Sometime late February, Firefox downloads crossed the 500 million threshold, up from the 400 million mark in September 2007, indicating an average rate a bit shy of 20 million per month at present.
It's an arbitrary but interesting milestone for the open-source Web browser, whose development is overseen by Mozilla but that's also developed and extended by a large number of outside programmers.
Firefox has spread widely in the years since its release. Browsers Statistics registered unprecedented increase from 6.8% market share in 2005 to 36.5% in Feb 2008.
The project originally was named Phoenix to symbolize a rising from the ashes of the Netscape open-source browser project that began in 1998 but languished for many years as Microsoft's Internet Explorer solidified its lead.
Now Firefox programmers are working on version 3, which brings performance improvements and interface changes, and Mozilla also is working on a mobile version of the browser for handheld devices.
Firefox is a highly recommended alternative to the Internet Explorer browser on all Windows computers, providing a standards-compliant platform for a more secure and faster surfing experience.
IE is known for its insecurity issues for years. The fact that it is pre-installed on all Windows PC sold means that all websites developed should still be tested to ensure that it runs well on IE, which unfortunately is not very Web Standards-compliant.
However, since FireFox is gaining momentum, do ensure your websites also looks its best on Firefox as well.
Other great browser alternatives available are Opera and Safari.
The point is, as a user, we have other choices besides IE. As a website owner, we need to ensure our websites are compatible with all the other popular browsers out there (particularly Firefox) for a positive user experience, as more and more users are using browsers other than IE to browse the internet.
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The award-winning Web browser is now faster, more secure, and fully customizable to your online life. With Firefox 2, we’ve added powerful new features that make your online experience even better. Firefox continues to lead the way in online security, and now includes active protection from online scams to keep you safer. |
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Experience the web, Apple style, with Safari: the fastest. easiest-to-use web browser in the world. With its simple, elegant interface, Safari gets out of your way and lets you enjoy the web — up to 2 times faster than Internet Explorer. |
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Opera is a super fast and free Web browser. Safe, secure, powerful and fully customizable, the Opera Web browser is faster and more secure than other browsers available on the market. Opera delivers robust security and a far-richer feature set than any other Web browser. |
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Internet Explorer 7 is the most secure version of Internet Explorer to date and now it's easier to install. Internet Explorer 7 provides improved navigation through tabbed browsing, web search right from the toolbar, advanced printing, easy discovery, reading and subscription to RSS feeds, and much more.
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HTML Performance Comparison
Source:
http://www.spreadfirefox.com/
http://www.apple.com/safari/
http://www.opera.com/
http://www.microsoft.com/ie
http://browsehappy.com/why/
http://www.news.com/8301-13580_3-9876676-39.html
http://www.quirksmode.org/dom/contents.html
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CREATOR'S DNA
