Microsoft indeed learns that if they want Bing to succeed it will need to sleep with the enemy, at least through promoting Internet Explorer rival Firefox. The proof: Bing is now offering “Firefox With Bing.”

Bing, through a blog post invites people to download a special version of Firefox where Bing is used as the default search engine. It is packed with a search bar that well, searches on Bing through “AwesomeBar” address window.
You can download Firefox with Bing here: www.firefoxwithbing.com/

Recommending a rival product is a first for Bing. Experts agree that it’s a much needed move should Microsoft want to go grow further. Pushing in their very Internet Explorer is a religion that has met countless controversies over the past few years. Internet Explorer is bundled in Windows Operating Systems and other Microsoft products.

This notes Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineLand.com is a big move since Firefox 4 added Bing as option in serving search results October last year. But users can of course see this as more than reciprocating Firefox’s

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Latest stats on browser usage show that Firefox and Internet Explorer declined in number of users favoring Google Chrome. Internet Explorer remains at the prime spot, followed by Firefox, but Chrome is steadily gaining more users.

Chrome’s strength is very obvious with the data released by Net Applications. Other browsers like Opera and Safari still have their small population of users.

We rarely love numbers so take a look at the graph below to see the browsers’ usage shares:


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Last week I found an Ubuntu package repository for the Chromium browser, the open source project behind Google’s Chrome browser. I didn’t get excited until I saw this post, which shows that the packages do contain a working web browser!

Chromium for Linux is pre-alpha software, but farther along in development than I expected. The GTK-based Linux interface looks and works just like Windows interface. The browser rendered sites I tested it with just fine, and I haven’t been able to crash the it yet. Lots of features, such as bookmarks, the options window, and even the about window, are simply are not implemented yet.
The big missing feature currently is the tab bar. You can open a new tab just fine, but the tab bar is missing so there’s no way to switch between tabs. Like the Windows version, Chromium for Linux runs each tab in its own process. Tab crash detection seems to not be implemented yet as killing a tab process causes the page to just stop responding.
Chromium, even in this early state, feels much faster than Firefox. I compared the 280Slides presentation editor running in Firefox 3 and Chromium, and the difference was like night and day. Chromium scores very well in the SunSpider Javascript benchmark: 4.7 times faster than Firefox 3, and 2.9 times faster than Firefox 3.1 Beta 3.
Firefox 3.1 Beta 3
1914.6ms ± 6.2%

Firefox 3
3082.8ms ± 0.2%

Midori 0.1.4
1111.4ms ± 1.2%

Chromium
657.4ms ± 2.6%



The Ubuntu Chromium Daily Builds PPA makes installing Chromium in Ubuntu very easy to do. However, these packages are pre-alpha and completely untested, they may not work for you at all. Follow the directions on the PPA page to add the software repository. Install Chromium from the package chromium-browser (click the link to install), or by running the command below in your terminal:

sudo apt-get install chromium-browser

The repository should be updated daily with the latest Chromium code. I’ll definitely be following Chromium for Linux’s development from now on.

[via tombuntu.com]

In my previous post on installing Firefox 3.5 on Ubuntu 9.04, I explained how to install Ubuntu’s firefox-3.5 package. As several commenters and I realized, this may not be the best solution. The package is branded Shiretoko instead of Firefox 3.5, including the user agent string which can cause compatibly problems with some websites.
Manually downloading and installing Firefox from Mozilla every time there is a security update is not a great option either. Instead, let’s use Ubuntuzilla, a script that can install and update Mozilla applications outside of Ubuntu’s repository system.
Ubuntuzilla can integrate the new version of Firefox into your system as well as undo its changes if you want to go back. All your extensions, bookmarks, plugins, and settings should transfer over to the new version. The only thing that didn’t transfer was my open tabs from my previous session.

1. Visit the Ubuntuzilla download page to find the latest deb package appropriate for your system (32 or 64-bit). Download and install the package.
2. At this point you should completely close Firefox.
3. You’ll need to use a terminal to let Ubuntuzilla guide you through the installation. Run this command to start:
   

   ubuntuzilla.py -a install -p firefox

Ubuntuzilla will ask a few questions: confirming that it has found the correct version to install, choosing a localization (14 for en-US), confirming the localization, a sudo prompt, and a prompt for enabling automatic updating.
4. Near the end of the process you should see The new Firefox version 3.5 has been installed successfully.

You can now use your normal Firefox item in the menu to start Firefox 3.5, or by running the command firefox. Check out Ubuntuzilla’s website for the simple removal instructions as well as what do do when you are notified there is a Firefox update available.
[update] Mozilla has released Firefox 3.5.1. I followed the instructions on Ubuntuzilla’s page to update to this new version.
I’ve come across two bugs so far in Firefox 3.5: clicking the middle mouse button anywhere on a page tries to load a URL from the clipboard (fixed using workaround), and fullscreen Flash video crashes Firefox (waiting for a fix or better workaround).

[via tombuntu.com]

Firefox 3.5 (formerly known as 3.1) adds support for new web standards including audio and video tags and downloadable fonts, a private browsing mode, significantly improved JavaScript performance, and more.
Ubuntu will not be upgrading the default Firefox package to 3.5 until Ubuntu 9.10. However, the universe repository in Ubuntu 9.04 includes a special firefox-3.5 package. At the time of writing this package contains an old beta release. It should be updated soon, but here’s a workaround if you can’t wait any longer.
Update: I’m now recommending installing Firefox 3.5 using Ubuntuzilla rather than the methods described in this post.
Before you update, consider backing up your Firefox profile if you may want to go back to Firefox 3 after trying 3.5. Running the command below will backup your Firefox profile to firefox_profile_backup in your home directory. To restore from the backup, replace your.mozilla/firefox folder with the backup.

cp -r ~/.mozilla/firefox/ ~/firefox_profile_backup

Update: The firefox-3.5 package in Ubuntu 9.04 has now been updated, so it’s no longer necessary to use the Mozilla Security Team PPA.
Open the Synaptic package manager and select Settings->Repositories. Select the Third-Party Software tab and add the APT line for the Mozilla Security Team PPA, which has Firefox packages which are undergoing testing prior to wider release:

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mozilla-security/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main

Return to the main Synaptic window and click the Reload button to download the repository listings. Find the firefox-3.5 package and mark it for installation. Click Apply to install.
After Synaptic is done working, you can remove or disable the Mozilla Security Team PPA if you don’t want to get any more untested updates.
Unfortunately, this package is still branded as Shiretoko (the codename for this Firefox release). Start Firefox 3.5 from Applications->Internet->Shiretoko Web Browser.

[via tombuntu.com]

Those of you who use Google Toolbar on Firefox are probably pretty familiar with the many features Toolbar 5 (beta) has to offer — from bookmarks to buttons and search box to «send to.» We've added a couple more features to the Firefox Toolbar, so feel free to download this «second beta» to get all the latest and greatest Google Toolbar has to offer.

One of the features I'm really excited about is the new tab page. Now, when you open up a new tab, instead of the blank white page you see by default in Firefox, you will instead see small thumbnails of your favorite sites (up to 9), as well as recently-closed and bookmarked pages based on your browser history. You can edit the thumbnails, and all this data remains locally on your browser, which means none of the information about your most viewed sites or recently closed pages will be sent back to Google. If for whatever reason you don't like this updated new tab page, you can always change it back to a blank page or to the website of your choice through either your Toolbar or Firefox settings. Some tab extensions may conflict with this feature, and it currently isn't compatible with Firefox 2, so make sure you check your settings or visit the Google Toolbar help center if you are having any problems.



Next time you want to go to your favorite site more quickly or restore an accidentally closed tab, you don't need to type out the URL. Typing Ctrl + T or double-clicking to the right of your open tabs will open up the new tab page with all your favorite sites right at your finger tips.

In addition, this release now provides the ability for Hebrew- and Arabic-speaking users to access Toolbar 5 with robust right-to-left text support. We've also fixed some of the most reported bugs to give you a faster and more stable experience with this update.

Redmond (WA) – Microsoft's new Internet Explorer has looked rather underwhelming in the way it aligns itself with common web standards and how fast it can load web pages. But Microsoft has released a quiet surprise document that claims IE8 is much faster in real life than it is in benchmarks indicate – and will beat Google’s Chrome and Mozilla’s Firefox.

Benchmarks are only one side of the performance capability of hardware and software, as they tend to explore only specifics and are often skewed towards a certain set of features. That was especially the case with recent browser benchmarks — which are anyway a rather questionable way to measure browser performance, as the speed a browser loads web pages will be different for every user. But, we have to admit that the latest round of JavaScript benchmarks was fairly convincing — as it they were in line with subjective speed improvements demonstrated by Chrome and Firefox and left the subjectively slower IE8 Beta somewhat in the dust.

The guys over at Ars Technica have now discovered a document published by Microsoft that claims the opposite. According to Microsoft, IE8 will beat its rivals in real world performance in actual web page loading and not just JavaScripts. If Microsoft’s test is correct, then IE8 will load twelve of the 25 largest websites faster than Chrome or Firefox, while Chrome wins in nine and Firefox in four. The comparison, however, did not include Firefox 3.1 Beta, but rather the upcoming 3.05, which does not yet include the much faster TraceMonkey engine.

It is not only surprising that IE comes out on top in this test, but we also noticed that IE is fastest in loading the web pages of its rivals – google.com and mozilla.com – while Firefox leads in loading microsoft.com.

The report is available for download here.