For the 47 percent or so of you guys who come here via Firefox, take five minutes to upgrade to Firefox 2.0. Most of the improvements fly under my radar but the built-in spellchecker has the potential to seriously upgrade my web browsing experience. It seems to work like MS Word minus the grammar tool, underlining offending words but sadly leaving homonyms and tortured syntax intact. No doubt that will show up as a module any day now.
Maybe this doesn’t bother most people, but for a borderline pedant like me a minor error can derail the thread of an otherwise insightful comment or post. There is even a neurobiological basis for that, which will form part of a much larger series of posts that I will put up whenever I get around to finishing them.
Consider this a public service announcement. Chat about whatever.
SomeCallMeTim
I second Tim on the coolness of spell-checker. Now, if only Google can seriously upgrade Documents & Spreadsheets, we will be able to start forward towards the Glorious Tomorrow.
Ned Raggett
Upgraded the other day; it’s a blast. If you’ve not already, grab and activate AdBlock, then download Greasemonkey, then go nuts with the various scripts on offer. Instant improving of the web experience. (My favorite two for Myspace, here and here, turn the whole site into something actually manageable.)
The Other Steve
It’s nice that Firefox took some usability cues from IE7.
I generally think spell checkers create lazy people. I spell very well without help. My problem is using the wrong word. there instead of their, etc. which spellcheckers don’t catch.
Punchy
Uh, I’d never thought I’d say this…but 5 posts before noon? I got threads coming on me faster than Rush on a Dominican. No wonder I get so little done.
tBone
What? Firefox 2.0 does stupid things like hiding the standard menu bar by default? :)
Lee
Us Opera users never get any love :(
craigie
As you wish, I have cmposed this in firefox2.0. Hey look! I misspelled something! Good to know.
BabyJane
Ill uhpdayt afta th bugs ar wurkd owt. Besids, th lak of a spellcheckr reely haznt ben a problum fer me.
Ned Raggett
The DownThemAll extension looks extremely handy as well, just had it recommended to me.
jcricket
In the vein of the Jesus-Party’s support of torture, I bring you a modern reworking of that classic hymnal “Jesus loves the little children”, for today’s Republican to sign to their children when they tuck them in at night:
over it
I downloaded Firefox 2.0 2 days ago.
I lost my bookmarks. Lost all of my settings. Lost the envelope icon in that bar up top the screen that lets me check my email. Lost use of 3/4 or more of the extensions I use.
I freely admit that I am a computer ignoramoose…so, I am sure that there was some way to fix some of the problems. I, however, have not the know-how.
I finally tracked down a copy of 1.5.0.7 (which was actually harder than I thought it would be)…and reloaded it. All is now back to normal. I was in quite the panic though. ;)
I have upgraded Firefox several times since I started using it 2-3 years ago…..this was, hands down, my worst experience (in fact, my ONLY negative experience with Firefox).
I love Firefox, and I am sure that I will eventually switch up to 2.0…..but, I am going to wait until the bugs are worked out and the extensions are upgraded for compatability.
IE is Satan incarnate.
manyoso
Tim F, how many are using Konqueror or Safari?
Ryan S.
Consider this a public service anouncement.
On the browser thing, I recently bought a Sandisk Cruizer Micro 2Gb thumbdrive. It is by far the best 40 bucks I’ve spent in a long time.
It comes with something called a U3 Launchpad, which you can download programs like firefox and thunderbird to for free, theres also a whole lot of other programs available. Firefox 2 isn’t available yet but I hope it will.
Its basically like a portable desktop.
Gold Star for Robot Boy
Firefox 2.0 looks cool, but be warned that not all extensions will work after the upgrade. Firefusk, for one.
Tim F.
manyoso,
Konqueror doesn’t even register, and the two versions of Safari clock in at a combined 8%.
jcricket
over-it – I’d say wait more than a day after FF 2.0 is out. The extension writers will re-write extensions for compatibility soon enough. And if there are indeed bugs that make you lose bookmarks and setting, those will get fixed. I upgraded from 1.5.0.7 to 2.0 at Release Candidate 2 and haven’t had those same issues. Perhaps there’s something under the Tools Menu inside “Options” that can restore your missing icons and what-not?
Retief
I thought consistent spelling was the hobgoblin of little mints؟
DecidedFenceSitter
Yeah, far more technically competent friends have warned me off Firefox 2.0 for the time being. Frequent crashes, bad lag, memory hogs.
*cuddles with his happy 1.5*
ThymeZone
I break my self-imposed vow of digital silence for this bulletin.
Vote for waterboarding, or die.
les
Thanks Tim. FF 2.0 installed fine, kept my old crap, and for those of us among the un-nimble fingered, spell check rocks.
Ned Raggett
Yeah, far more technically competent friends have warned me off Firefox 2.0 for the time being. Frequent crashes, bad lag, memory hogs.
Honestly haven’t had a single problem with it for two days now. Am running the most recent Mac OS, FWIW.
rachel
Lee,
Does Opera have a spellchecker?
Lee
rachel, Yes.
At least from the Menu under ‘Edit’ there is ‘Check Spelling’. It is running me thru the set up of it now (never used it before :)
rachel
Lee,
Thanks. I was looking under the “tools” menu. I don’t generally feel I need spellcheckers, but sometimes they come in handy.