Why I say NO to Firefox
If you read my first post, you might have noticed that I use a strange program called "Seamonkey" for my Internet needs, instead of the popular Firefox or the risky Internet Explorer.
To explain why, I have to take you back in time, to 1996, to the First Browser's War. At that time, I was using Netscape Communicator. I just loved having a single, perfectly integrated program that could take care of browsing, email, and web page creation..
When the original (4.x) Netscape died, Mozilla and Netscape 6 came out, and I switched, but it was clear that this where not really 100% what they should be, with long loading times and a sluggish interface. That's when Firefox (Phoenix, as it was known then) was born. The idea was to have a browser-only lightweight competitor to IE. But as time went on, Mozilla was becoming faster, and Firefox, now the favorite, was getting more and more features. By 2006 the Mozilla Suite became "Seamonkey" after being abandoned by the Mozilla Foundation and saved by the user's community.
As of today, Seamonkey 2 has the same rendering engine that Firefox 3, and it's smaller and lighter than Firefox+Thunderbird.
That's why I say NO to Firefox, the little browser who grew to much, yes to Seamonkey, "the all-in-one internet suite"
P.S. If you are looking for a really light browser for M$ Windows, try K-meleon
Software… New or tested?
This last weekend I installed Windows © XP in my main PC.
I have been using Windows 2000 for the last 4 years, and have been quite satisfied with it's speed and stability.
But lately, more and more software makers have been dropping support, limiting my options.
I figured that it was time to go for XP.
After 3 service packs and 6 years, it should be mature enough, and the improved compatibility should make up for the slower response. (I don't believe what Microsoft's marketing department tells about ever new version being faster, I've tested it, and it's slower, even in my 2.6 Ghz / 1 MiB PC)
Then, when I was reinstalling my software (the upgrade option would not work, even after trying whit different versions and CDs) I realized that I'm using many "beta" versions of my favorite programs, and even the "alpha" version of thw Seamonkey Internet suite.
Why is it that I resent using a 6 years old version of Windows, but will gladly install Seamonkey 2.0 Alpha?
Let's see… Both ar significant improvement over older versions, offering many new features.
But most of Windows XP new features are not anything I like to use. On the contrary, I usually find them annoying and childish.
On the other hand, the lattest "alpha" version of Seamonkey has some very nice new features, a new "core", and it is 25% smaller and runs faster!
Now at least I know why sometimes I just have to have the lattest version of a program, while with some others, as long as the one I use works, upgrading sometimes feels more like DOWNgrading
Diego Barizo 