in IE, all the posts are centred on the page, and the sidebar stuff is all at the bottom of the page, so I don't know what the fuck's going on there?) I look forward to hearing...

18 Comments:

Blogger Shep said...

I'm all over Firefox here. IE is just plain awful. Opera looks even more ZX81 than Firefox. My firefox is faster, crashes less, and is skinnable, so I can make it look purdy. In truth it's the functionality and the non-Microsoftness of it that keeps me with Firefox. And the download manager. And all the add-ons. And the fact it takes up about 4 meg. And the fact you can get a version you don't even have to install.

I have a question though for Gmail Mac users - does the Gmail IM thingy work in Firefox, 'cos I know it doesn't with Safari...

04 October, 2006 10:07  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

Yeah, the skins on Firefox are nice (I've opted for a Safari lookalike, of course), but what about those rounded buttons? We Mac OS X users want lovely rounded buttons! I'm not using Gmail yet, though I know it has found favour with many Mac users, so I'm assuming there is full functionality.

04 October, 2006 10:14  
Blogger Shep said...

"We Mac OS X users want lovely rounded buttons!"

"We Mac users want pretty cases!"

"We Mac users want a little thing at the front that glows like my computer is breathing!"

Pretty versus versatile and functional. Hmmm.

God bless Apple. It's like my Creative Zen Vision: M vs an iPod. iPod is prettier. The Zen is cheaper, plays more different formats, has higher screen res....oh I'm boring myself already LOL

04 October, 2006 10:49  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

Yes, but the Mac and all its Apple brethren are eminently versatile and functional too, arguably more so than PCs (just as Beta was better quality than VHS but just had fewer users). Surely no one can deny that those menu buttons are far more attractive than the boxy PC/Firefox ones? See how I made my text fit so neatly, little knowing that no one else would see it that way. I assume then, as a Firefox user/lover, that you see my sidebar as per the right-hand pic, Shep?

04 October, 2006 11:00  
Blogger Suze said...

Why are people raving so much about Firfox? Whenever I come across a blog using it the display is always fucked up.

I use IE and your page looks fine to me. :)

04 October, 2006 11:03  
Blogger Shep said...

I do! The right hand side sidebar. I realised when I was doing web design-y stuff that most stuff I did purdy would be ruined as soon as someone looked at it with a different browser. It's a damn shame. Also annoying when you make it all sit right and then look at it in 800x600 and see it all looks pants.

So Macs are like Betamax, and PCs like VHS. Yep, sounds like a pretty accurate summary...

04 October, 2006 11:10  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

Suze: Thanks for your input. I've got a feeling that my IE is fucked. Not that it really matters cos I almost never use it.

Shep: You're a cheeky monkey twisting my words like that... Anyway, it does suck that everything can't just look the same whichever browser you're using.

04 October, 2006 11:14  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

i couldn't give a fetid dingo's kidney what it fucking looks like! i love reading what you write, and isn't that why we all come back every day? (three or four times a day in my case!)

the one on the left if you are REALLY worried. but WITH the scrolly bit!

04 October, 2006 11:23  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

you anal nerd you!..
I see the right side..but then my laptop is shit.

Silly man ..its the words not the bells and whistles..
( yeah what cappy said )

04 October, 2006 12:17  
Blogger Tamarai said...

I get the square boxes, but the letters moving across the yellow strip.

04 October, 2006 12:39  
Blogger Candy Minx said...

I use Safari...the only reason I used Firefox was for the uber cool website Stumble Upon, which doesn't seem to work on Safari.

I see a huge difference between the two...and I have also taken to reading blogs sometimes with the RSS button pushed, especially if the blog has lots of decor. It's funny at first I only loved the look of really fancy blogs...and my first web site was really fancy, designed on my mac...edgy urban hip (hee hee well it WAS!) but I preferred the experience right away of bloggin...just dropped the web site within a onth. Yawan.


And now I really really like simple looking blogs...it's so weird, I find I am very much attached to the content of a blog what kind of pics, what kind of content and style of writing...that I actually don't care about how they look. Although I really like those drop down bars and want to figure out how to make them....simplicity!

04 October, 2006 13:18  
Blogger Spangly Princess said...

firefox here too. and now I know that I'm missing out on ROUNDED BUTTONS and the myriad joys of SCROLLING TEXT I'm gutted. As a queen or possibily princess of style over substance I am most dismayed. Frankly it's not good enough, asterisk, and I'm tempted to flounce in high dudgeon. (what does one do in medium or low dudgeon, incidentally?)

04 October, 2006 14:15  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

L: Thanks. And it was good to be your first commenter!

Cappy: You're right, content is the most important thing. But if you spend a little time trying to find colours and bits and pieces to make the thing look more appealing too, it's nice to know that everyone gets to see the fruit of your work. But it seems they don't. Thanks for the kind words.

Tinkerbell: I know. I should probably stop gazing at my navel for a few minutes and write something worthwhile instead...

Tanya: Thanks for the info.

Candy: I will use Firefox, but, like you, only for sites where Safari is not supported. I agree with you (and those others who mentioned it), of course, about the content being the key thing. That was one of the things that pissed me off about the whole Humping thing: the attention paid to look over substance. Simple is best, and I certainly don't think my layout is anything but simple.

04 October, 2006 14:19  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

Spangly: We must have been typing at the same time. You'll just have to go out and buy a Mac, I suppose! I believe that's what people do in medium and low dudgeon, after all.

04 October, 2006 14:23  
Blogger Martha Elaine Belden said...

yeah... i see the thing on the right (using firefox on a pc)... but your yellow tinker-tape thing does work... so i guess that's a plus :)

04 October, 2006 16:21  
Blogger * (asterisk) said...

Martha, that is a plus. Thanks for letting me know.

05 October, 2006 10:48  
Blogger Spangly Princess said...

asterisk: happy to buy mac. pls send funds. await yr cheque.

05 October, 2006 11:15  
Blogger Will said...

Firefox is amazing. And Version 2.0 has just come out. It spellchecks for you! It lets you save and snapback your tabs! It guesses what you're searching for! Wooo!

05 October, 2006 15:28  

Post a Comment

<< Home


Who links to me?