01 Mar Die Firefox! Die!
Before I get started on this rant, if you are viewing this article using the Firefox browser, close the page and never come back. What follows will certainly offend your counter-culture sensibilities.
The History of Firefox
Version 1 was released in 2004 as an “experimental” branch of the Mozilla browser. Since March 2011 there has been a scheduled release every 6 weeks (on Tuesday). This browser is so flawed that even the creators realize it needs to be fixed every 6 weeks! Does anyone else find that disturbing? It is now up to version 43 and if there really is an internet god, there won’t be a version 44. If the US still had an internet czar (yes there was one under Bill Clinton) we could appeal to him for intervention. However, we just have to let the laws of supply and demand work this out.
More Firefox History
This browser was created in a time where processing power and bandwidth were limited and a lightweight, customizable, open-source browser could somewhat reduce the time it took find internet porn. However, advancements in technology have made those reasons irrelevant. There are now countless available add-ons (most of the good ones can also be found for the other browsers). Many of these reduce the speed of the browsing experience to rival that of very first days of the internet. In addition, pages with large images (basically 90% of the meaningful internet) can also bring the browser to it’s knees.
Firefox Cons (partial list)
Aside from the comparably poor performance, the utter lack of meaningful advantages, almost no support (community forums only), the biggest problem is compatibility. Some web pages simply will not load on this browser! Other style elements are either poorly rendered or simply not rendered at all. The add-ons are developed independently of each other and are often incompatible. The fix is to start disabling add-ons one at a time until the problem goes away, and then delete or replace the offending add-on. Open enough tabs and the memory usage soars until the browser eventually freezes.
Firefox Marketshare and Conspiracy
Despite a rapidly dwindling market share which is now 5.2%, the editors from PC Magazine proclaimed the newest version their “editors choice”. I am willing to concede that it is the “editors choice” for anyone who has the time and energy to customize their browsing experience and then look down on the rest of us. That sounds like a decent portion of the 5%, and I suspect the others just have an aversion to Internet Explorer or Chrome. I suspect the writer of the PC Magazine piece is one of the thousands of coding volunteers who keep “innovating” the browser. So the planet has given this product a 5% confidence rating. Maybe the review should be done by someone with more to do than play with their browser configuration. PC Magazine is not alone, so maybe I am the crazy one…
Nearly every reviewer touts the speed advantage which is only a few microseconds faster than Chrome. The plain vanilla version (virtually no-add-ons) is used when doing speed comparisons with the other browsers, add a few basic add-ons and the speed advantage is gone.
The Firefox-WordPress Dilemma
Fun Fact: 58% (and growing) of all websites that use a content management system use WordPress. This represents more than 25% of ALL websites.
What happens when you combine an open-source browser (with various add-ons), an open-source content management system (with various plugins), and developers on both sides with often dubious skills? A recipe for countless frustrating chats with the WordPress support team that all end the same way.
Support: “Could you please try this with another browser?”.
WordPress content editor: “Oh, it works now. Could you make this work on Firefox?”.
Support: “Please remove all the Firefox add-ons.”
WordPress content editor: “Done!”
Support: “Please remove this version of the Firefox browser.”
WordPress content editor: “Done!”
Support: “Bye…” (end chat)
The Bane of Developers
Today’s designers are engaged in a never-ending game of one-upmanship with each other to come up with compelling layouts and engaging features. They could care less about the various shortcomings of Firefox. They leave that hurdle to the developers. This is why I am writing this! The developers are already faced with making sure the site is responsive, mobile compliant, and works on a myriad of sometimes obscure devices and browsers. It all looks great and then some miscreant decides to view it in Firefox. Then the developer is faced with the unenviable task of explaining why certain “must-have” features and graphics simply don’t work on a browser that 5% of the planet is still using.
So basically, this memory hogging chunk of code, that was originally built to enhance the browser experience, now does exactly the opposite. Simply stunning…Die Firefox! Die!