Which Browser is Best for Puppy
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I'm agreeing with gliezl. On a low memory system, Opera runs far more smoothly than Seamonkey, probably due to allocating a lot less memory to start with. And that's one app with browser, mail client, torrent client, chat client all built in.
On this portable with 800x600 display I make extensive use of Opera's convenient page zoom function (+ and - keys).
Really, though, we need to build a special Puppy version of Firefox that dumps most of the unnecessary bloat....
On this portable with 800x600 display I make extensive use of Opera's convenient page zoom function (+ and - keys).
Really, though, we need to build a special Puppy version of Firefox that dumps most of the unnecessary bloat....
- craftybytes
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RE: Which Browser is Best for Puppy
I vote for Opera - because it is:-
* very fast;
* very configurable;
* easy to use;
* multi-tabbed;
* can be configured thru web page;
* font rendering is very good and can be configured;
* skinable;
* has inbuilt - mail client, torrent client, chat client;
* handles java & javascript well;
* separate javascript scripts can be easily added & used (easy to filter out unwanted muck on incoming web pages BEFORE it is rendered to screen) ..
Edited: forgot to mention -
* multiple panels - can be docked where user chooses;
* multiple toolbars - configurable;
* toolbar buttons - configurable ......
Have used it for many years in it's various incantations - the latest version v9.02 is very stable AND FREE ..
* very fast;
* very configurable;
* easy to use;
* multi-tabbed;
* can be configured thru web page;
* font rendering is very good and can be configured;
* skinable;
* has inbuilt - mail client, torrent client, chat client;
* handles java & javascript well;
* separate javascript scripts can be easily added & used (easy to filter out unwanted muck on incoming web pages BEFORE it is rendered to screen) ..
Edited: forgot to mention -
* multiple panels - can be docked where user chooses;
* multiple toolbars - configurable;
* toolbar buttons - configurable ......
Have used it for many years in it's various incantations - the latest version v9.02 is very stable AND FREE ..
3 x boot:- ASROCK VIA 'all-in-one' m/b; AMD Duron 1.8Ghz+; 1.0GB RAM; 20GB hdd (WinXP Pro); 80GB hdd (MEPIS 3.4-3/Puppy v2.15CE Frugal); 1GB USB pendrive (Puppy 2.15CE Frugal); CD/DVDRW; 17" LCD monitor; HSF 56k modem... MEPIS is great.. Puppy ROCKS..
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Yeah, but informed decisions are based on facts, so the point of the thread is to gather facts and experience reports to base future decisions on.John Doe wrote:> Which Browser is Best for Puppy?
Whichever browser the user at the keyboard thinks is.
Firefox simply won't run on most older machines of the kind that Puppy is so great at revitalising. Sad, but true.My vote is still with Dillo because it's just really fast. Of course I don't want to loose the ability to install firefox for browsing more bloated sites. Seamonkey would be my third choice.
Dillo is a great start at making a browser, with absolutely no future. I say this as someone who reads the dillo-dev mailing list. Clue. Average traffic is about a message per month, normally saying "when is the next dillo coming out?""
If I could change my vote I'd move from Firefox to Swiftfox.
After the last couple of days experimenting with it, I like that it gives me most of Firefox v2.0 functionality but it's FAST.
I've moved all 3 of my Puppy installations to Swiftfox.
Don't know about how it goes on the older machines yet, ms2k. I'll try some of the real clunkers I've got in rebuild after Christmas and let you know. It's processor-specific so it won't be a short trial.
Cheers
After the last couple of days experimenting with it, I like that it gives me most of Firefox v2.0 functionality but it's FAST.
I've moved all 3 of my Puppy installations to Swiftfox.
Don't know about how it goes on the older machines yet, ms2k. I'll try some of the real clunkers I've got in rebuild after Christmas and let you know. It's processor-specific so it won't be a short trial.
Cheers
So, I bumped it. You're welcome.marksouth2000 wrote:Yeah, but informed decisions are based on facts, so the point of the thread is to gather facts and experience reports to base future decisions on.John Doe wrote:> Which Browser is Best for Puppy?
Whichever browser the user at the keyboard thinks is.
I've only used Firefox, Dillo, and SeaMonkey. Of those I prefer Firefox, but I feel it is more bloated than the ideal browser should be. This makes me very interested in Swiftfox (which I had not heard of before), but it cannot be the best browser for puppy because of its processor dependency. Hv3 sounds worth looking at, but Firefox is probably the best for most uses. Something else might be better for a specific puplett, though.
If you're going the "let them install what they want when they use puppy" approach, then Dillo is the best choice as a default because it is small and works well enough to keep people happy until they install their browser of choice.
If you're going the "let them install what they want when they use puppy" approach, then Dillo is the best choice as a default because it is small and works well enough to keep people happy until they install their browser of choice.
...but you've never tried opera. give it a goSirDuncan wrote:I've only used Firefox, Dillo, and SeaMonkey.
....
but Firefox is probably the best for most uses.
i suspect a lot of moz ppl have never given opera a chance yet say ff is the best. the only argument i can see for prefering a moz browser over opera is the open-source one. opera beats ff on virtually every count. i admit that ive not tried ff2 but i use ie6,ff1.5 and opera at work and here/witness the same old serious problems with ie and ff.
ff (when v1 was released) did a good marketing campain considering the product on offer. opera shoud've gone ad-free then (not 6? months later) i reckon the browser market would look a lot different today if opera had got its name about (iirc opera 4 yrs ago was better than ff1.5)
Try Opera
The opinion that I gave above (and what will be appearing below) is, of course, limited by my own experience.
I probably will give Opera a try since everyone seems to like it. However, Firefox is most likely still the best for puppy at the moment. Here's why: Puppy has always touted itself as being friendly to Windows users, and Firefox is the only browser other than IE that is regularly used on Windows computers. It is also very stable (I won't say that FF2 is since I haven't had enough time with it yet, but previous versions have been) and has great compatibility with HTML standards.
That being said, I will be testing other browsers for my own use. I like Firefox, but it is larger than I would like. Swiftfox is too fickle at the moment or I might go with it. I'll post again once I've messed around with Opera. If it is as stable and standards compliant and can overcome unfamiliarity issues for new users, it may be worthy to be the default puppy browser.
I probably will give Opera a try since everyone seems to like it. However, Firefox is most likely still the best for puppy at the moment. Here's why: Puppy has always touted itself as being friendly to Windows users, and Firefox is the only browser other than IE that is regularly used on Windows computers. It is also very stable (I won't say that FF2 is since I haven't had enough time with it yet, but previous versions have been) and has great compatibility with HTML standards.
That being said, I will be testing other browsers for my own use. I like Firefox, but it is larger than I would like. Swiftfox is too fickle at the moment or I might go with it. I'll post again once I've messed around with Opera. If it is as stable and standards compliant and can overcome unfamiliarity issues for new users, it may be worthy to be the default puppy browser.
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Opera certainly runs on the widest range of platforms, Linux, BSD, Windows, cellphones, Nintendo DS etc.
As to standards, the CTO of Opera ASA is the guy who invented CSS when he worked for W3C, they are certainly standards focused.
Oh, and there's an Opera widget for a Sokoban game, so that's a big win right there
As to standards, the CTO of Opera ASA is the guy who invented CSS when he worked for W3C, they are certainly standards focused.
Oh, and there's an Opera widget for a Sokoban game, so that's a big win right there
Hv3
I have tried Hv3 and I have to say that it is very impressive and definitely has a future. I voted for Konqueror, but having thought about it, I think Hv3 is probably the best for Puppy. My reasoning is as follows:
1 - Hv3 is open source (BSD type license)
2 - Hv3 is under continued development
3 - Having Hv3 as the default allows the user to install their browser of choice while at the same time giving them something to start with.
Todd
1 - Hv3 is open source (BSD type license)
2 - Hv3 is under continued development
3 - Having Hv3 as the default allows the user to install their browser of choice while at the same time giving them something to start with.
Todd
Hv3
My only problem with Hv3 is that it currently displays many of the pages that I have visited incorrectly. I like its layout and feel better than Dillo. Unfortunately, it just doesn't seem far enough along yet. It's one I will be keeping an eye on.
I don't know which is the best (Puppy or not), but I tried the 2.0whatever that had Opera in it. Opera may have advanced to useable since then, or may not be so incompatible with Puppy now, but that release gave Opera a big black eye in my view.
Dillo is awful in my experience. I have the strange feeling I'd prefer Lynx over Dillo any day, but I haven't tried Lynx (unless is was the gopher client that my old freenet.uchsc.edu account had, but that wouldn't be a fair comparison either).
I've recently obtained a Mac laptop with Core Duos, so I also know Safari isn't what I'm looking for in a webbrowser either. Of course FireFox for Mac didn't score me many points either, so maybe its the 'act like a Mac' that I don't like in that version.
With Puppy I use whatever real browser comes installed with that version, avoiding those with the crippled identifier 'Opera' since that one time. So normally in Puppy I use Firefox or SeaMonkey.
Most of my browsing still occurs with Mozilla 1.0 on my Win98 machine (after all it has internet access [dial-up]). The Macbook I have to go to the library and use their wireless (so I plan for big download days at the library, and surf while I wait).
Dillo is awful in my experience. I have the strange feeling I'd prefer Lynx over Dillo any day, but I haven't tried Lynx (unless is was the gopher client that my old freenet.uchsc.edu account had, but that wouldn't be a fair comparison either).
I've recently obtained a Mac laptop with Core Duos, so I also know Safari isn't what I'm looking for in a webbrowser either. Of course FireFox for Mac didn't score me many points either, so maybe its the 'act like a Mac' that I don't like in that version.
With Puppy I use whatever real browser comes installed with that version, avoiding those with the crippled identifier 'Opera' since that one time. So normally in Puppy I use Firefox or SeaMonkey.
Most of my browsing still occurs with Mozilla 1.0 on my Win98 machine (after all it has internet access [dial-up]). The Macbook I have to go to the library and use their wireless (so I plan for big download days at the library, and surf while I wait).
There is a yellow one that won't accept the black one
That won't accept the red one that won't accept the white one
And different strokes for different folks
That won't accept the red one that won't accept the white one
And different strokes for different folks
opera 9.0 was a bad release in terms of bugs just like firefox 2.0, or most n.0 releases of software - the jump from verson (n-1).x to n.0 often involves significant code changes. i believe it was opera 9.0 (or even a beta?) in an earlier puppy iso so that would explain the bad experience.
9.02 (2nd minor release since 9.0) is solid for me so haven't felt the need to upgrade to 9.10.
like others have said, firefox is too big and older hardware struggles to run it. opera is very lite in comparison (>10mb smaller than the cut-down seamonkey used in puppy) yet has more features out-the-box. i believe sony phones come with opera mobile pre-installed - proof that it's designed to run on both low-spec and hi-spec platforms.
realistically, i can't see opera being the std browser in puppy. there's just not enough 'brand awareness' and too much anti-closed source sentiment in linux. i'd be happy with a basic browser like dillo or hv3 pre-configured with bookmarks to download the users favourite browser. and/or easy set-up scripts to select a separate .sfs file for each major browser - opera9.10.sfs, firefox2.0.sfs etc
9.02 (2nd minor release since 9.0) is solid for me so haven't felt the need to upgrade to 9.10.
like others have said, firefox is too big and older hardware struggles to run it. opera is very lite in comparison (>10mb smaller than the cut-down seamonkey used in puppy) yet has more features out-the-box. i believe sony phones come with opera mobile pre-installed - proof that it's designed to run on both low-spec and hi-spec platforms.
realistically, i can't see opera being the std browser in puppy. there's just not enough 'brand awareness' and too much anti-closed source sentiment in linux. i'd be happy with a basic browser like dillo or hv3 pre-configured with bookmarks to download the users favourite browser. and/or easy set-up scripts to select a separate .sfs file for each major browser - opera9.10.sfs, firefox2.0.sfs etc
Opera
Well, Opera seems okay so far. It displays most of the pages I have visited at least as well as Firefox. The first problem that I've noticed is that ctrl+clicking does not open the link in a new tab. I find this annoying. It is shift+enter+click. That's too many keys in my opinion. I feel that I should be able to change this, but cannot find where.
Other than that, I'm liking Opera. I can't say that it is actually any faster than Firefox, but it certainly isn't slower. I may find more to say about it after using it a awhile.
I still think Firefox is better as a default browser because of it's familiarity. Open source is a nice bonus, but in no way a deciding factor. It's simply the ubiquitous, non-Microsoft browser.
I must thank all of you for pointing me to Opera, though. It is a nice, good-looking browser, and although I may not think it is better than Firefox, it is most certainly better than Seamonkey and probably on par with Firefox.
Other than that, I'm liking Opera. I can't say that it is actually any faster than Firefox, but it certainly isn't slower. I may find more to say about it after using it a awhile.
I still think Firefox is better as a default browser because of it's familiarity. Open source is a nice bonus, but in no way a deciding factor. It's simply the ubiquitous, non-Microsoft browser.
I must thank all of you for pointing me to Opera, though. It is a nice, good-looking browser, and although I may not think it is better than Firefox, it is most certainly better than Seamonkey and probably on par with Firefox.
Be brave that God may help thee, speak the truth even if it leads to death, and safeguard the helpless. - A knight's oath
- Pizzasgood
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Ok, noticed this is old thread resurrected by Pashabear to ask about Swiftfox. I have no idea about swiftfox. I will mention I tend to use Opera most. Occasionally Seamonkey when some website wont work properly with Opera. I have no real problem with Dillo (unoffial modified version). It is fast, but anymore so many sites that wont cooperate with it.
I used to like Konqueror, but dont want 70mb just for a browser. I may though add it one day as I really would like to have K3B. One of best browsers is actually Kmeleon or its even more simplified derivative K-Ninja run under WINE. Its as fast as anything even with the extra WINE layer.
I used to like Konqueror, but dont want 70mb just for a browser. I may though add it one day as I really would like to have K3B. One of best browsers is actually Kmeleon or its even more simplified derivative K-Ninja run under WINE. Its as fast as anything even with the extra WINE layer.