Which is better? Mozilla or Opera?

Alex · May 28, 2003, 09:36

I am bored today, so I decided to give Mozilla Firebird a try. It seems nice, and it certainly loads faster than both IE and Opera, plus it also has support for tabbed browsing and mouse gestures. I did not have a chance to try its email client (I'm using the Firebird version, after all), but it seems to be as fast as Opera in terms of browsing and seems to be more compatible with each and every web page -- Opera has problems with some pages.

All in all, I still prefer Opera, it seems to have more customizability options. Which is better for you? Mozilla or Opera?

Ari Rahikkala · May 28, 2003, 11:03

That question is way too vague for a definite answer... but what I can say at this part that Opera having more customizability options is probably not quite true. Just have a look at the stuff at http://texturizer.net/firebird/extensions.html . Mozilla Firebird is highly extensible. Oh, and unlike Opera, it's actually free...

Zopperoni · May 28, 2003, 11:12

I haven't worked with Mozilla for a while now, but I'm content with Opera as it is, and don't feel like getting a third browser to be honest.

FrustratedPoet · May 28, 2003, 11:44

I've never tried Mozilla, but I'm very happy with Opera.

Edan · May 28, 2003, 11:57

Lynx

Between only Opera and Mozilla, though, I would say Opera, but I've only had limited recent experience with Mozilla.

Pekka · May 28, 2003, 11:59

intternet eksploorer 4!

Mercator · May 28, 2003, 12:03

Last time I tried Mozilla was months ago when it still looked like an ugly cousin of Netscape 5.

I'm happy with my Opera 7.

Oerdin · May 28, 2003, 12:07

I just use IE though I do have Netscape installed on my computer at home. Is Opera or Mozilla actually that much better on a Win XP machine that I should look into it?

Alex · May 28, 2003, 12:59

I don't know about Mozilla on WinXP (I'm using it at work, Win2000), but I use Opera at home (Win XP) and it is pretty good, fast and use less memory than IE.

One thing bothers me about Mozilla, though: when you go back one page, it tries to reload that page unnecessarily, just like IE (but it is faster than IE anyway). Opera displays that page immediately.

Alex · May 28, 2003, 13:00

And Mozilla seems to load images faster, or am I wrong?

St Leo · May 28, 2003, 13:17

I keep myself up-to-date Mozilla wise and I definitely prefer Opera.

That question is way too vague for a definite answer... but what I can say at this part that Opera having more customizability options is probably not quite true. Just have a look at the stuff at http://texturizer.net/firebird/extensions.html . Mozilla Firebird is highly extensible.

Uh huh. Can you make the tabbar vertical along the right side of the screen with a mouse-click? Can you move the address bar to the bottom of the screen with a mouse-click? Extensibility is nowhere near as important as built-in customizability.

My main beefs with Mozilla:
-closing a tab brings up an adjacent tab rather than the tab you were viewing before the current one. This might be fixable with MultiZilla or whatever it's called, but
-it's too easy to open a new browser window. New windows are only opened in Opera when you hit CTRL+ALT+N, but Mozilla seems to do it for every target=_new. I do not want to use context menus or modifier keys to get something to open in a tab
-Preferences is in the Tools/Edit menu rather than the File menu as Allah intended

You should seriously release a version with all of those extensions preinstalled. I am sure there are ones that add a Show Images button, but I have better things to do than make a browser I don't use have enough features to seduce me.

Oh, and unlike Opera, it's actually free...

I live with the banner. I am no more likely to pay for Opera than I am to donate money to an Open Source project via PayPal.

Mercator · May 28, 2003, 13:33

Quote:

-Preferences is in the Tools/Edit menu rather than the File menu as Allah intended

But who needs menus when F12 or Alt+P will suffice.

Whaleboy · May 28, 2003, 13:34

The windows version of Mozilla rocks!!!

Im running 1.3 now, and its fantastic. I tried all the major web browsers for *nix and windows, and I gotta say that this is the best, forgetting any OS wars, or arguments between proprietery vs GPL vs BSD, Mozilla is still the best. Genius piece of code!

chequita guevara · May 28, 2003, 14:26

Mosaic!

SlowwHand · May 28, 2003, 16:49

So you have like a real old OS ? I'm just asking, cuz that's how the site reads.

War4ever · May 28, 2003, 17:41

do you load opera ontop of windows?

Urban Ranger · May 29, 2003, 00:41

Quote:

Originally posted by St Leo
-it's too easy to open a new browser window. New windows are only opened in Opera when you hit CTRL+ALT+N, but Mozilla seems to do it for every target=_new.

This is a defined property of HTML. So if Opera doesn't do it, it's not doing things right.

Quote:

Originally posted by St Leo
-Preferences is in the Tools/Edit menu rather than the File menu as Allah intended

Nah. Most programs have that under either Edit or Tools (or some sort of variant thereof). "Files" should be for just dealing with files.

ixnay · May 29, 2003, 00:48

Opera 7 > *

/me proud IE -> Opera convert

Al'Kimiya · May 29, 2003, 06:46

firebird/thunderbird nightly builds

http://komodo.mozilla.org/pub/firebi.../latest-trunk/
http://komodo.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/nightly/

Skanky Burns · May 29, 2003, 07:41

Opera is great, when it is working properly.*

* Apparently, mine is the only one in existance that crashes on 'Poly though.

St Leo · May 29, 2003, 16:44

This is a defined property of HTML. So if Opera doesn't do it, it's not doing things right.

It opens a new child window/tab. The context menu for a link lists
-Open
-Open in new page (shift + click)
-Open in background (ctrl + shift + click)
-Open in new window
-Open in background window

I use the latter four frequently.

/me is a proud Netscape 3 > IE 3 > IE 4 > Netscape 4 > Opera 4 > Opera 5 > Opera 6 > Opera 7 convert

Urban Ranger · May 29, 2003, 22:22

Quote:

Originally posted by St Leo
This is a defined property of HTML. So if Opera doesn't do it, it's not doing things right.

It opens a new child window/tab. The context menu for a link lists
-Open
-Open in new page (shift + click)
-Open in background (ctrl + shift + click)
-Open in new window
-Open in background window

What the difference between a new browser window and a new child window? What is the difference between "open in background" and "open in "background window?"

St Leo · May 30, 2003, 00:25

What the difference between a new browser window and a new child window?

A child window shows up in the pagebar (tabbar). A browser window shows up in the Windows taskbar and has its own distinct set of pagebar tabs. The background variant is exactly the same except that your current window remains on top.

You can see a tree with all the browser windows and child windows if you enable the Windows sidebar, but that feature isn't complete yet in the current release.

The only time I open up a new browser window is when I want to research the bare human form without closing the tabs in my current window.

Oh, and you can dragndrop tabs in Opera around. It's nifty and I use that every other day.

War4ever · May 30, 2003, 01:39

no one answered me

i assume it is..i had it before and got rid of it..it was an early version

Rasbelin · May 30, 2003, 02:40

/me is a damn proud Mozzist who uses Mozilla and Mozilla Firebird.

First of all I don't recommend using Thunderbird for now. Secondary I recommend Mozilla 1.3.1 right now as Firebird still has annoying issues unsolved and tends to crash during longer sessions. For now I primarily recommend a mixture of both Mozilla and Mozilla Firebird. 1.4 will be soon out.

Urban Ranger · May 30, 2003, 02:43

Quote:

Originally posted by War4ever
no one answered me

i assume it is..i had it before and got rid of it..it was an early version

Was your question "Can I run Opera under Windows?"

The answer is yes.

DRoseDARs · May 30, 2003, 02:44

Quote:

Originally posted by War4ever
no one answered me

i assume it is..i had it before and got rid of it..it was an early version

Well, I'll try.

I just installed Opera v7 a few hours ago and am slowly getting used to it. It doesn't override my IE v6 at all since I maintain seperate shortcuts on my desktop for IE and Opera. Haven't noticed any problem along those lines yet. In fact, I'm using Opera right now...

I hope that's close to an answer for you, War4ever.

DRoseDARs · May 30, 2003, 02:46

To reflect UR's answer, the Opera site offers versions for:

Windows
Linux
OS/2
Solaris
FreeBSD
QNX
(^Those last three. Are they OSs? Never heard of them...)
Smartphones/PDAs

Urban Ranger · May 30, 2003, 02:51

Quote:

Originally posted by DRoseDARs
Solaris
FreeBSD
QNX
(^Those last three. Are they OSs? Never heard of them...)

Yup, they are all variations of Unix.

Solaris is Sun's own version. FreeBSD is a version of BSD (Berkeley Software Distribution), which is itself a version of Unix.

QNX is specificially written to be used as OS's on embedded controllers, i.e., computers used to control machinery, home appliances, etc.

DRoseDARs · May 30, 2003, 02:55

I think I'll stick with Microsh!t OSs, thank you very much...