6 Reasons Why You Should Not Switch to Safari for PC
By Tomer Tishgarten on Thursday, June 14th, 2007This week, Apple has released a beta version of Safari for Windows. Wow — that means Safari is now available for the Mac, PC and the soon to be released and highly hyped iPhone. Now like all smart technologists, I downloaded and installed it as soon as possible. But, within a day I realized that Safari is no reasonable substitute for Firefox or Internet Explorer.
Here are 6 reason reasons why you may want to think twice before switching:
1. Control + Enter shortcut doesn’t exist. Folks that are getting things done already know this little trick saves a few keystrokes by automatically appending the “www” and “.com” to any word (just type in yahoo and then press Control + Enter to see it in action). Without it, I have to waste more time typing in the complete web address – yuck!
2. Refitting the browser window to the desktop is challenging. While you can click and drag on the border of almost any Windows application to adjust how it fits into the screen, these controls in Safari are limited to the bottom right hand corner.
3. Plug-in support is non-existent. Plug-in developers are not considering Safari yet because Safari has only a 4.7% market share as of 1/07. That means that you’ll likely “run for the hills” if you’re accustomed to using Firefox add-ons such as IE View (which easily let’s you switch between Firefox and IE) or Web Developer (which puts web development powertools at your fingertips).
4. Your website and application won’t look/work correctly. While developers these days are paying more attention to how their favorite website and applications are working in Safari, there have been several instances where highly-visited websites did look right (for example, the headlines on the popular The Register website did not display correctly earlier this week).
5. Importing bookmarks not a part of the installation process. While Safari imports all of your browser bookmarks, it does it secretly and puts in a special place called a “bookmark folder” [which is accessible via a special icon in the Bookmarks Bar]. (Addition: While Safari for PC tries to make it easy, it is a shame that the process is not more apparent — that could be accomplished by including an informational screen during the installation process). This process lowers the average user’s awareness of how to get to your favorites.
6. Another reason I can’t justify buying a Mac. Until this week, web developers had an air-tight excuse for needing a Mac Mini or Mac Book – they needed to ensure that their web site or application was compatible on that “other” platform and Safari was only available on OS X. Damn you Apple!
For a company that’s known for exceptional user interface, design and innovation, Apple has let us down with this release of Safari for PC. Let’s hope that before Apple goes alpha to a public release with Safari that they fix some of these issues and give us “Windows lovers” another reason to switch back to the Mac! 
I understand your criticisms, but I don’t think that #1 and #5 are completely valid.
You don’t NEED to enter www. or .com to a web address; just type the central part (e.g., yahoo) into the URL and press Enter. Safari automatically looks for yahoo.com and www.yahoo.com.
Editing the bookmarks folder is very easy. Select Show All Bookmarks (equivalently cmd-opt-b or click on the tiny book-like icon on the left of the bookmarks bar). Safari shows all your bookmarks, neatly arranged in folder. You can easily edit either the name or the URL for any bookmark by selecting it and pressing Enter.
Just because Safari doesn’t work identically to IE or FoxFire doesn’t mean it’s more difficult. But I agree with your complaints 2, 3, 4, and 6.
Yeah, we just tested our web application (web-based task management) on the Safari browser yesterday. It (safari - sosorry) is REALLY having a tough time with basic JavaScript, has a serious problem with table layout (percent and fixed widths can not be mixed like you can do in every other browser), and intermittently doesn’t display some form elements if they have JavaScript actions. We pride ourselves on having the JobTraQ web client run on practically everything, so we’ll plow through it, but I hope Apple will not make us work so hard at supporting this browser that we have to consider dropping it. We can’t get spun up around the axles supporting this browser if it isn’t going to support standards.
1. You are right, but its DNS lookup is quite speedy in Safari. Since CTRL+Enter is only supportive of .com - “http://www.” + WhatYouType + “.com”, and most people don’t even know the keyboard shortcut, I don’t know that that should be number one on your list. I work in an IT department where no one I have talked to knows that shortcut.
2. You are right. How often do you want your window maximized, if anything, I think most people want to have multiple windows open in a visible space. So the real question is do you do it because you want to, or because windows offers it? Apple offers the zoom feature, but it is as worthless as windows maximize feature.
3. Plug-in support is robust. Do you mean add-ons? There are few, but tell me how many add-ons do you see for IE? You are talking about something that makes FF unique.
4. I am a web developer. If you build with standards in mind, what you say is just untrue. If you are building so that it cannot be seen on mac, it cannot be seen on Firefox either 9 times out of 9.1.
5. I assume that is true and I have no argument.
6. I think if they are serious about developing it, it could cause a hit to their market. But most people who use it for that use it for their videography and other things as well. It is a mixed bag, that in the long run could make it better for them. But that is neither here nor there.
Apple won’t be going “alpha” with Safaria. Alpha is before Beta.
Most of your reasons fo rnot switching are lame. This is a test release. Most people should not switch until the production release in October.
Well, I haven’t used the Windows version of Safari, but I have used the Mac one for as long as it’s been around. In regard to your #1 complaint, on the Mac, it’s a non-issue. If I type “yahoo” into the address field and hit return (or enter), I am whisked away www.yahoo.com… no need for a keyboard shortcut because if you don’t type in a domain qualifier, it just assumes that “www.” and “.com” are the ones you are looking for. It bugs the crap out of me whenever I have to use IE because I am just not used to typing that in, and I invariably end up at some strange search page. Blech!
Hopefully the Windows version of Safari works this way too… ?
Items
1. Just type the name of the site - e.g. yahoo and press enter - control is unnecessary. This is something that has frustrated Mac people who have to use IE for over a decade. Most of the otherbrowsers have already implemented this feature. Get with it Microsoft - get rid of the required use of the control key!
2. I think Apple made a mistake here. If they want to play in the Windows sandbox they need to follow the Windows standard.
3. There were no plug-ins for IE when it first came out either. This is a rediculous argument and it is trotted out as justification for not adopting every new major program that comes along!
4. This is not something that should be laid at the feet of Safari. It one of the most compliant browsers out there, along with Firefox. The problem has been created by Microsoft who have published a browser which does not properly follow established web standards. The second party to blame in this matter are the web designers who produce and publish web sites that ‘work best with Internet Explorer’. This is totally irresponsible on the part of the web developers who follow this practice. Personally I will not visit a site which follows this philosophy!
5 I do not see this as a big deal. Presumably one downloads and installs Safari to ‘give it a try’. That neither requires nor necessitates transfer of all of a person’s bookmarks. There is a way to do this but, I do agree that some kind of automated tool to perform this action should be included in the download. Perhaps Apple will do so once the browser is out of Beta.
6. Obviously a tongue in cheek comment, the poster is apparently a closet Mac lover, who secretly desires to have a Mac, but has to rationalize his decision to somebody. Who? Grow up, raltionalizations are for Kids! If you want a Mac jsut go buy one.
Jim Davis
Mount Royal College
Calgary, Canada
Oh by the way, an Alpha version comes before a Beta version. I believe you mean to refer to the Public Release. for information refer to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_software
On #1, with Safari you don’t even need to hit Control + Enter. It will add it automatically.
RE: #1: Just type in the site name and hit return. Safari automatically adds the http:// and the .com at the end.
Coming from a user that uses both platforms, granted Apple much more often, I find that only reasons 3 and 4 are the only real vaild ones. And 4 is interchangable on whichever OS your using so, it holds some water but, you could say the same from the Mac to PC side. Reason 1, you do not need to type CONTROL+ENTER because it will fill it in automatically or as with just about ANY browser just type the name and .com or .net and it fills www for you. (if typing an extra three letters is a pain in the butt for you well…) Reason 2, challenging? C’mon. Not what you are used to, OK, but “challenging” I don’t buy for a nano second… unless maybe your challenged in other ways. Reason 5, See reason 2. Reason 6, Im not sure why this was included in this article. Reason not to get a Mac because your not going to switch to Safari? Im confused.
Hold on, let me get my fire extinguisher…
OK, Go!
“Let’s hope that before Apple goes alpha with Safari…”
Alpha is before Beta.. so from beta they could only go to a release version!
“6. Another reason I can’t justify buying a Mac. Until this week, web developers had an air-tight excuse for needing a Mac Mini or Mac Book – they needed to ensure that their web site or application was compatible on that “other” platform and Safari was only available on OS X. Damn you Apple!”
Wrong.. Mac runs Firefox as well and so no need to test anything.
I think the launch Safari to Windows now by two reasons:
one - is what you saying but in the different way.. apple, now, wants web developers to test their sites with safari and not only with firefox!
two - Apple will launch Iphone at 28 June and the apps made to him will be develop for Safari (Iphone uses safari as browser), so now anyone with mac or not is possible to develop applications to Iphone because you have Safari for windows.
You are a Windows-slave idiot.
I haven’t used Safari for Windows yet, but Safari on Mac does the “Control + Enter thing” by default. Just type Yahoo in and it adds the http://www. and .com. It also works with /’s. E.g., type google/bookmarks and you get http://www.google.com/bookmarks
1. Control + Enter shortcut doesn’t exist.
Who needs it? I just typed “spunlogic” into the address field and hit return, and I got the www.spunlogic.com page.
If you’re going to complain about not adhering to “standards”, I, for one, find MS’ Active X and Front Page strategy far more objectionable. The result is web sites that don’t look or work properly with anything but IE, as well as a whole new family of vulnerabilities. MS practically blackmailed ISPs into installing Active X APIs onto their servers. Talk about “proprietary”. As for Firefox, I find its UI complicated, visually taxing, and ugly. And, it spits up random error messages from time to time. Extensions might be nifty, but I want a browser that’s elegant and doesn’t get in my way. That’s Safari.
Oh, and by the way, why don’t Firefox or IE have built-in color management that interprets ICC tags to ensure accurate display of photos? Safari’s had this since day one.
Also (and feel free to combine these… shoulda read the whole post better before replying…) as far as No. 4 is concerned, Safari actually conforms to the Acid2 standard, while IE does not. I know it’s not mandatory, but cooperative standards exist for a reason. If you make it work in Safari, it’s actually _better_ for you. Just more work.
In OS X, the green button (your box) works different. It doesn’t maximize a window, it fills the window vertically and pushes it out so there’s no horizontal scrollbar. Does it work that way in Windows? (That issue solves the fitting-to-workspace problem if it does).
1- You don’t need to add the www. pluh-ease
2- seriously?
3- If I wanted a bloated web browser- I’d download firefox
4- It looked fine on mine (and If your operating system doesn’t know how to deal with the choice of other language support…)
5- I like not having to sift through billy’s blog and mother’s recipies in html bookmarks on the desktop…to each their own I suppose
6- hehe - gess you gotta fess up and stop picking holes
Having defeated each point I must say that it is a beta- I’m sure you’re familiar with betas. I’m using it with no issues, that’s truely all I can say. The rest was for entertainment purposes only ^^
1. The reason control + enter doesn’t work is that there is no need for it. If you just type in “yahoo” and hit “return” — er…. “enter” in the PC world, it will load www.yahoo.com. It knows to append “www” and “.com”. This is the way Mac browsers have worked since day 1 and is the way browsers should always have worked.
I rounded up an XP machine and installed Safari just to be sure and sure enough,,,,
Hi there. As a longtime Windows user, and a Mac user…I can appreciate your points. But I have issue with them for a couple of different reasons:
1) Your points do not tackle the average computer user. Let’s use our moms as average computer users. Do they do the web development? Fancy keystroke movements? Not really.
2) This item is a BETA release. I expect it to have plenty of issues before they issue a final release. Points like yours should be taken into account by Apple before they wrap up the beta…but jumping down the company’s throat 4 days after the release of the beta isn’t going to make it the best product ever.
The best thing to do here is just to download the beta, use it, and tell them how it can be made better. They DO listen to feedback.
Thanks for letting me share my opinion.
-Mike Leader
ummmmm regarding reason #1 I’m using Safari right now and it does have the shortcut, you just have to press return.
I downloaded the beta version of Safari. I imported my bookmarks from Firefox. I was annoyed that they were imported into a separate folder, rather than in the format that I had them in Firefox. Oh well, some work to do there. Then I went to import my cookies. This is very important, as virtually every website requires you to register to get full features. Where is that import cookies feature? Answer — there isn’t one. Goodbye Safari. I have no intention of re registering on every site I’ve ever visited.
Funny article. Please know that you are wrong on your first point #1: Control + Enter shortcut doesn’t work.
Since Day 1, Apple has had a far easier solution.
Simply type anything into the addressbar (shortcut Cmd-L to jump there), for example “spunlogic” press Enter.
Safari automatically adds “.com” & if that doesn’t work, “www.” to the name.
Secondly, on Point #2, pressing the green/maximize button zooms the window to the last size the window was changed to. If u want it to be full screen, then drag it full screen one time only. It will remember that until u change it.
Number 1 and 2: Safari is in beta, which means that some advanced options will not be available.
Number 3: As time goes on, safari will get more and more plug-ins. You cant expect that safari will have everything that other browsers have from day one.
Number 4: That will obvoiously be fixed, plus most website do work in safari
Number 5: This is not a reason at all, there is a bookmark button on the top of the page, that has an option called “Show all bookmarks”
Number 6: The only valid reason.
Overall, your arguments were weak, You dont aknowledge that safari is in BETA. All of these problems will probobly be fixed when safari ends beta.
One by one:
1 I never type either “www” or “com” in Safari’s addtress field. I just finds stuff (or dns resolution does)
2 True - that’s a Mac gui thing. And one thing I like about Windows. But OS X’s green button does the same thing.
3 For what? Are all Windows users developers? Most I know think their OS is called “Word”.
4 Well, when you build for IE you get IE websites. If you want broader support, go for open standards. Most clients just want .Net sites that work in IE7. That’s what they get.
5 What’s secret about that? Why should installing an app for daily use have to be a lesson in exploring the inner workings of an OS? Your bookmarks arrive, don’t they?
6 Just buy one.
It’s disappointing to find that a few small holes discovered and plugged in a beta can condemn an app to accusations of incompetence. No, it won’t take the Windows world by storm. But it’s one browser my dad can understand. I like Safari but I know there are sites (Air New Zealand being one) where I need Firefox. IE? Not any more.
I love it! Apple releases a BETA of Safari for Windows, and already “Windows Lovers” are stating that it’s not as good as some well-aged Windows browsers. (Well, garsh! I thunk that all them browsers should be as good as th’other ‘uns, even if’n ’tis the first try. Hyuk!) I agree that Safari is no substitute for Firefox, even on a Mac, but IE? I guess I’ve been away from Windows for too long, and haven’t seen the great version of IE that has that nifty Control + Enter feature!. (Come on, now! Get a life!) Don’t get too down on Safari because, if you do, you just might push the right buttons to cause Apple to get mad enough to put their famous creative masters together and turn Safari into the best browser ever created for ANY platform! Then. I’ll just sit back and laugh, and laugh, and laugh. Garsh!
btw, you don’t need to type www or .com into safari…ever, for several years
#1. Safari always performs the - functionality, there’s no need for a special key sequence. type “apple” on the address bar and it goes to www.apple.com. It’s always been this way.
#2. There’s no reason to make the window as large as the desktop. Windows users only do this because they can’t reliably run multiple apps at the same time. Most web sites don’t benefit from a window larger than 1000 pixels wide anyway.
#3. I really don’t understand this comment. It’s like saying the add-on market for a band new car is non existent on the day it is shipped. Safari has a plug-in architecture but most people find its features adequate without add-ons.
#4. Every web site I visit in Safari looks fine. Those that don’t invariably fail the W3 validation test, meaning that the web site creators don’t know what they’re doing. There are bugs in Safari 3; it’s a public BETA test.
#5. I agree it needs to be more explicit. But you can’t have it both ways, either the bookmarks are imported during installation or they’re not, you seem to be stating both sides in the same comment.
BTW: I love the resizable text areas, makes entering comments on sites like this SOOOO much nicer. I wish the search feature was like the earlier beta where the entire web page was dimmed out except the found text. The current model with the boxes obscures the surrounding text.
mac fanbois no one is listening… and please .. do you all HAVE to repeat yourselves.
this browser will ONLY we used on windows to interact with the iphone period
Woe is he who pisses of apple fans.
Seriously, most of you need to re-read this post…. oh and there are websites with I don’t know addresses that end in .org ? hmm never thought of that, did ya?
Frankly, apple is jumping into PC world. It should remain consistent with the normal behavior of applications. I for one am ditching your crap browser since Firefox well owns you all, period.
RE: Vaughn and you web application.
If you are writing a modern APP you should be using modern tools such, ie: CSS. Stop by www.w3.org and read all about their opinion of using tables for layout. I’ll summarize: don’t. Ever.
I dumped safary 1 hour after install. Fonts are blurry and bold, it’s painfully slow, and butt ugly. At least I now know for sure I’m not missing much by staying away from Mac. Firefox rules. Still need IE for sites that don’t work well with Firefox. No room for the third wheel especialy a squeaky one.
Listen, Windows users (I am one) react to a Mac product in the same way … they EXPECT problems since that is what happens with most Windows-based products on first release, so when a Mac product that is in BETA ships, they are gnashing their teeth and saying “uh, huh! I KNEW it! Mac is not nearly as good as my seasoned IE (Firefox, Mozilla, etc.)
I use a Mac primarily and I like Safari. Not buggy, not glitchy and the popups are non-existent. I’m sure when Safari 1.0 came out for a Mac, it had glitches too. There just weren’t as many users to complain about it. If you don’t like the product, delete it, but don’t come on here and bash Mac for a, let’s say it again, BETA product. Let it get fixed and then you can gripe.
I do Wordpress work on my web site, and have used Apple, Linux as well as Windows for ages. I think I can understand Apple’s reasons for bringing out S4W, which is to drive further consumer use of their products, and get higher market share for Safari. I *like* a lot of Safari on the Mac, it’s a pretty clean interface, but find I usually use Firefox. The Windows version seems to be as compatible with my Wordpress site as IE7, but oddly FF doesn’t display correctly! Anyway, many casual Mac users I meet use Safari. I do wish that Apple, MS, Oracle and others would stop their marketing people from making the stupid mistake of promoting their “security”. Anyone who has been in this industry for five days knows security is a moving target, that is only a marketing ploy if you never have a problem! All browsers do.
June 16th, 2007 - Goran B Says: “I dumped safary 1 hour after install. Fonts are blurry and bold, it’s painfully slow, and butt ugly. At least I now know for sure I’m not missing much by staying away from Mac.”
The blurry fonts are a problem with the Windows version of Safari because Apple didn’t get it together to use Windows’ built-in ClearType. This is NOT an issue on the Mac version. Speed is also not an issue with the Beta version of Safari on Mac; it’s very fast (finally!). However, there are still sites that Firefox handles much better than Safari. On my Macs, I keep both browsers active at all times. Each has advantages.
I hope the complaints of Windows users will spur Apple to compete more aggressively with Firefox and improve Safari for both platforms.
Personally, I think Apple should have waited to release this until a few more bugs were worked out. — Comments submitted through Safari. The formatting better look OK.
I want to clarify that the key sequence CTRL + ENTER is available on Firefox (Mac + Win) and IE (Win). I wasn’t aware of the Safari key sequence until I read the comment above (apparently you just click ENTER). It would have been nice if Safari implemented either both key sequences or simply provided some informational screens during the installation process with a “switch” tip about this feature.
Hmm. I don’t know this blogger, but it smacks of someone with an an axe to grind. Having been a software developer for the last 10 years, I’ve got to say that Safari outclasses any browser I’ve ever used - and I’ve only been on Mac for 6 months or so.
Sure, you can only drag one corner, but the majority of websites share the same dimensions (if not literally, then they scale to fit the page without any particular problem). So it doesn’t follow the windows convention, but it’s hardly a show stopper, is it?
Admittedly, the compatibility is a pain in the arse - and the reason I’ve tested a total of SIX different browsers on my Mac - but I always come back to Safari and fire up Firefox only when Safari gets baffled. Ultimately, it’s hardly Apple’s fault if developers (poor ones) ignore widely accepted standards and fill their code with Microsoft proprietary code!
Safari is simple, quick, uncluttered and speedy - oh, and it’s fast too! That’s all that matters to me when it comes to browsers - SPEED! Maybe I’m getting old (almost 30!) but the availability of hordes of plugins really doesn’t mean a lot to me any more!
Interesting what a boost your blog can get when it is mentioned in an article on MacCentral eh?
I think we are getting a bit hung up on ctrl-enter and blurry fonts. They’ll fix the bugs and the security holes.
The real issue is WHY? why do we need another browser on the PC? What purpose will this serve? Who gains?
I’m getting a bit tired of of software marketing strategists - either from Cupertino or Seattle…
Apple is not entering the browser wars. It is making Safari available on Windows so developers who want to make applications for the iPhone have access to the same platform without having to use a Mac. After all, many windows users will be purchasing the iPhone.
As to your Safari complaints, one word: BETA - Try it again in October when it’s an official release before bashing it.
awwww, poor windoze users find clicking on a corner “challenging”.
no, just simple and uncomplicated.
1 & 2 are not safari problems, but learnt windows behaviour problems.
3 is not true, anyone can write plugins for safari, from simple bookmarklets to the fabulous inquisitor plugin
4 This is perhaps your worst assumption. Safari uses webkit (also used by konqueror on linux) to render, so it’s market share is slightly above that of the Mac’s. It is infact the most css and html compliant rendering engine on the market. If your sites don’t work right, it’s the author’s fault NOT the renderers. This is such a basic error, but is constantly trotted out by windows know it-all biggots. Besides, any web designer who doesn’t check his site in the fastest and most compliant renderer is not worth spending money on - after all, you are future proofing your website.
5. is just plain stoopid
6. How about you just buy a mac and install boot camp or parallels then you get everything on one box anyway.
You don’t even mention some of Safari’s fantastic features, better rendering, better font aliasing, dragging tabs, etc. Why? because it’s not window enough for you. That’s what the Mac vs PC thing has always boiled down to - the majority are exposed to and learn a poor imitation of the gui, and when they can’t find their favourite little way of doing things on other platforms, they claim they are incomplete. Fine, live on in ignorance.
The amount of Apple sychophantry in these comments shows how uncomfortable Apple users are about their platform. Every criticism must be destroyed via fallacies and in some rare cases the truth (very rare). While the mac user is busy pirating 100s of packages just to get a usable desktop the rest of the world is going out, paying for their software and getting their work done.
A lot of the complaints I’m hearing seem like they’re just looking for stuff to pick on. Ctrl-Enter sounds like people who just like pressing the control button.
I’m trying to figure out what this magic keyboard shortcut does that Safari doesn’t do when you just type in “yahoo” and hit Enter.
Resizing windows: 1) How often do you really resize your browser windows? Every time you make a new one? 2) I find it much easier to use a bottom right corner than to mouse over the 1-3 pixels on any side where I can change the side. Maybe that’s just me.
This one’s really special, too:
— Importing bookmarks not a part of the installation process. While Safari imports all of your browser bookmarks, it does it secretly and puts in a special place called a “bookmark folder.”
Huh?
The only good thing is that the X (close) button is on the right-hand side
Chi: “Seriously, most of you need to re-read this post…. oh and there are websites with I don’t know addresses that end in .org ? hmm never thought of that, did ya?”
And what, Control-Enter works with those?
Overall this article made some good general observations, but like always rabid true believers in products by Brand “X” (Opera, Firefox, et al fans can be just as bad) can’t see see beyond their blind allegiance. If Safari wants to gain acceptance on the Windows platform then it needs to do things the Windows way. That means:
1) Get rid of the fuzzy over bold fonts they make pages hard to read on screen.
2) Use Windows standard menus and shortcuts, it doesn’t matter if Apple has a “better” way of completing addresses still include the short cuts windows users are used to (e.g. [Ctrl]+ [Enter]). This is the big problem with Office Vista and why people don’t like the new Windows Vista, Microsoft tried to change the basics and people don’t like change to the fundamentals.
3) Don’t screw with basic functionality. In the Windows environment we are used to being able to expand a window by grabbing any edge and dragging it out. If Apple wants to win over Windows users, it had better give them the things they are used to.
4) Be prepared to take criticism. In the Mac world people seem to worship the vision according to Jobs. In the Windows world Windows fans have no problems taking their favorite software vendor (e.g. Microsoft or Mozilla) to task for delivering something we don’t like.
5) Don’t claim to be delivering the most secure browser and not expect someone to break it in short order to provide a little humility. Oh and blaming a browser’s security faults on the OS doesn’t hold water on PC’s whether they are running Windows, Linux, et al. Unlike with OS/X web browser is responsible and accountable for providing its own security.
As far as Safari being in beta, yes it is in “beta” but even for a beta it has some significant issues. We do expect more from even beta software. Not the least of which would have been fewer security issues that were uncovered within hours of Safari being made public. This was just plainly sloppy work on Apple’s part.
Like Steve Jobs used to say… “This is version 0.1″.
It was the same for iTunes years ago.
Look at it now.
Namaste.
The only reason for this release is to facilitate developing iPhone applications on Windows. Third party apps will only run in a browser, and Safari is the iPhone browser. I really don’t think Apple is expecting any large number of people to use Safari as their everyday browser.
This is great stuff here!
Not being a regular PC user, I get easily annoyed with Windows OS and Windows apps. I’m sure if I didn’t use a Mac 98% of the time I would find MS standards quite comfortable. It makes sense to me that regular Windows users will find the Mac OS look and feel strange as well.
So please, be patient, download the beta, play with it, make your complaints, wait for the final release or the next version and try it again. I find that Apple’s apps are usually better than competing offers.
This is a great way to press the web development community to abide by open standards instead of developing for Windows IE only. Beware of and always challenge MS use of fear, uncertainty and doubt to maintain dominance, ultimately giving the end user less. Remember Netscape’s dream of platform independent web based application environment and how MS forced PC manufacturers to exclude it from their machines. Remember Sun’s platform independent Java and how MS’s free Java development environment built apps that would only work on a Windows PC.
Thanks, Spazz
The font issue is an easy fix. It’s caused by a font ID conflict between the two Lucida Grande fonts in the Safari.resources directory and the two with the same names in the Windows fonts directory.
Simply remove the Lucida Grande fonts from the Windows fonts directory and (if you wish) replace them with the two font files from Safari. Problem solved.
(People who didn’t already have Lucida Grande fonts installed before Safari haven’t had the problem.)
Firefox can be set to autocomplete the www…com, but it will not do SHIFT+ENTER for .net or CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER for.org shortcuts are a big deal to lose if you know and use them. I know that Apple users are better at doing things with pictures, like illiterates at a restaurant but you cannot discount the little things because you don’t know them.
Don’t think that you can use Safari for Windows to get an idea of how sites will look with Safari on OSX. This is the story.
A friend called me yesterday to report a misalignement on a page of a heavily graphic site of mine. Some elements were getting positioned a few pixel higher than they should have. He’s using Safari on OSX.
I previously made the site behave consistently with IE6/7, FF1/2 and Opera 9.1+ so I fired up Safari on my Windows box and was preparing myself for another CSS bug hunting safari (!) without the help of any Firebug-like tool (shame on Microsoft for not having a decent free debugging tool and shame on Apple too) but guess what? On Windows Safari misaligns the page too, but a by few pixel in the *other* direction. Basically you still need a Mac if you want to be sure of how a page looks like on a Mac. No shortcuts here.
Can’t imagine what Windows users will think of Safari; it’s not the favorite browser even on my Mac. But, it’ll give the PC crowd some familiarity with the Apple look and feel before the iPhone comes out. Jobs isn’t selling browsers… .
I think these points really do not have substance. So, i’m not going to discuss them here (also, already many comments are posted regarding that). What matters is that a new browser player (with credible reputation) has entered the browser market with some new features. I’m giving it a try and its not bad (though I love FF just because the power it gives to me with plenty of Add-ons and customizable features).
I like the rendering technology of Safari (or Mac), which is little strange to Windows users at first sight. Though, I personally never owned a mac, I’m trying to get its feel through Safari.
FireFox is the best in and a clear winner hands down, for its stability, flexibility, standards, features and customizations (with or without add-ons). I love this product (so, I’m not switching from FF), but i’d like to see a healthy competition going forward.
I’m not an IT professional, just a broadcaster who uses windows by day and a mac at home. Corporate requires us to use Firefox on our PC’s, and I use it at home as well. But i decided to give the Safari beta a try for sh!ts and giggles, and becase it’s supposed to be speedier. The last version of Safari seemed like it was a memory hog. So far, the one complaint I have is that I can’t (or can’t figure out) how to force links that open in a new window to open in a new tab like I can in Firefox.
I can see Apple’s logic in Safari for PC. If I pick up an iPhone, it sure would be great to sync it with my work PC and mac at home and always have my bookmarks sync’d up.
I think it says a lot about Safari and the browser market in general when these are the worst criticisms you can level against it.
And I’m actually an Opera fanboy, not Safari. But these criticisms are just silly.
I’ve tried Safari and I’ve read the comments here. The only two that matter for me so far are the windowing issues and to a lesser extent the keyboard shortcuts. Both are productivity deal-breakers.
Not only am I used to dragging any edge as I need to, it’s part of my basic expectations of a Windows application; there are several misbehaving apps whose designers brought style without function. Bad idea. And I’m also used to maximizing windows (’real’ maximizing, no border weeping with stuff peeking underneath; ALT-SPACE-X) for a clean working space. Moving between apps and windows are simple ALT-TAB or CTL-TAB, no reaching for a mouse.
Keyboarding is my main working style. When one of these expected shortcuts is changed (as Adobe did with Audition 2, changing ALT-F-A from Windows-standard “save as” to “save all” — a real project wrecker), it not only slows down work, but produces anomalous results and some productivity disasters. Designers sometimes forget that not all of us look at the screen as we work, expecting keyboard shortcuts to work consistently and reliably.
I’m also a firefox fan and welcome safari. RK said a lot of what I was going to say. I would repeat that this goes beyond just another browser with its own hits and misses. I would not be surprised to see Apple Safari ads on tv with more reach than the small firefox flicks campaign. Apple has a real chance of fighting the browser war against IE. Firefox has the utility but Apple has the style. You need both types of users if you want to convince web developers to design for the latest web standards instead of IE.
It’s a Beta version.
reminds me of the first time IE tried to do Firefox. Was a weak effort and pretty much reminded me of why i use Firefox.
Safari looks ok but is just too hard to use. Removed it from my PC after about 15 mins.
Safari sucks. It’s all blurry, the “back” and “forward” buttons on my mouse don’t work with it. There are no mouse gestures. And, I hate not being able to resize it from any edge.
Firefox craps out with some java apps I have to use.
Internet Explorer is bloated and slow and insecure.
Opera wins.
Haha you guys are funny - 1,000,000 downloads later, using crappy, slow browsers with lame UIs and feature bloat.
1,000,000 downloads vs how many uninstalls.
that’s a statistic that’ll tell the whole story
Mac users tend to always worship whatever crap comes in their boxes when they buy them, why? because everything its a whole, safari works good in mac, but don’t expect the whole pack of windows users to grab a browser intended for a specific public and adopt it, its lame.
The difference there is obvious, mac users blindly believe that the piece of software they’ve got its perfect, windows users try to find the same usability they had already.
Come on, how can you compare the plugins/addons available to safari with addons.mozilla.org ?!?
Ohh, the eternal cry of ‘wait to see the final version’, then, why the heck do they release a beta if they are holding the ‘good’ stuff for the stable version? its ridiculous… That would be dumb, you are creating bad consumer opinion without giving them the real product. If its bad now, will be the same thing later… or can they make a fork of safari and make it better for a foreign OS that for the osx itself?
I think Apple will definately appreciate all the work the author has done for the beta version of Safari. Most people just don’t take the time to let software companies know of the shortcomings of their BETA software. (insert snicker here)
Okay, here is #1 problem with Safari for Windows, and I’m going to yell it because otherwise people might not here:
SAFARI DOES NOT EVEN HAVE DOMINANT MARKET SHARE ON THE MAC PLATFORM
In fact, Firefox does. There is a very good reason for this: Safari sucks balls. Apple decided “Fuck the ECMA” and invented their own version of JavaScript. Even the most basic sites don’t work on it. No-one I know uses it. Every website I’ve ever designed, I put in as default in browser detection that it doesn’t work in Safari - I don’t even need to test it. I know it doesn’t work.
In this crazy world, there are three things we can rely on the user supporting: HTML, JavaScript and Flash. HTML works perfectly on Safari (it doesn’t work so perfectly on other platforms). Flash and JavaScript barely work at all. I’m sorry. It’s not worth it.
I think it’s probably worth noting that almost all of Apple’s other software is brilliant. iLife and iWork both work fantastically. The various stuff that’s built into OSX - Dashboard, Exposé, etc. - I love all that stuff. But Safari can suck a fat one. I use Firefox, and you should too.
#1 is critical, saying that ctrl + enter is not neccessary is ugly. Do you really know the difference bw supporting ctrl + enter and automatically adding .com after resovling? For people with slow connections slow DNS, this is critical. idiots!
Yawn.
Well I read all the posts above and I agree with one thing, if Apple wants to encourage use of Safari on windows platform, it should conform with Windows standards. Secondly they should have tested Safari thoroughly before launching a beta because some errors are too much even for a beta version. e.g. Safari does not display Indic text at all. When I tried to type Indic or Japanese characters in fields, the characters appeared on top left corner of the page and vanished. When I opened a Marathi language webpage, SAFARI CRASHED. Also it messes up with naming of downloaded files.
Secondly there is no option to make new pages open in tabs by default.
However I can say on my dial-up connection, safari IS faster the even FF. Opera is good but is plagued with faulty rendering.
About security, I heard of a story that someone challenged hackers to hack his mac machine and it was hacked in six hours. I think it is only because mac os and safari have a low market share that we hear less complaints about them.
Finally, I love mac (by the looks of it ’cause I haven’t yet laid my hands on it), I would stick to PC because PC is for computers what Linux is for PC—open source, variety, freedom etc. However, everyone has a right to make his choice.
As far as the Mac vs PC debate goes…
1. I’ve never even heard of 1 person who bought a Mac and then switched back to PC.
2. Apple’s market share is constantly increasing.
Once people learn to use a Mac, and Mac software, they then realize how much easier it is. Windows is full of useless and time consuming operations. Macs come with all the software you need to get started, and if you want anything extra there is always open source available. I bought my first Mac 3 years ago, and at first found it a bit of a challenge to get used to, but once you use it for awhile, it’s great. One other point, Windows Vista is like 4 years behind OSX, and that’s with Mac taking software engineers away from the new OS and devoting these resources to the iphone. When the latest OSX comes out for Mac (October?) windows is going to be 7-10 years behind.
Apple is the most innovative company in the world right now. They will only continue to widen the gap between themselves and Microsoft in terms of quality and the use of cutting edge technology. Apple continues to speed a head while Microsoft sits there twiddling it’s thumbs.
How far will the 72 remaining mac users go to support this lame addition to the apple lineup? I had an Apple GS back in the day, and I could not get any applications for it then, and the problem grows. Sosorry browser does not work well with all web sites, it really only effects less than 5% of the world. Microsoft would not even release a patch for a problem this small.
In my opinion, jumping to conclusion, as posted here, about a beta version, is premature and to some extent prejudiced. As far as I am concerned, I have not been a Mac user till now. But I find safari loading much faster than any other existing ones… and if I compare it with IE (even 7), by the time IE window opens, I may be able to type and go to 2-3 web sites using Safari…. typing (and enter) just the name of the website is sufficient… no “Control” is necessary. That is why I prefer IE extension in Firefox if I have to use IE compulsorily (There are some sites that insist on) at all. I simply love Bonjour feature. I don’t have to go individually to all the printers on the network to modify the configurations and do troubleshooting.
There are some problems I face though…
1. No drop down menu in address bar for previously visited pages (although if start typing, it gives the list of previously visited pages and moreover, probably guesses and gives a list of pages that I have not visited also, if I have not perceived it wrongly).
2. Yahoo mail!Beta page is not supported as Yahoo has not tested this browser.
3. Saving any file does not have the option of “ask every time to save to a specified folder.” This way, I have only one option to save any file on desktop.
4. If I maximize/restore browser from its minimize state, it changes its size (e.g., becomes smaller and I have to double click on it to maximize it to fit the screen.
Apart from all this, I am very happy to use it as it is very fast. Another thing, although on the download site of Apple, it is said that it is for Windows XP, it was a pleasant surprise for me to install it and successfully use it on an older machine running on Windows 2000 Professional (as the machine is slow and I wanted my browser to load the pages fast).
My brother had a Mac for years, then bought a Windows XP PC and says he will never go back.
Anything designed for Windows should have Windows standards.
And I have lots of windows open all the time, full size, just tab between them. Having several small windows open seems crazy.
I don’t understand the title of the article: safari “FOR PC”? What does that mean?
I believed that Apple just shipped safari for WIN32. You might just as well say “for NT/386″, but “for pc” doesn’t make any sense!
This little detail in the title says it all about how ill this industry is after 20+ years of monopoly.
What Apple is doing with safari for NT is creating mindshare regarding the browser market, which was clearly a non-existent market “for pc” where 99% of users truly believe that IE is the only browser in existence “because it’s part of the OS”.
Thanks to Apple, now non-computer people will make an entry in their mind called “you can choose a browser” like they think they can choose a car or a TV brand. After that they will start looking for Firefox, which they never did before.
From this thread, one thing is clear. There are a lot of fanatics out there. Reading this thread is almost comical in terms of the number of blatently false statements out there.
It seems people are dismissing Safari because the “beta” is buggy. Of course, these aren’t the brightest bulbs in the bunch.
Anyway, I see one legitimate gripe about Safari. The application should be consistent and conform to the user interface guidelines of the platform it’s running on. Pushing the Leopard Grey theme and right corner windows resize issue on Windows users is not a good thing. At best, it should be optional.
For those complaining about the text rendering slowly, they should note a couple things. First, most XP users aren’t even using Cleartype. Second, cleartype is slightly less blurry but it’s also less accurate and less true to the actual font design, particularly at lower point sizes. It’s not a better or worse thing, it’s just a different design philosophy. Bundling Apple’s font rendering with Safari is necessary for web designer’s testing and consistent output across both the PC and Mac platforms for Safari.
Firefox is great. It’s my favorite browser on Windows for many reasons. However, if/when the bugs are cleaned up on Safari, that would likely change for me. IE7 is a vast improvement, but I tend not to use it except for the sites I have to. The internet is best served when you don’t have one browser with dominant market share. From a user’s perspective, IE7 is fine, but from a web developer’s perspective, I don’t like it. Standards compliance is important. Unfortunately, more web designers should be paying attention to W3C compliance as opposed to MS compliance.
Finally, I have to chuckle at the types that reject IE7, Firefox and Safari in favor of Opera. But, whatever, to each his own. Overall, I see Safari entering the Windows market as a good thing for web standards in general, even if you choose not to use Safari.
folks, don’t have a coronary … this article is just a troll, likely from Microsoft (or Microsoft-related company).
Who really cares about control-ENTER?? How many people know about it?
This critisms, while they may be valid, are just so nit-pickey they that don’t even seem to merit an article.
i think the main issue that seems to be forgotten is that safari is still safari, not “safari-redone-for-windows” the complaints i have read are all complaints that come with not being familiar with the mac platform. mac users are used to different things than pc users, but we already knew that. an example: the window resize issue. as a mac user, I almost never resize my windows. on a mac, there is really no need to, and therefore, there is no need for safari to have various features allowing windows to be resized conveniently. the setup of windows may make that necessary, but thats just how it is. the complaints mentioned above prove only one thing to me: windows users are used to using windows. if you owned a mac, you would understand safari and love it.
conversely, i might complain that having to click on the X at the top right corner of a windows application is annoying when i am used to just typing command+Q no matter what application i am using.
you cant compare apples and asparagus.
What a bunch of whiny defensive babies!
To jess (#76):
Don’t need to click on the X. ALT+F4 will do it.
Why is there no need to resize windows on a Mac?
Dennis
Damn, you whine about a few lacking features in the first release of a beta! Give ‘em a chance. It is hard to port a beautiful app on a beautiful OS to work flawlessly on a sucky crappy Windoze OS.
I am an IT professional, with a PC and Mac in my office. I am certainly no Mac fanboy, but I do love it for many reasons that I don’t like my PC, (and vice-versa when it comes to my PC.) So that means I switch between them quite often, and I think I have a very objective viewpoint.
That being said, as a Windows user I am embarassed at the lack of knowledge of the author. He should have confirmed #1 before writing it. If he uses Firefox, he should have tried entering the site name in Safari without the ‘www’ or ‘.com’, because that’s the way it works in FF! He should have tested it, and then he could have said ‘it works like FF, where you don’t need Ctrl + Enter.’ (Admittedly, I didn’t know about Ctrl + Enter, but I would have tried all avenues before writing this piece!)
#2 - Safari is not the only software I can recall trying where the window does not resize well. Do you think that a window resize issue is a reason to ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater?’ That can’t be THAT much of a dealbreaker!
#3 - I agree with most of the other posters, give it time. As it is adopted, there will be more plug-ins. Maybe the article should say, ‘6 reasons you might want to wait to switch to Safari,’ then I would say that argument is valid.
#4 - I am responsible for maintaining 2 corporate websites. Safari on Mac. FF on Mac, and FF on PC have always been consistent. It’s the stupied IE that I’m always tweaking for!!!!
#5 - The bookmarks comment seems to be nitpicking. They were there, weren’t they? Maybe the “alpha” release will have it in the install.
#6 - There are only two reasons that do not ‘justify’ me buying a Mac. The sticker price, and lack of gaming software. Unfortunately, I can get a PC much cheaper, but if I could, I’d definately keep both in my house, or just a Mac if I had to. The ease of use, the fact that OSX runs on platforms from G5-G3, and the graphics, sound and video capabilities are superior.
I have FF and Safari on my Mac. I use Safari, it’s faster. But there are some drawbacks too. I can’t run Google chat in Safari, or similar programs, so I’ll give you that arguement.
Bottom Line: We Windows users could learn something from the Mac guys, and you Mac users could take some pointers from us Windows guy too! Can’t we all just get along?
Chris — regarding your comment about my #1 reason for not switching to Safari for Windows, it seems that Safari users are versed on the ability to use the ENTER key as a shortcut.
I actually used the Safari help menu first. I looked under both the terms “shortcuts” and “URL” but didn’t find this trick. In fact, here’s what the help menu says about typing the URL:
Avoid needless typing: Type the key part of the address and Safari fills in the rest. For instance, to visit “http://www.cats.com”, type “cats.com”.
Why isn’t Apple making it easier for ALL users to use Safari?
Chris — one additional comment regarding the ENTER button on Safari for Windows. I re-installed Safari on my Windows machine and wasn’t able to get your shortcut to work; this shortcut did work on a Mac so I’m guessing this may be another variation for the Windows platform. Can anyone else validate this test?
Hi Tomer,
I understand your criticism but I think you’ve missed the point.
It isn’t about switching to an obviously-beta-version of Safari, it is about getting the opportunity to develop software that will run on Safari regardless of which OS the end-user to chooses to use. Great news for web developers around the world whose lives will be made easier !
Just my two cents…
Elinor
normal man - c’mon…
Surely anyone with a brain can type in www and .com without too much trouble. Don’t you think?
#1 CANNOT be critical
I woudln’t mind knowing how many people have :
1. heard of ctrl + ENTER
2. actually use it
And among those who use it how many can actually type properly.
Regards,
Elinor (again)
point #1 - big deal. But now you’ve let me know about ctrl-enter
point #4 - maybe this got fixed. The linked “Register” page looks better in Safari than IE
First - why is everyone so incensed about the ctl+enter comment?! Focus, kids.
Tried Safari along side IE in vista home premium. The Mac defenders above obviously feel the complaints listed might be a little silly - however, half a dozen small annoyances repeated throughout a day add up to a measurable chunk of my productivity.
The resizing issue is top of my list: it took me long enough to figure it out to embarrass me when I finally found it. It may be standard on an apple, but when in Rome, eh?
Found that Apple’s claim of fastest page rendering to be somewhat exaggerated. My fave test page right now is starwars.com as there is lots to load - over a 7Mbit connection IE beat Safari by a full 2 seconds.
Also had problems printing from webpage print buttons.
Disagree that plugins are an issue. The beta I downloaded came w/ links to any of the plugins most folks use when web browsing and they seem to work well once loaded.
Not a bad browser, but nowhere near great either. Anything I liked about it I already have in EI or Firefox.
That would be IE or Firefox.
I installed safari on Windows XP Home with SP2 and all the latest updates. There were no menus; there was no place where I could type an URL. I figured out quickly that only the lower right corner was enabled for resizing, but the browser was useless. Evidently it interfered with something on my system (or rather, something on my system interfered with safari) but after a few minutes of nothing but adds for itunes and iphone and other useless Apple crapware, I shut it down (Alt-F4 worked) and uninstalled it. I then went through and manually deleted all the directories that the install created that the uninstall did not delete (4-5 of them).
Don’t forget: they forgot LIVE BOOKMARKS!
I’ll never switch from firefox if safari doesn’t have that!
The negative comments re Safari remind me of the negative comments re iTunes when it came out. We all know how that turned out. I expect we’ll see a similar outcome with Safari.
safari can not write chinese,so apple company,go to your mother!
lol you don’t know what your talking about
I know this is a great deal of time later but I am still searching for information on point #1 the Control + Enter. Many users have responded with the same claim that Ed Kimball wrote in response to this. I wish to rebut. Ed read the help for SAFARI. It states that if you type just the domain name portion of a page YOU HAVE ALREADY VISITED safari will fill in the rest for you automatically. If on the other hand you put in the domain name of a site you have never visited safari fails spectacularly. Try typing “smelly” and hit enter. Then go to FireFox and type “smelly” and type Command Enter on a mac or CTRL Enter on a Windows machine and watch what happens. The Command Enter tells firefox to automatically prepend the http://www. to the front of what you types and the .com/ is appended to the back of what you typed. So without ever having visited the page before, FireFox takes me right where I want to go. Similarly you can hold Command + Shift+ Enter and you get .org/ appended Hold just the Shift key + Enter you get .net/ appended. Now can anyone tell me why this feature (if only in the .com/ version of it) is present in the windows version of Safari and completely missing from the Mac version???
Thank you for your time