Talk:Comparison of web browsers

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I have edited the discussion page in order to restore the initial order. In order to preserve this order, please use three equal signs (===) to create sub-sections rather than sections. And please add your post at the bottom of a section.
Possible topics are Standards support issues, Features you want mentioned or Browsers you want added/removed. Grey (talk) 03:43, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Features

[edit] Ad filtering

As far as I know Internet Explorer doesn't do any ad filtering. Can someone verify this? (I'm not using Windows so I can't) --85.225.32.57 (talk) 21:20, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Emulation/API

Since when does Konqueror run without emulation under Windows? Even partially? It doesn't, the only way to get even close is to use Cygwin.

Cygwin is not an emulator. Neither is Wine. WinUAE (Amiga emulator) is an emulator, but Cygwin and Wine are API layers that makes it possible to run software from other OS'es. Cygwin is no more an emulator on Windows than Windows API is. 83.92.119.42 15:07, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
Konqueror currently runs on Windows in a very limited state. For KDE 4.0's Windows release Konqueror 4.0 should be included in a (at least mostly) fully functional state. Also this port doesn't require Cygwin or an emulator.

[edit] FTP upload/download file/folder

The FTP column needs more than "yes/no". On Firefox 2.0.0.1 I cannot find any way to FTP upload even a file. (There is a FireFTP extension.) Same on Opera v9; download only. Yet even old IE5.5 is very nicely integrated with Windows Explorer, and can easily FTP upload not just files but also whole directory structures. 69.87.203.244 02:01, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] IE6 and IE7

Should there be separate rows for IE6 and IE7 (like there is for IE for the Mac)? Both are very widely used so the IE6 information is still relevant, and they have a very different features, rendering abilities, and platform compatibility. Koweja 18:47, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

I believe this would make the page cluttered. After all, this page's point is to compare the last released versions of different browsers. Comparison of separate versions of one browser should be done on its own page. --Mégara (Мегъра) - D. G. Mavrov 13:38, 14 July 2007 (UTC)
I agree with you on most of that, Mégara, but IE6 should still be listed seperately from IE7 because of the significant differences between the two. It's not much of a leap to consider them as two individual browsers with no connection with each other. IE6 still holds a significant portion of the IE browser market share sadly; W3C records indicating version 6 is still more popular than version 7. Other major browsers are good at telling a user to upgrade to a newer version, but that is also provided the user is knowledgeable enough to seek out a better browser than the IE that came with windows..... which, evident by IE's runaway popularity, is not something the majority of web surfers think to do. --Anonymous 17:35, 21 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.130.65.241 (talk)

[edit] IE voice control

Hi! I think internet explorer should have "partial" instead of "no", since, if running windows vista, you surely can control the browser with your voice!213.64.150.116 17:05, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Split View (multiple panes)

As a Konqueror user I rely heavily on the "Split-View" feature allowing a single window or tab to be split vertically or horizontally into two or more panes and drag and drop graphics and text from websites to multiple locations. I would like to know which - if any - other browsers support this and thus copy and modify the relevant section "Accessibility features" here for completion. I would only consider putting this into the article itself if at least one other browser supports "Split-View". A related question is which browsers other than Konqueror have graphic file-managing capabilities, so maybe the column should be called "file managing". Please help with filling this out, especially if with more "yes"s. --Theosch 12:45, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Information about what common accessibility features are implemented natively (without third-party add-ons).

Opera allows for this, though more specifically each tab can be resized and reshaped as a window-within-window type configuration. Not sure how you would denote that in the table, maybe rename Split-view to something a little more generic and deal with it in notes? -Keithjgrant (talk) 23:34, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
Browser Tabbed browsing Pop-up blocking Incremental finding Ad filtering Page zooming † Split-View (multiple panes)
Amaya Yes N/A ? No Yes ?
AOL Explorer Yes Yes No No Yes ?
Avant Yes Yes No Yes Yes ?
Camino Yes Yes Yes Yes No ?
Dillo No N/A No No No ?
ELinks Yes No Yes N/A N/A ?
Epiphany Yes Yes Yes Partial † No ?
Flock Yes Yes Yes Yes No ?
Galeon Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ?
iCab Yes Yes No Yes Yes ?
Internet Explorer Yes Yes No † No Yes ?
Internet Explorer for Mac No No No No No ?
K-Meleon Yes Yes Yes Partial † Partial ?
Konqueror Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes
Links No Yes No Yes No ?
Lynx No N/A No N/A N/A ?
Maxthon Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes ?
Mosaic No N/A No No No ?
Mozilla Yes Yes Yes Partial † No ?
Mozilla Firefox Yes Yes Yes Partial † No [1] No
Netscape Yes Yes Yes Partial † No ?
Netscape Browser Yes Yes Yes Partial † No ?
Netscape Navigator No No No No No ?
OmniWeb Yes Yes No Yes Yes ?
Opera Yes Yes Yes Yes † Yes ?
Safari Yes † Yes † No Yes Yes ?
SeaMonkey Yes Yes Yes Partial † No [2] ?
Shiira Yes Yes No No Yes ?
WorldWideWeb No No No No No ?
w3m Yes Yes Yes No Nozt ?

[edit] Size of program and it's influence on browser startup time

I just gladly see anyone compare - how much space does a 'clean install' take, and how long do you actually have to wait for browser to launch.

It will be very hard to find reliable sources which can be cited for the purpose of determining size (also build sizes vary across platforms and even installations). For startup time, the tests would always be subject to individual hardware/software combinations and nothing apart from a vast and dedicated case study could deliver data that is anywhere near objective or reliable. As any producable data is near impossible to verify (and will likely fuel edit wars), I'd suggest not to include this into the article... --Grey 16:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Internet Explorer 7.0 Progressive JPG?

I refute the comment that IE7 does not renders Progressive JPG in a progressive way. It does.

All you have to do to prove it is to upload a progressive (large so you can see the progressive effect) JPG into a server and see it at IE.

This would remove the "partial" from JPG support on IE7 which is very weird to be there. BTW I'm using safari and I confirm the "slow script" warning.

BTW this might be true for IE6 but I also have to agree with those mentioning the tables should either separate IE6 and IE7, or focus on IE7, unless we start also listing issues with older versions of the other browsers on the same tab. I know everyone (including me) hates IE, but biasing is wrong ;)

The problem is in the "all you have to do to prove it" part. That's original research. Can you provide a reliable source to cite so that any reader (even those that cannot run IE) can verify that IE 7 supports progressive display of progressive JPEGs? -- Schapel 14:27, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
That's not quite how this works out. The claim that IE7 does not support progressive jpgs needs to be proven. You don't make a claim and then tell everyone else to prove you wrong. - Koweja 17:47, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Exactly. In fact, the claim needs to be proven either way. I'm not making a claim and telling everyone else to prove me wrong, as you seem to imply. I was replying to the original poster, who was making a claim and supporting that claim with original research rather than a reliable source. Do you have a such reliable source that can verify the case one way or the other? -- Schapel 17:53, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Well, if it's a choice between something that many people can verify versus something that is an unverified statement, then surely WP should opt for the former, even if it is strictly "original research".
I fear that some posturing I've seen over time on "original research" goes too far. Do we also need a citation to write that a lead weight will sink in (liquid) water?
—DIV (60.241.29.107 12:50, 1 December 2007 (UTC))
Everyone knows Schapel is a WP:RS extremist ;-). The sources says IE7 supports JPG. With no other precision. Full support is assumed. So go on, be bold, change "partial" to "yes" and remove the note about IE6. If Mr Chapel can find a reliable source that says IE7 does not support it fully, he'll correct it back. I'm sure of it.--Fenring 13:16, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
No, we do not need a citation that says a lead weight will sink in water. It's not something that would be challenged. I will, however, challenge that IE 7 supports progressive display of progressive JPEGs, if no one can find any source that says that, and the sources all say that IE 6 does not support it. My reasoning is that it would still be okay to say IE 7 fully supports JPEGs even if it does not support progressive display, because the progressive display is optional. Additionally, if IE 7 added new capabilities for JPEGs, they would be documented by someone. Remember that the threshold of inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. If we cannot verify that IE 7 supports progressive display of JPEGs by referring to a source, we must not include it. And remember, I'm only as extreme as the people trying to break the rules. ;-) I've had to play by the book only because if we don't, all sorts of garbage gets added to articles. -- Schapel 13:48, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
Well anyway it's completely false ! Out of curiosity I just checked in IE7 with the first image that google image returned me. It does NOT display it in a progressive way. But is progressive display really optional ? Then (the comment can stay of course but) the cell deserves the {{yes}} template. --Fenring 15:56, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
That's what I suspected. I can't find a reference that says progressive display is optional. But I'm fine with saying that IE 7 fully supports JPEG, as long as the note that says it does not support progressive display remains. -- Schapel 16:17, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Addition of encoding support table?

One thing that is a good idea to have is a table on encoding support (Unicode and legacy encodings), which would probably go on a separate page due to size issues. This is useful because support on encodings is very different between browsers (for example, IE is the only browser with ISCII support) still need to test this -- Prince Kassad 18:06, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

If you can find any reliable sources, why not... --Grey 15:44, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Perl-script

I've just read that "there are browsers with perl scripting interpreters" (ENDRŐDI Tamás: Internet alapú alkalmazásfejlesztés. p. 58.) - have u ever heard about such things!? I didn't. - user:tothaa —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.99.124.188 (talk) 11:11, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Standards Support

[edit] CSS ─ Scope

Someone has made changes to the (now former) revision claiming Konqueror, Opera, Safari do not fully conform to CSS (2.1). I've reverted the changes, since I think "Yes" does not by all means imply "full" support. Because NO Browser has full support. The same source he cited implicitly stated this (even for Gecko). If you are going to judge on a more detailed level, do it in Comparison of layout engines (CSS) and please, no bias.
Remember, even Internet Explorer is marked as "partial" so this column doesn't help anybody if all Browsers would show up as "partial". Grey 20:32, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I must have misread the conformance requirements here. I somehow missed the bit about "must . . . render the document according to the media-specific requirements set forth in this specification", I only spotted the parts about parsing and whatnot. That doesn't negate the fact that no existing client conforms fully to the specification; I would be inclined to add some intermediates between {{partial}} and {{yes}} rather than incorrectly suggesting that some existing clients fully support the specification. It's important to indicate that conformance to CSS 2.1 is not yet complete in any browser, just as conformance to SVG isn't. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 05:15, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Whereas I agree that it isn't entirely right to call it "yes" and that we should indicate no client does fully implement CSS2(.1), it's diffcult to draw the line. At the Moment, CSS2.1 is Working Draft. The Errata were considered to be CR, but I can't find the note on this atm; they might have removed it. Also, clients intentionally do not comply to certain passages in the specs (and have no intention to change that). As seen in other discussions these are still problems throughout the series and need to be adressed. We could impliment something like "minor" and "major" (like it was done in css comp.), but the colour key imho is very, very important. Having all the Browsers marked "yellow" does not help anybody. I think what could be done is using some orange colour for Trident Browsers and the likes and mark the others as "major" and yellow. I just doubt it's worth the effort. This article is more a summary of the others, so that it doesn't make much sense to be too specific. I'd just leave it as is. Grey 15:02, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

The CSS column is not strict. So why is the SVG column ? I changed the Opera/SVG cell to "Yes (SVGT)" (which is strictly correct) and someone reverted it arguing "partial means partial". What do you think about showing the percentage of features supported, with ranges of colors (like webdevout) ?--Fenring 11:24, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Here is what it looks like, with a percentage template. If no one react, i'll do the change in the article.
CSS 2.1 SVG
Firefox 91% 38%
Opera 94% 90%
IE7 56% 0%

--Fenring 13:13, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm concerned that adding percentages is simply just going to fuel edit wars about which browser supports what percentage of which standard. The article already has problems with being unverifiable, and adding "percentages" will only add to the problem. -- Schapel 04:24, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Schapel. The sources don't provide enough information for all the browsers, imho. Also I'm curious where you got those figures for SVG from? --Grey 21:49, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your answers. I agree, BUT i still think we should use the same politic for all columns. There is no reason to be strict for SVG and loose for CSS. As Grey said above, a column doesn't help anybody if all Browsers would show up as "partial". I have been developing svg and testing on the different browsers. And I think at least Opera should be considered 'Yes', if the loose solution is chosen. (Grey, the svg percentages came from the detailed wikipedia table) --Fenring 22:37, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
I agree that the loosness or strictness of columns should be consistent. Many browsers support enough of CSS2 to warrant a "yes" in that column. I think we could even come up with fairly reliable sources to verify that amount of CSS2 support, at least for the more popular browsers that support CSS2. But does Opera really support as much of SVG? If so, are there reliable sources that can be used to verify that fact? What we should really be focusing on is finding these sources and citing them, and adding the only the information that is truly verifiable to the article. -- Schapel 05:00, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
I also agree on the looseness of the columns, of course. But see, I've edited the article you cited myself for a part (on behalf of Opera). You should note that every "8.0 (SVGT)" means that the conditions for SVGT compliance are met, SVGF compliance most probably not. Since I didn't have any extra information, I didn't remove any of those SVGT tags, but I'm pretty sure at least one of the elements is useless because nearly none of the attributes are supported (<g>, or glyph I guess). I believe SVG support has improved on the documentation Opera offers (which is what the material in the page is based upon), though... We just need a creditable source stating the extend of support. As far as I know, you could even publish such a resource yourself (as you said you develop for it). Now, I know it's a lot of work. And I also know David Hammond has been tempted to to ths for a while. His absence as I perceive it might be a sign he's been working on it. Or maybe he doesn't have anything yet. But there's plenty of tables for CSS (right or wrong), less so for SVG. We need some kind of jusification. --Grey 05:41, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
Hey everybody! Here is what you've been calling for, Schapel and Grey. Another justification : official test suite results. Opera supports as much SVG as Firefox supports CSS. Don't you think that more than 90% is enough to use yes template ? --Fenring 20:15, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
The page you reference clearly states that the SVG test suite doesn't cover all functionality. This shows that Opera 9.10 supports 90% of the test suite, but how much of the SVG standard does it support? -- Schapel 23:28, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
If you want an exhausive list of supported features, go the Opera website. The test suite report is just a creditable source that gives us another hint that Opera does support SVG very much. But *sigh* ok, let's keep that svg column useless. A few of us know which browser(/plugins) we can develop for. But shh... don't tell anyone.--83.99.37.222 10:26, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
This is exactly the wars about which browser supports what percentage of which standard I warned about above. It's making you irrational already, speaking of developing for a particular browser, rather than coding to the standards. Anyway, according to Opera Software ASA, Opera supports only SVG 1.1 basic, which is only part of the full SVG spec. [3] -- Schapel 11:21, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
And the edit wars have begun. Instead of having a fight about which browser is best, how about let's make this the best article we can, huh? We can begin with removing one of the redundant SVG columns in the tables. Then we can add links to show in more detail how much support for SVG that each browser has. Who's with me? -- Schapel 16:42, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Read the previous comments above again and remember what decision was made for the CSS column. Tell me again why we should keep this inconsistency between CSS and SVG column. Lack of reliable sources ? I think it's subjective. But I really don't want to argue about browsers competition (by the way, is the Opera/PDF cell really yes ? think it's a mistake). So let the partial template be then, if nobody else object. (and I agree about the column redundancy) --Fenring 17:53, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Many sources say that many browsers support CSS. I do not see any sources that say Opera supports SVG Full. Opera Software ASA states that Opera supports SVG Basic, which seems clear to me is partial SVG support. I see no inconsistency. If you can find a reliable source that clearly and unambiguously states Opera supports SVG Full, then by all means change Opera's SVG support to Yes and cite the source. -- Schapel 22:35, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Strictly speaking, it does not. Though from all the references cited in Comparison of layout engines (CSS), I can see no statement about full support of CSS2.1 either. They unambiguously state the contrary! So I'd change that column to partial too. But other people think it's not a good idea (see the begining of this section)... So I don't agree about the consistency, but as long as the detailed comparison pages are correct, and if no one else agree with me, I just resign. --Fenring 23:34, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
I did not refer to "full support of CSS" or "full support of SVG", but support of "SVG Full". Opera claims support of "SVG Basic", so to claim in this article that Opera supports SVG Full seems clearly incorrect. You should not state that Opera supports SVG Full until you can cite a reliable source that makes that exact statement so readers can verify it. This does not mean you can point to a source that you interpret as saying Opera supports "most" of SVG. I hope this simple statement is clear enough. -- Schapel 12:48, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
SVGT and SVGB are just Mobile SVG Profiles, the SVG spec does not make mention of "SVG Full" (or any of the other profiles for that matter). Thus, a source stating "X browser has support for SVG 1.1" states synonymously "X browser has support for SVG 1.1 Full" (i.e. the "real" spec). And I think it should be possible to find a source that states Opera's SVG 1.1 support. I'm repeating what I said above: a column doesn't help anybody if all Browsers would show up as "partial". And the source above uses the only way currently possible to measure SVG implementations on: The official test suite. Thus, Opera's support of SVG can be assumed to be on the same level as Firefox's support of CSS 2.1 and both fields should receive the same rating. --Grey 23:13, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
Let's look at the facts, shall we? Not all columns show up as Partial. Some show up as Partial and some show up as No. Therefore the column is not useless. And as soon as Opera stops qualifying its SVG support as partial, feel free to change Opera's SVG support to Yes. You should be careful to distinguish the situation that all browsers currently fall considerably short of complete SVG support, compared to the situation that many browsers have excellent CSS support. -- Schapel 21:34, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
If I may interject... instead of using percents to sum up the overall css compliance, how about just labeling it as a fraction wherein n/x represents the browser's total yes or no compliance (n being the browser's yes total, and x being the total number of W3C recommended properties/etc.). -- Anonymous 17:25, 21 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.130.65.241 (talk)
There's one problem with your suggestion: How do we determine the appropriate fraction for each browser? To paraphrase my earlier concern, I'm concerned that adding fractions is simply just going to fuel edit wars about which browser supports what fraction of which standard. -- Schapel (talk) 00:34, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Schapel, I don't think it would be smart to do this to the article. There's just too many places to mess up or where it is too diffcult to draw the line (between CSS2, CSS2.1, CSS3 (Working Drafts esp.)). If there was a template counting total yes/no counts for all browsers, well, I'd think twice, but I don't think it would be good to open this page to edit wars. --Grey (talk) 18:38, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
Schapel, point taken on Opera claiming partial support for SVG. Once they claim full support, I'll upgrade them right away. --Grey (talk) 18:38, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Inclusion/Removal of Browsers

[edit] splitting "Early Web Browsers and OS"

This historical stuff is interesting, but as the article is very long already and the tables are ungainly for the large number of old OSs listed, I'm going to recommend splitting it to a series of different articles. At a minimum, the table should be split into Windows/Mac/Unix sections. ⇔ ChristTrekker 16:28, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to moving the table to a new article, but I see absolutely no reason to split the table. That table is relatively short. Also, because it is ABOUT platform support (and because many are multiplatform), makes splitting it by platform seem a bit silly. --Karnesky 17:29, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
Point taken. (Will revise accordingly.) Yet, the table is very wide, which limits its usability IMO. I (in general) am not interested in Windows browsers, yet there are 5 (6 if you count OS/2) columns of "obstruction" there before I get to anything "interesting". That's almost the full width of my browser window already. If there were a way to hide/show a column group, that would be ideal here! ⇔ ChristTrekker 18:31, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
Now that you broke the table out, I guess we can move discussion to the new page. There is a table template which allows the table to be resorted on different columns, which may bring some of the usability you want. --Karnesky 18:57, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Terminated and stagnant vs. ongoing browsers

I believe terminated browsers should be kept in the tables considering they didn't disappear, but adding a space and relegating them to the end of each table would make it easier for visitors to compare current browsers without historical mentions getting in the way. Ghen55 (talk) 19:14, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

Current Browsers Bookmark managing Download managing Password managing Form managing Spell checking Search engine toolbar
Amaya No No Yes No Yes No
AOL Explorer Yes No No Yes No Yes
Avant Yes No Yes Yes No † Yes
Camino Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Internet Explorer † Yes No Yes Yes No † Yes
Mozilla Firefox Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Terminated and/or Stagnant
Internet Explorer for Mac Yes Yes Yes Yes No No
Netscape Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Netscape Browser Yes Yes Yes Yes ? Yes
Netscape Navigator Yes No No No No No
Netscape Navigator 9 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Browser Bookmark managing Download managing Password managing Form managing Spell checking Search engine toolbar
etc etc deleted some of 'em for sanity

[edit] Major versions only?

In the "Web browsers by year" table at present both Safari 3.0 and Safari 3.1 are listed, under different years. Given the small difference in version number, is this justified? —DIV (128.250.80.15 (talk) 09:29, 7 April 2008 (UTC))

I don't think we can go by how the version number looks. Safari 3.1 was the first final release version of Safari on Windows, so that was a fairly major release. -- Schapel (talk) 15:11, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Other issues

[edit] Spyglass as creator for IE

Why is spyglass listed as the creator for IE. The original technology was licensed but I dont believe any of the current versions are built using that same technology. Since this is under general information and not history I would assume that we would only care about the current versions. If not then why isnt Firefox listed as netscape? Doesnt make sense. The licensing of the original technology is covered in the IE article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.49.41.2 (talk) 15:10, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Bias Towards Open Source

Because of the Yes/No template usage on the Open Source column, this article appears to have bias towards open source. The Yes/No templates highlight Yes in green and No in red, seeming to indicate that non-open source implementations are somehow inferior. Though this may not be the intent, it seems to highlight this feature as somehow positive or negative. Wikipedia should not choose sides in this issue.

Good point. Would it be an adequate solution to simply use "Yes" or "No" without using the template? ⇔ ChristTrekker 18:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Why not use this space to specify the license, linking to proprietary, GPL, and so forth? A column indicating whether the source is open or closed is going to come off with an OSS bias no matter what. Simply linking to the article describing the license style gives information that is both more neutral and more accurate. —ptk✰fgs 04:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
I'm all for that, as I noted in the layout engine article. I think it would be best to remove the column entirely, since there already is a column for the license. --Grey 23:46, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
As per discussion on the template page, green merely indicates "yes" and red merely indicates "no." There are NO value judgements--only presentation of facts. As such, I've restored the use of temlates. --Karnesky 00:13, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
This information is clearly misleading. Whatever you conclude it SHOULD mean, to most people, green will mean "good" and red "not good". That's like changing traffic light laws so red is "go" and green is "stop". Also, the column "Open Source" is unnecessary. More detailed and accurate information is given in the "license" column. The fact is, people will judge the products according to the colors. I will remove the templates once more, and what's more I will remove the "open source" column, since there has not been one argument/reason why it should be kept (even if I'll be doomed forever). I would ask you to give a good explanation before reverting anything. --Grey 01:24, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I strongly object to removing the column for this particular page, as it clarifies the multi-licensed products. As for "bias," please take up your case on Template talk:Yes‎. Most other comparisons ONLY use green for yes and red for no (including for "free software" or "open source" columns). If you see bias, it brings into question the use of the template for every other feature. You're making am implicit value judgement that browsers SHOULD HAVE download managers, password managers, form managers, spell checkers, etc. Others would want a browser which is lightweight and didn't have these. "Open source" is no different than any other yes/no column. --Karnesky 01:34, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
For that column, the licsensing column gives much more and more detailed information. And without it, the licensing models are not less confusing than with it. I therefore propose that we add explanatory information to the licensing column. And yes, it is an implicit judgement that browsers SHOULD HAVE these features. Why do you think proprietary technologies have not been listed? Because the editors are of the opinion that they shouldn't be (among other reasons, on the grounds that usually only one layout engines possesses these "features").
On that template page, take the example of the "non-poisonous" fish. The wording of the column, "non-poisonous" or "poisonous" expresses a view on the "qualities" or "benefits" of a particular kin of fish (and thus that another has "less" benefits etc.). Now, with "poisonous", the majority of mankind prefers not to be poisoned, thus this expresses quite a broad view. With "open source" the plus/minus is highly disputed. Sympathising with one or the other would be POV.
Maybe a link to a "feature creep" article would help overcome this bias? I won't revert your changes again (at least not for considerable time). I don't think the templates belong there, though, and I am positive someone else will change it soon enough.
--Grey 03:01, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I'd support adding better explanations for the licensing column (particularly for all multi-licensed products). Can you do that BEFORE deleting the open source column? If it is clear enough, I wouldn't be opposed from just removing the "open source" column as you propose.
I still disagree that we should be saying that browsers should have particular features. Certainly, it seems there is no consensus at all to have bittorrent support or an integrated email/newsgroup client.
I'm not sure which proprietary technologies you are referring to. If only one or two browsers supports them, they'd clutter up the table if they were whole columns. I think an "other" column would be perfectly acceptable.
The poison fish example is trite & there seems to be consensus that largely rebels against that single wikipedian's view. Feel free to comment on that page, though.
Karnesky 03:15, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Regarding extending the license column before removing the other... agreed. I wanted to do something about it anyways. Any suggestions? I thought that "tri-license" could be a footnote explaining what is going on. Generally, we could make the licenses footnotes and quickly explain them in the article. Or something like that. What do you think?
Generally, though, I think features are considered to be something good. It's the side-effects of implementing them (e.g. size, complexity) that are considered "bad" by people. These should be pointed out. I wonder how that format would look like, though. Many of these are hard to be verified, also.
Concerning proprietary technologies/features... they're often covered by patents, copyright, a ristrictive license (including GPL), which prevents competitors from implementation. That's why there are web standards... well, in theory.
The fish example was nothing more than an example. I'm not in favor of "but-not" etc. but my intent was to leave that discussion there, not here.
--Grey 03:37, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

(arbitrarily starting a new, unindented block for readability)

One suggestion I have for improving readability is that any proprietary products which have some material under an open source license should be listed as "proprietary," but with a footnote. The footnote for any multi-licensed products should describe which licenses apply to which parts of the code. I believe that some of these have EVERYTHING is under the user's choice of one of three licenses & that some of libraries/renderers/other backends which are open, but front-ends which are proprietary. --Karnesky 04:26, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

So Safari would be "proprietary"? I don't know if I 100% approve of this. If we were to do it, though, it would be smart to arrange the footnotes according to the rendering engine (atm only Gecko and KHTML/WebKit, imho). Also, what about the "protected" pictures in Firefox (i.e. the reason IceWeasle (sp?) exists). Does that make it proprietary? --Grey 00:17, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Safari IS proprietary, yes. That is why there is a "no" in the "open source" column and why the wiki article is not in the free software category. Yes, the backend (webkit:webcore) is open, but the rest is not. Comparison of layout engines already does a good job of explaining what is or isn't free/open source.
Regarding Mozilla Firefox, trademarks are not generally seen as upsetting the free/open source nature of a product. Furthermore, the Mozilla Firefox source distributions are shipped with a Makefile which allows them to be compiled with generic branding, making the whole issue moot. --Karnesky 00:27, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
{"Iceweasel" is the correct spelling. See Mozilla software rebranding. —DIV (128.250.80.15 (talk) 09:39, 7 April 2008 (UTC))}

[edit] Java

In all other columns I can find "Available with...", but not for Java. I am not sure about it, if Java is included in the install package from all other browsers with java support, but it's not included in any IE package and must downloaded from SUN. (Except the an old version where this MS java virtual machine was included) But only with Internet Explorer java is not available. If all browsers need a SUN download, maybe a footnote in the header would be nice. --Lastwebpage 16:08, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Picture

Can someone add the image "Comparison_of_web_browsers.JPG"? I recently uploaded it, but it's too large to fit. I'm too lazy to make a table and don't know how to adjust the size without one.

[edit] Usage share incorrect

Internet Explorer - only 57%: http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.183.130.7 (talk) 07:33, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

The W3Schools stats are for their server only. They are not global statistics. Read more at usage share of web browsers. -- Schapel (talk) 12:41, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
Apparently someone thought the W3C statistics where right anyway..they where certainly added instead of the "propper" ones. I'm changing it back by copying and pasting as other stuff has been changed since the 14th jan.Tehniobium (talk) 20:46, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Slow Script Warning on Safari

During all of my time on Wikipedia, I have never encountered a script error, except while loading this article. Here is a screenshot Does anyone have any ideas why this is happening or how it can be fixed? Thanks Monkeynoze 14:07, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Well I don't have any idea what in the page causes these messages, but the only time I experienced them on Wikipedia was with Safari 1.3. The obvious solution would be to upgrade Safari (and OS X with it...) or maybe set it to ignore the warnings, but this is imho not the forum to talk about troubleshooting a browser. Unfortunately, I have no idea where on Wikipedia you should post this to, so I can't give you directions (sorry). --Grey 11:27, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I use Safari 3 beta on windows, and I've also encountered this slow script warning on several asp & aspx pages. Haven't seen it happen on wikipedia. --Anonymous 17:10, 21 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.130.65.241 (talk)

[edit] Image suport: Mozilla Firefox

I believe wich Mozilla Firefox suport PDF. --200.100.215.1 (talk) 00:34, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Not natively. It uses Adobe Reader (helper app or plugin) to display PDFs. -- Schapel (talk) 01:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] IE Vulnerabilities

There seems to be some sort of dispute about the vulnerabilities in IE as reported by SecurityFocus. Let's discuss that. But to try to make it look like Firefox has many more vulnerabilities than it does by treating it as a special case is just silly. For the SecurityFocus data, the list of bugs for the latest release it shows is used. Counting the vulnerabilities in Firefox 2.0.0.0, released almost a year and a half ago, makes no sense. -- Schapel (talk) 18:24, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry Schapel. I didn't read the headers of the table nor the introductory text in that section very well. I thought the SecurityFocus stats were for all time, rather than current vulns.
I screwed up. Sorry about that.
But, the link to SecurityFocus for IE 6 is for IE 6 SP1. I'm updating it for IE 6 SP2, which is the latest release.
WalterGR (talk | contributions) 18:36, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
And since todays vulnerabilities is not notable over time the table is of no encyclopedic value. Besides, who guarantees that is always kept up to date?--itpastorn (talk) 16:28, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Image support in browsers

I take it means native support of image formats instead of support through plug-ins? Then currently no web browser can natively support JPEG2000 AFAIK, and none of the major browsers natively support PDF either. However the Mac OS X operating system natively supports PDF, and JPEG2000 is supported via Quicktime. Also Konqueror supports all image formats via available KIO KParts on Linux. Since Safari and Konqueror are now ported to Windows, it shows neither of them can support JPEG2000 or PDF natively, and Konqueror on Windows cannot even support BMP. So should we make it clear between browser support and OS support (and KIO KParts support)? Ufopedia (talk) 08:48, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

mmh, yeajh you're right. maybe we should them mask as no and then make footnotes... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mabdul (talk • contribs) 20:46, 15 May 2008 (UTC)