TranceAddict Forums (www.tranceaddict.com/forums)
- Canada - Toronto & Southern Ont.
-- Firefox barricade storming peters out...
Firefox barricade storming peters out...
March 1 2005
Market share gains slow.
By Joris Evers, IDG News Service
Firefox's dramatic success in the browser market appears to be slowing, according to the latest figures.
After an initial surge with the release of the first full version in November, the pace at which the open-source browser is winning market share has slowed down. It now holds 5.7 percent of the market, according to analyst firm WebSideStory. Microsoft's Internet Explorer may have seen its figures slip but it still dominates with a remarkable 89.9 percent of the market.
According series of figures from OneStat.com, give Firefox an 8.45 percent share with Explorer boasting 87.28 percent.
However, the speed at which Firefox is gaining market share has slowed down, WebSideStory said. Firefox's market share grew 15 percent over the last five weeks, compared to growth of 22 percent in the period between December and January. From November to December, it was growing at 34 percent.
Firefox's initial aim was to reach a 10 percent market share by the middle of 2005 and it is set to reach that goal - but only at the end of the year, warned WebSideStory. "Growth in Firefox�s usage has slowed slightly since its big surge in November. This is probably to be expected as we move beyond the early-adopter segment," WebSideStory CEO Jeff Lunsford said. "Growing concern over potential security holes in the browser might be another factor to consider."
The Mozilla Foundation, the distributor of Firefox, last week warned of serious security flaws in the browser and released an update. In an about face two weeks ago, Microsoft said it would release a test version of Explorer 7.0 later this year. Previously, Microsoft had said it would not offer a browser upgrade until the next version of Windows ships in late 2006.
lol.. cherry pickin news RJ .. ? 
| quote: |
| Originally posted by dEsidEL lol.. cherry pickin news RJ .. ? |
Yes but!...
| quote: |
| Firefox market share rockets IE5 users might be moving to Firefox not IE6, says web analytics firm Steve Ranger, vnunet.com 01 Mar 2005 Mozilla's Firefox web browser has boosted its total global usage share to 8.45 per cent, according to figures by web analytics company Onestat.com. Firefox's total usage share has increased by more than one per cent since November 2004, the web analytics company said. Mozilla announced last month that downloads of Firefox had hit 25 million since it was launched. Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) still dominates the global browser market with a usage share of 87.28 per cent, 1.62 per cent less than at the end of November 2004, according to Onestat.com. "It seems that global usage of Firefox is increasing and global usage of IE is decreasing. It looks like users of IE 5 are switching to Firefox instead of upgrading to IE 6.0," said Niels Brinkman, co-founder of OneStat.com. The global usage share of Apple's Safari has increased from 0.91 per cent to 1.21 per cent since November 2004. Netscape (1.11 per cent) and Opera (1.09 per cent) are the fourth and fifth most used browsers. |
| quote: |
| Firefox gains foothold 01 March 2005 By MICHAEL HERMAN The award-winning open-source browser Firefox has been downloaded more than 25 million times since launching less than 100 days ago. Distributed by the Mozilla Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to preserving choice and promoting innovation on the internet, Firefox is on the ascendancy and becoming the browser of choice among technoliterate users. User-friendly features - such as tabbed browsing, built-in pop-up blocking and live bookmarks � have made it easy for Mozilla Foundation's volunteer advocacy group, Spread Firefox (www.spreadfirefox.com), to promote the browser around the world. Developed on the same model as the open-source software itself, Spread Firefox has already enlisted more than 70,000 members, "each of whom bring unique and diverse experience to the project," said the president of the Mozilla Foundation, Mitchell Baker. "Twenty-five million Firefox downloads is a significant achievement, and we see that number continuing to grow. "Firefox is being rapidly adopted by the mainstream, with this audience embracing Firefox as a more user-friendly web-browsing solution." Firefox achieved more than 10 million downloads in its first month, shattering all records for earlier versions and increasing the pressure on software giant Microsoft to update its Internet Explorer browser. Microsoft's chairman, Bill Gates, announced two weeks ago a new version of the world's most widely used web-browsing software, saying IE 7 would be released for preliminary testing around June this year, with stronger, built-in security features. Meanwhile, Mozilla Foundation volunteers have translated Firefox into 28 languages, ensuring consumers around the world have equal access to the Firefox browser, and putting Microsoft under orders to improve its game or risk losing hearts, minds and desktops. |
| quote: |
| Slower Firefox Growth Still Hurts IE By Matt Hicks February 28, 2005 While Mozilla Firefox has slowed its growth pace, the open-source browser still is making enough inroads to knock Microsoft's Internet Explorer below 90 percent user share for the first time in three years. ADVERTISEMENT Web browser user-share data released Monday show that Firefox's rate of growth has dropped slightly since its Version 1.0 release. The browser had been increasing about one percentage point a month since November, but the pace has fallen this month, reports Web analytics provider WebSideStory Inc. For the five weeks that ended Feb. 18, Firefox usage had jumped 0.74 percentage points to 5.7 percent. That growth was enough to hurt Microsoft Corp.'s IE, which dropped 0.43 percentage points to 89.9 percent, WebSideStory reported. The last time IE dropped below 90 percent in WebSideStory's surveys was in early 2002. "Maybe the biggest story of it all is that Firefox isn't going away," said Geoff Johnston, a WebSideStory analyst. Since WebSideStory began tracking Firefox usage separately in November, the browser has risen 2.7 percentage points while IE has fallen 3 percentage points. IE had commanded a 95.5 percent share in June before it began to drop. WebSideStory, of San Diego, Calif., tracks U.S. browser usage based on the percentage of unique browsers hitting its network of sites. The network consists of between 20 million to 30 million Internet users each day. eWEEK.com Special Report: Browser Security PointerRead more here about Mozilla preparing to tackle security issues. Johnston attributed Firefox's tempered growth to the typical slowdown in interest in a new software release as time passes. Firefox also has battled recent security issues, including an Internationalized Domain Name spoofing flaw affecting non-IE browsers. Mozilla last week issued a Firefox update to fix the problem. Meanwhile, Microsoft appears to be getting ready to more directly battle Firefox. The company shifted it strategy this month by announcing plans to release IE 7.0, an update focused on security and to be launched outside of a general Windows release. "There are a lot of ifs with Microsoft's new browser, and it may affect Firefox," Johnston said. "But I would not at all be surprised if we see sometime in the fall that 10 percent of all browsers in the U.S. are using Firefox rather than IE." Mozilla Foundation leaders have set a goal of reaching a 10 percent share in 2005. At its earlier pace of growth, Firefox appeared on track to reach that milestone by midyear. If it continues to grow between a half and three-quarters of a percentage point every month, it would reach 10 percent usage by late fall, Johnston said. |
| quote: |
| Firefox keeps seizing IE browser market share Firefox slowly increases its share of the Web browser market where Microsoft Internet Explorer keeps its leading positions, San Diego-based WebSideStory reported Monday. WebSideStory registered Microsoft's Internet Explorer�s share drop under the 90% level for the first time, while Firefox has enticed additional 0.74% to its 5.7% browser market share in the last five weeks since the research in January. Although the speed of Firefox spreading decreased, WebSideStory analyst Geoff Johnston doesn�t see it is "stopping or flattening," but showing "steady half-a-percent-point increase each month." He thinks that Firefox�s "new features" are "what got them where they are today." Amsterdam-based OneStat awarded Firefox with 8.5% share of the browser market. According to its Web research, the share of IE has fallen to 87.3 percent. Niels Brinkman, the founder of OneStat.com, admitted that the "global usage share of Mozilla's Firefox is still increasing," mostly because 'browser users of Internet Explorer 5 are switching to Mozilla Firefox instead of upgrading to Internet Explorer 6.0." According to WebSideStory, the Mozilla Foundation could possibly reach its desirable 10% browser market share by the end of the year. But even with such results the Mozilla Foundation will not be able to force Microsoft Internet Explorer out of the market because Mozilla doesn't have such "benefits" like its own operating system. "The only way I see Firefox really cracking the big time is if Mozilla partnered with the likes of Google. It's amazing how long it's taken everyone to realize that search is the killer app of the Internet, that search is where the money is for browsers," Johnston added. |
Go go Firefox
| quote: |
| Originally posted by loca Go go Firefox |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by starsearcher are you working for firefox? |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by loca Mozilla's Firefox web browser has boosted its total global usage share to 8.45 per cent, according to figures by web analytics company Onestat.com. Firefox's total usage share has increased by more than one per cent since November 2004, the web analytics company said. The global usage share of Apple's Safari has increased from 0.91 per cent to 1.21 per cent since November 2004. |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by starsearcher are you working for firefox? |
Ahhh I see...i knew there was some kind of a connection
And Safari's growing thanks to Apple's increase in popularity (I think)...I want a powerbook 
sounds like some conflictin info
| quote: |
| Originally posted by amb_ Nah, her fulltime job is with Cuteness, Inc. |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by rabbitjoker From November to December, [Firefox] was growing at 34 percent. |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by rabbitjoker Looks like Safari is growing faster than all other browsers. |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by AwakenedAddict Safari's rate of growth is actually much slower. |
Well I was comparing apples to apples... that's why i converted the figures. BUT this could just be a case of conflicting statistical reports. I tend to trust reports with precise figures more than reports with approximate figures (ie: "more than one percent"). Either of the growth rates cited in the articles could be wrong, what is certain is that they present conflicting data
Sweet merciful crap, you mean Firefox's market growth is slowing down as market saturation increases? I'm shocked, SHOCKED! 
...No, seriously, what's surprising about this? They'll hit their 10% mark soon enough, and that's more than enough to get competent web designers to think twice about designing IE-exclusive sites.
Websidestory is acting like a Microsoft ballwasher. Ever since Firefox started gaining in popularity they've been consistently under-reporting its market share by deliberately ignoring all non-Windows systems. Yes, Windows dominates the OS market, but it only has about 90% of it, and Firefox has almost half the OS X market and almost all of the Linux market. So do the math, and comes out to about 8.5%, not 5.7%.
Why market gurus love to "estimate" their figures by simply shrugging off the non-Wintel systems will always baffle me. They should know better, since the corporate market is what really matters and Wintel has even less domination in that area (at least, to the best of my knowledge).
Opera Still Tops for Browser Innovation
By Jim Rapoza
April 25, 2005
eWeek.com
For a few years during the height of Internet Explorer's dominance and the depth of Netscape's follies, Opera was the clear choice as the alternative Web browser. But given the recent and rapid rise of Firefox, Opera's status has greatly diminished.
Opera is still a very good Web browser and, with the April release of Opera 8.0, Opera Software ASA shows that it's still clearly No. 1 when it comes to Web browser innovation. Many of the standard features found in the current generation of browsers, such as cookie management and tabbed browsing, were introduced in the Opera browser.
While the improvements in Opera 8.0 aren't monumental, users who are willing to try new things in Web browsing will find Opera 8.0 to be a very intuitive and friendly application to use.
Opera ran well on all of our test systems and for the most part properly displayed all Web pages, although we did run into problems on a few sites, including the home page of espn.com.
One of the most talked-about new features in Opera is a simple whitelist tool that attempts to prevent the Web-site spoofing common in phishing and other fraud-based attacks. Opera does this by supporting only top-level domains that have controls over the Internationalized Domain Name technology that lets sites be described in their native languages. Although this will help to stop some attacks, those who use international character domain names may run into problems.
Click here to read more about the steps Opera took to thwart spoofing in Opera 8.0.
Opera 8.0 also provides much more information about Web pages secured through SSL. When visiting a secure page, users can click on the new security bar to get detailed information about the page and a score on its security rating�3 being the highest rating.
For the general browsing experience, Opera 8.0 has a cleaner interface than the previous versions, although we still found it a little too cluttered until we had adjusted it to our liking.
One of the coolest�and, surprisingly, most useful�new features in Opera 8.0 is the inclusion of a trash barrel on the address bar, which allowed us to see all pop-up pages that had been blocked, and also see any pages or tabs that we had closed. Since we often found that we'd closed a Web page prematurely, this proved to be a very handy feature for getting back pages we had closed.
Another new interface feature we liked was the way Opera could be set to automatically resize the width of a page to fit within the window. This made many pages much more viewable and cut down on annoying horizontal scrolling.
One potential drawback is that, unlike Mozilla-based browsers and IE, Opera cannot log in to Web sites that use Windows authentication.
Currently, Opera 8.0 is available on Windows and Linux systems, and a Mac OS X version is expected in the near future. Opera is available in a free version with an embedded advertising window or without advertising for $39.
For more information, go to www.opera.com.
Microsoft discloses some IE 7 plans
By Paul Festa, CNET News.com
Published on ZDNet News: April 25, 2005, 3:23 PM PT
Microsoft finally told Web developers what they've wanted to hear for years, promising support for graphics and style sheet standards.
In a blog entry posted Friday, a member of Microsoft's Internet Explorer development team said the company plans to support key elements of World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendations Portable Network Graphics (PNG), an image format, and Cascading Style Sheet (CSS), a Web page styling standard.
"We have certainly heard the clear feedback from the Web design community," Chris Wilson, lead program manager for the Web platform in IE, said in reference to support for the PNG standard. "Our first and most important goal with our Cascading Style Sheet support is to remove the major inconsistencies so that Web developers have a consistent set of functionality on which they can rely."
While Microsoft and critics of its Web browser have focused most of their attention on IE's security liabilities, the issue of standards support remains crucial to Web developers.
Glitches in IE's standards support mean that developers have to code separately for IE and for browsers that hew more closely to the standards. IE enjoys about 90 percent browser market share despite losing some points to the Mozilla Foundation's open-source Firefox browser.
Last month, Microsoft was reported to have been planning better PNG and CSS support, but Wilson's blog entry Friday is the first public word to developers that the next version of IE--pegged as a security-focused release--would feature these improvements.
One standards proponent and Microsoft competitor said he looked forward to the proof of IE 7's standards support in the new release.
"The blog says they have fixed a few bugs. Great, but we expect more than that," said Opera Software's chief technology officer, Hakon Lie, who co-authored CSS. "The big question is: Will IE 7 pass the Acid2 test? I proposed the Acid2 challenge in a CNET article, and it has later been published by the Web Standards Project."
Other improvements said to be on tap for IE 7, currently code-named Rincon, include tabbed browsing and support for IDN (Internationalized Domain Names).
For years, developers have complained about IE's CSS bugs, and have called IE's rendering of certain PNG images "ugly."
Firefox still rocks my socks. Extensions are the best things ever. EVER.
ForecastFox and the GMail notifier are the 2 best things in the browser universe.
| quote: |
| Originally posted by VERTiG0 GMail notifier |
| quote: |
| Originally posted by rabbitjoker FYI: Google has a system-tray (non-browser based) version of this software. |
I have been a Opera fan for many years....
It is my primary surfing browser and I love it...
Go Opera Go!
It is funny, I have installed it on friend's machines and once they use it, they love it..period.
Well what do you expect when IE comes with windows. Not only that but a lot of people are computer illiterite and just stick with what works. Not to mention that IE has been around since the dawn of time and a lot of people don't want to switch from the tried, tested, and shitty internet explorer.
| quote: |
| Originally posted by loca Yes but!... <snip> Go go Firefox |
Powered by: vBulletin
Copyright © 2000-2021, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.