Personal Browser Usage Update

Ever since I last wrote about Opera and Chrome, some things have changed about my browsing habits. On Windows, I’ve gone from always using Flock to always using Opera. I just found out that Flock finally released version 2.0 because I wanted to check up on my facts before looking like a dork on my own blog. So I haven’t used version 2.0 and that doesn’t figure into what I’m going to say here.

Basically Flock is ridiculously slow to open up. It takes forever to load into RAM and even after the browser window comes up, it takes forever to get ready to accept a URL. And for flickr it sucks because each page takes forever to load because of its blogging image code, so while it’s an awesome browser for finding out what your flickr contacts are up to, when it comes to uploading and maintaining your own flickr page, it sucks. When I browse the web, I want to have a window up right away so I can get whatever info I want and get on with my life. So while Flock was still great for browsing the web, it lost its edge for getting quick info - like directions to a restaurant. Also, since I switched to IMAP with Gmail, Opera’s mail feature is now very convenient for me. If I happen to already be browsing and want to send someone an email with a link, I can just do it there. I don’t know - Opera has just really grown on me and I love it for everyday quick usage. Also, I love that your last viewed tabs remain open so that you can have a set of pages you always look at when you start up.

I still haven’t used Chrome much at all. I don’t see the value proposition. Opera is fast and Firefox/Flock have extensions. Sure, it’s the cool Google cachet, but I’ve never been big into that. By the time I bought an iPod it was because I wanted to listen to podcasts, not because it was the cool thing to do.

On Linux I’ve moved back to Firefox from Epiphany. Firefox for Linux has improved in every area that had made me want to leave for Epiphany. The new theme integrates very well into Gnome/Xfce. Also, the memory footprint is lighter and it’s much quicker to load. I’ve also been trying out Midori, a small, Webkit-based broswer which may become the default browser for Xfce. It’s a little buggy here and there, but it’s a very fast broswer and quite light on the RAM requirements.

So, there you go. It’s quite amazing how much can change over the space of a few months - let alone a few years.

• Chrome
• Flock
• Opera