Firefox Myth

[CrONoS]

[b]www.shoutwire.com/viewstory/5482/Firefox_Myths_Myths_Regarding_The_Firefox_Web_Brow ser[b]

Strange... I really feel Firefox as being faster to show webpages than Explorer... Maybe this text, it's just a crappy bash on FireFox..

p.s.: When the link included the [ URL ] Extension, it doesn't seem to work!

Performance Myths

Performance Fastest Web Browser

Myth - "Firefox is the Fastest Web Browser" - Example

Reality - Opera (now 100% free) is the fastest Graphical Web Browser in Windows. - Source

Internet Explorer Faster than Internet Explorer

Myth - "Firefox is Faster than Internet Explorer" - Example

Reality - Internet Explorer 6.x is clearly faster than Firefox 1.x overall and is significantly faster from a cold start. - Source

Notes - The argument that components of Internet Explorer may load during Windows Startup is nullified by Opera's start times. Which means there is no excuse for this except poor coding on Firefox's part.

Mozilla Faster than Mozilla

Myth - "Firefox is Faster than Mozilla" - Example

Reality - Ironically Mozilla is faster than Firefox 1.x overall. - Source

Notes - Considering Firefox is supposed to be the lighter, leaner version of the Mozilla suite, this is very surprising.
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Market Share Myths



Firefox Downloads Downloads

Myth - "Firefox Achieved 150 million downloads (2-2006)" - Example

Reality - "Oops. We recently introduced a bug into the counter and it's being fixed. We're not quite there yet. Sorry for the confusion. We accidentally counted the 20 million people who updated from Firefox 1.5 to Firefox 1.5.0.1 this week." - Source - Source 2

Market Share Market Share

Myth - "Firefox Achieved 10% Market Share in 2005" - Example

Reality - "According to WebSideStory, a San Diego-based Web analytics provider, Mozilla's Firefox closed 2005 with 8.9% of the browser market, while Microsoft's Internet Explorer wrapped up the year with 87.6%." - Source - Source 2

Market Share Market Share Europe

Myth - "Firefox Achieved 20% Market Share in Europe (1-2006)" - Example

Reality - "As good as those numbers are, they need to be taken with a grain of salt. XiTi performed its measurements on a weekend, which means it captured a disproportionate number of home users and comparatively few corporate desktops. Most large companies still use Internet Explorer, so using weekend surfing activities as a baseline for market share evaluations is going to miss out on a lot of IE use." - Source
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Security Myths



Insecure Security

Myth - "Firefox is Secure" - Example

Reality - Firefox is anything but Secure with multiple unpatched vulnerabilities allowing exposure of sensitive data to local users. You only need one vulnerability to be insecure. Since Firefox v1.x was released, users have been exposed to 72 security vulnerabilities and counting, 39 of which are rated as Highly Critical and 1 Extremely Critical. - Source

The Mozilla Foundation lists 64 "known" security vulnerabilities, 18 of which are rated as Critical and 13 High. - Source

"In the excitement that surrounded its launch last year, Firefox was unreasonably portrayed by some as having unbreakable security, but the vulnerabilities that have been detected in recent months are injecting a dose of reality into this myth, analysts say." - Source

Notes - The number of Secunia advisories does not equal the actual amount of vulnerabilities. Over ten advisories have multiple vulnerabilities, look carefully.

Opera Most Secure Web Browser

Myth - "Firefox is the Most Secure Web Browser" - Example

Reality - Opera is actually the most Secure Graphical Web Browser in Windows. - Source

OS_Security OS Integration Security

Myth - "Firefox is More Secure because it is not integrated into the OS" - Example

Reality - "The issue of not being part of the Operating System is an interesting one though that is frequently the subject of misunderstanding. IE is part of the Windows Operating System so that parts of the OS and other applications can rely on the functionality and APIs being present. IE in turn relies on Operating System functionality to do it's job. To be clear there are no Operating System APIs that IE uses that are not documented on MSDN as part of the platform SDK and available to other browsers and any other software that runs on Windows. The security of any browser is irrelevant to if it is part of the operating system. If we are to debate security of browsers then let's bring in relevant arguments and accurate details about different possible attacks rather than rely on the irrational fear that because IE is part of the operating system it must be exposing OS functionality to the web. This is not the case as any software has access to the same set of OS APIs and can therefore expose the same set of OS functionality as IE." - Source

ActiveX ActiveX

Myth - "Firefox is More Secure because it does not use ActiveX" - Example

Reality - "ActiveX gets a bad rap as the cause of all of Internet Explorer's security woes. But it's just not so. Old myths die hard! There's no doubt that Internet Explorer has more than it's fair share of security holes, but very few of them have to do with ActiveX. ActiveX controls are packages of code that can run in the context of the browser. They are installable through a link on a Web page. Exactly how different is this from having a link to an executable file that you have to explicitly run? Essentially not at all, except that the ActiveX version is more convenient. Even with Firefox you can download and run an executable file. Does this make Firefox unsafe? In fact, Mozilla and Firefox's support for XPCOM, a plain text and platform-independent software model, is very comparable to ActiveX once you get the user to click "Yes." The complaint against ActiveX has always centered around the ability to install native code from across the Internet, but this is less unusual than it seems, and ActiveX arguably makes things more secure. When you encounter an object tag referencing a control that you do not have installed, you then have the opportunity to install it. Under the default security settings, you will be warned before this happens and given an opportunity to approve or reject the installation." - Source

Extensions Extensions

Myth - "Firefox Extensions are Safe" - Example

Reality - Firefox Extensions can be very unsafe. A vulnerability in older versions of the Greasemonkey Extension can be exploited by malicious people to disclose sensitive information. - Source

Spyware Solution to Spyware

Myth - "Firefox is a Solution to Spyware" - Example

Reality - This is very misleading and can lull users into a false sense of security. Use the free Secure XP Guide to properly secure your system and get a REAL solution to Spyware. Firefox is nothing more than a Web Browser. Installing Firefox does not clean your system of existing Spyware infections or prevent you from manually installing anything in the future, including Spyware. These can come from Downloads, Email Attachments, File Sharing and by other means. You can still easily get infected with Spyware using Firefox as this exploit demonstrates. - Source

Notes - Internet Explorer with Windows XP Service Pack 2 installed provide the same level of Spyware security as Firefox. SP2 includes a built-in Pop-up blocker, a Download installation warning system and removes MSJVM from the system. This eliminates all the known security exploits some Spyware applications used to auto install themselves. Anyone who claims Internet Explorer cannot be secured from Auto-installing Spyware either doesn't know how or is lying.
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Feature Myths

BugZilla Bugs

Myth - "Firefox is Bug Free" - Example

Reality - Firefox is like any other software application and has plenty of bugs and problems. - Source

BugZilla Memory Leak

Myth - "Firefox's Memory Leak is a Bug" - Example

Reality - The Firefox Memory Leak is not a bug. It's a Feature! The "Feature" is how the pages are cached in a tabbed environment.

"To improve performance when navigating (studies show that 39% of all page navigations are renavigations to pages visited less than 10 pages ago, usually using the back button), Firefox 1.5 implements a Back-Forward cache that retains the rendered document for the last five session history entries for each tab. This is a lot of data. If you have a lot of tabs, Firefox's memory usage can climb dramatically. It's a trade-off. What you get out of it is faster performance as you navigate the web." - Source

Notes - Opera is able to do the same thing without consuming anywhere near as much memory.

Extensions Extensions

Myth - "Firefox supports Extensions and Internet Explorer does not" - Example

Reality - Internet Explorer has supported extensions since Internet Explorer 5. - Source

Integrated_Search Integrated Search

Myth - "Firefox was the first Web Browser to include an Integrated Search feature" - Example

Reality - Opera was the first browser to include an Integrated Search feature in Opera 5 in 2000, via a field in the browser interface. - Source

Innovative (Definition) - "The act of introducing something new."

Pop-up Blocking Pop-up Blocking

Myth - "Firefox was the first Web Browser to include Pop-up Blocking" - Example

Reality - Opera was the first browser to include Pop-up Blocking in Opera 5 in 2000, known as "allow pages to open new windows". - Source

Innovative (Definition) - "The act of introducing something new."

Pop-up Blocking Pop-up Blocking All

Myth - "Firefox Blocks all Pop-ups" - Example

Reality - Firefox does not Block all Pop-ups. PopupTest shows the "Drop down Popup" and the "Sticky Popup" are not blocked. Other types of Pop-ups continue to get through. - Source

RSS RSS

Myth - "The Firefox RSS icon was stolen by Microsoft for IE7" - Example

Reality - "I'm excited to announce that we're adopting the icon used in Firefox. John Lilly and Chris Beard from Mozilla were very enthusiastic about allowing us (and anyone in the community) to use their icon. This isn't the first time that we've worked with the Mozilla team to exchange ideas and encourage consistency between browsers, and we're sure it won't be the last.." - Source

Tabbed Browsing Tabbed Browsing

Myth - "Firefox was the first Web Browser to include Tabbed Browsing" - Example

Reality - Tabbed Browsing has been around a long time. Netcaptor offered Tab Browsing back in 1997. Opera developed it back in 1995 and added it in Opera 4 in 2000. Other Popular Browsers such as Avant Browser and Maxthon also had these features way before Firefox officially arrived in 2004. - Source

Innovative (Definition) - "The act of introducing something new."

MSN Toolbar Tabbed Browsing IE

Myth - "Firefox supports Tabbed Browsing and Internet Explorer does not" - Example

Reality - Internet Explorer 6 supports Tabbed Browsing when used with the MSN Toolbar extension in Windows XP. - Source
MSN Toolbar

Notes - Internet Explorer 7 will include Tabbed Browsing by default. - Source

W3C Standards W3C Standards

Myth - "Firefox fully supports W3C Standards - Example

Reality - Firefox has incomplete support of many W3C standards including HTML 4.01 and XHTML 1.1. - Source

Update - The link here has changed so you get a non-biased view of the Source. The owner of this Source had tried to redirect visitors coming from this site to specially created warning pages.

Warning - When viewing his website in Internet Explorer you will receive deceptive warnings saying: "Warning: There is a problem with your web browser" which links to his "IE is Dangerous" propaganda page. This is an attempt to use scare tactics to try and get people to use an alternate web browser. Please do not fall for these. He is also well aware some of his web pages break in Internet Explorer but deliberately refuses to fix them out of clear bias: "Do I dislike Internet Explorer? Yes. Do I wish Internet Explorer would just go away? Yes." - David Hammond. It should be noted these guides here will always attempt to work with all web browsers and never resort to these dishonest tactics.

Notes - Internet Explorer has very good support (83%) for the most important web standard, HTML 4.01. In most educational systems an 83% would equal a "B" grade and without HTML the World Wide Web would not exist as we know it. - Source

W3C Standards W3C Standards Development

Myth - "The W3C Develops Recommendations not Standards." - Example

Reality - "W3C Develops Web Standards and Guidelines. W3C primarily pursues its mission through the creation of Web standards and guidelines. Since 1994, W3C has published more than ninety such standards, called W3C Recommendations." - Source

W3C Standards W3C Standards define a Webpage

Myth - "A Site that doesn't conform to W3C Standards is not a Webpage"

Reality - W3C Standards have nothing to do with the definition of what a Webpage is.

Webpage (Definition) - "A document on the World Wide Web, consisting of an HTML file and any related files for scripts and graphics, and often hyperlinked to other documents on the Web." - Source

Acid2 Acid 2 Browser Test

Myth - "Firefox fully supports the most important W3C Standards" - Example

Reality - The Acid 2 Browser Test is a test page, written to help browser vendors ensure proper support for web standards in their products. Although the Acid2 Browser Test does not test every web standard, it tests the features considered most important for the future of the web. This test clearly shows Firefox does not fully support the most important web standards. - Source

Firefox v1.5 Acid2 Browser Test Results:

Firefox Acid2

Notes - Opera v9 offers the best Acid2 Browser Test Results in Windows:

Opera Acid2

Web Page Rendering Web Page Rendering

Myth - "Firefox is completely compatible with every Web Site" - Example

Reality - 10-15% of web sites aren't completely compatible with Firefox. Firefox is not 100% Internet Explorer and ActiveX compatible. Web sites that depend on ActiveX or were only tested in Internet Explorer (which there are many) will only render and work properly in Internet Explorer based browsers. Web site features such as Menus, Web forms or other content may not function or behave differently then intended. While Internet Explorer is completely compatible with 99.99% of all Web Sites. - Source

In a recent study by a UK based web testing firm SciVisum, 1 in 10 UK web sites failed to work properly with Firefox. - Source

Notes - Opera has the same problems as Firefox in regard to web site compatibility.

Web Page Rendering Web Page Rendering Differences

Myth - "Firefox supports Progressive Rendering and Internet Explorer does not" - Example

Reality - "Actually this is not true and you can see from going to many pages that Internet Explorer does support progressive rendering of content as it arrives. This is true however for table rendering. When Internet Explorer encounters a table it measures all the content of the table before rendering so that it knows what the widths of the columns are to render the content correctly. On the other hand Firefox uses a different algorithm in that it renders the table contents progressively before it has all been passed. There are pros and cons to both approaches. In the case of progressive rendering a table it can result in an experience where content is initially displayed and then moved as the browser progresses creating a clunky and poor quality feel. On the other hand if we parse the entire table content first then it can take some time to display in the case of heavily nested tables. I've heard user feedback supporting both arguments and more than a few people have mentioned that they find Firefox's rendering a little off putting in this regard." - Source
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Myth Origins

These Myths originated from various sources on the World Wide Web in news articles, Blogs, forums and on various other pages. The World Wide Web is a very large place with millions of pages and forums. What is known in one corner, may never be heard in another. So readers of this page may have only heard of one, many or even none of these Myths. It all depends on where you go and what you read. It is quite possible for many more Firefox Myths to exist out there that are unknown to this page. As they are discovered, they will be added and debunked with Facts and Sources as the rest have been here. Making the argument that no knowledgeable individual would say these things is obvious. Myths are not created by knowledgeable individuals. It is the lack of knowledge in the first place that leads to their creation. Simply using a search engine to find the origins of all of the Myths presented here will lead to inconclusive results since a search engine was never used in this manner by this author. Search engines rely on exact wording and having the ability to search all known sources. The Myths presented here are not always worded exactly the same way and not all sites allow search engines to crawl them. The reasoning for not linking to the origins is simple, I will not unleash the full wrath of the Firefox fanboys on anyone - I am human. However I have added some search engine located examples as additional proof. Keep in mind these are the not the "origins" but a simple demonstration that these Myths do exist.
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Disputes

The eye-opening nature of this page has caused some controversy. When some people are presented with facts that go against their established beliefs their first reaction is to blindly react rather than calmly think. This has caused a few rather amateurish and rash "rebuttals" to this page. In each and every case they are merely filled with opinions, rhetoric and conjecture. All have been thoroughly and easily refuted with the facts and sources presented here. I have noticed most to be by Macintosh, Linux and Anti-Microsoft advocates, not surprisingly. Yet this page is clearly about Myths relating to Firefox running on Windows. Some even openly admit to being unable to stop something as elementary as Malware infection when using Internet Explorer - hardly reputable sources to dispute anything! Regardless don't be manipulated by excuses and rhetoric, demand the facts and sources. Always ask for irrefutable proof. Any testing needs to be fully documented and reproducible. The shortcomings of other browsers does not excuse the shortcomings of Firefox and the spread of misinformation about it. The sources speak for themselves and the facts are irrefutable, use them.

Update - A small group of Firefox fanboys have been unsuccessful in refuting any of the factual evidence presented on this page and have thus turned to personal attacks against myself, which include lies, slander and unfounded accusations. This sort of behavior is not only unprofessional but immature. Apparently the closer you get to the truth the more desperate some become.
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End

This page will be revised as new Myths are confirmed and added. Feel free to submit suggestions or comments to OptimizeXP@comcast.net

Make sure to check out these guides before opining.
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Many have asked what I recommend and use. I recommend and use Avant Browser, the best of all worlds.

AvantBrowser Avant Browser - Download - Home Page
A custom Internet Explorer based browser that utilizes the Internet Explorer Engine for 99.99% web site compatibility and features all the new features of Firefox and Opera. It has a Built-in Pop-up Blocker, Flash Animation Filter, Tabbed Browsing, Built-in Search Engine, Built-in RSS/ATOM Reader, Safe Recovery Feature, User Friendly Interface and Full 100% IE Compatibility. Editor's Pick

[reds4ever]

Firefox has lost my boomarks on at least 5 occasions on 2 different computers. I know I can back them up, but I shouldn't have to....

[Asher]

Originally posted by reds4ever
Firefox has lost my boomarks on at least 5 occasions on 2 different computers. I know I can back them up, but I shouldn't have to....

There's a completely new bookmark/history/storage engine coming in Firefox2 called "Places", based on a database called SQLite. It's faster and more flexible.

[Snotty]

Firefox seems to take longer to load initially, but lets me change to the pages i want a lot faster without annoyingly changing where my text cursor is, or chopping me off halfway through writing in the address bar on start up

[Asher]

The article strikes me as written by somebody who doesn't really know what he's talking about.

Opera is certainly very fast. So is IE6. So is Firefox.

There's a difference though with speed perception, Firefox renders pages in a different method than IE that displays more of the content faster. So while it may take slightly longer to render some content than IE, it's not detected by the user because the initial screen is filled up faster usually.

I'm not sure what the point of the article is at all, to be honest. Opera has a quirky UI most people hate (to their credit, they are slowly copying Firefox to a more reasonable default UI), and IE has so much marketshare that it is being targeted.

A lot of people don't know that Firefox does have more security vulnerabilities being discovered and fixed than IE. This is true. Part of the reason is it's open source, so it's easier to identify exploit points. Part of the reason is it's newer code that for many years virtually anyone could check in to the tree without any peer reviews or security overviews. Those are both inherent dangers of Open Source.

A while ago, Mozilla locked down the code, and now if you're going to commit code to Mozilla it needs to be reviewed by the "owner" of that component, an then "superreviewed" by one of a handful of people who know the code inside and out.

Firefox is simply a safer browser than IE because of its marketshare, not because of its design. Same reason MacOS X and Linux is safer than Windows. If you look at the vulnerability counts of MacOS X and Linux, they're also very high. They're just not being exploited.

What it all comes down to is you should use what you like. I really don't like Opera, IE is too oftenly exploited and until recently didn't have tabs. IE7 is a huge jump forward.

[Asher]

A lot of the "points" made are just, frankly, retarded:

The Acid 2 Browser Test is a test page, written to help browser vendors ensure proper support for web standards in their products. Although the Acid2 Browser Test does not test every web standard, it tests the features considered most important for the future of the web.

The Acid2 test doesn't test "features most important for the future of the web", it is mostly an obscure set of use cases for standards that are actually not likely to be used at all.

Internet Explorer has very good support (83%) for the most important web standard, HTML 4.01. In most educational systems an 83% would equal a "B" grade and without HTML the World Wide Web would not exist as we know it.

/me dies.

The author is an Avant-browser advocate which uses the IE6 engine.

[Sava]

@ article

the only complaint I have with firefox is the bookmarks thing

and one of the two times it happened to me, it was stupid what happened... the whole profiles thing in FF was to blame... I was following instructions on their forums to fix something, and it deleted my bookmarks

[Apocalypse]

I'm happy with my switch to Opera...it's been faster than Firefox. It's been far faster with window's media and quicktime streaming.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Apocalypse
It's been far faster with window's media and quicktime streaming.

......

that is something completely independent of the browser. Plugins handle those.

This is an example of psychological bias.

[Apocalypse]

Well I mean while it is loading Firefox pretty much just hangs while I can still do things in Opera.

[Shi Huangdi]

I'm not a security professional or anything like that, but it's been my experience and several of my friend's experience that people who have difficulties with spyware and browser hijacks when they were using IE stopped encountering these problems when they switched to Firefox. I don't know of a single person who has seen a serious malware infection after they switched to Firefox. Devestating infections happen all the time to IE users. I know part of it is probably due to Firefox having smarter users, but I don't think it's a coincidence that IE users have 21 times more spyware on average then Firefox users.

[CrONoS]

@Shi

From Asher:
Firefox is simply a safer browser than IE because of its marketshare, not because of its design. Same reason MacOS X and Linux is safer than Windows. If you look at the vulnerability counts of MacOS X and Linux, they're also very high. They're just not being exploited.

[Sava]

I have no desire or need to try Opera.

My FF is fast. Everything loads instantly. I don't see how Opera could be any faster. Those extra millaseconds, well, I don't care. It's not worth the bother of downloading and installing a new browser.

Firefox

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Asher
* Asher dies.

Please don't

Besides that I agree that it's a pile of crap.

Myth - "Firefox fully supports W3C Standards - Example

Reality - Firefox has incomplete support of many W3C standards including HTML 4.01 and XHTML 1.1. - Source

Update - The link here has changed so you get a non-biased view of the Source. The owner of this Source had tried to redirect visitors coming from this site to specially created warning pages.

Warning - When viewing his website in Internet Explorer you will receive deceptive warnings saying: "Warning: There is a problem with your web browser" which links to his "IE is Dangerous" propaganda page. This is an attempt to use scare tactics to try and get people to use an alternate web browser. Please do not fall for these. He is also well aware some of his web pages break in Internet Explorer but deliberately refuses to fix them out of clear bias: "Do I dislike Internet Explorer? Yes. Do I wish Internet Explorer would just go away? Yes." - David Hammond. It should be noted these guides here will always attempt to work with all web browsers and never resort to these dishonest tactics.

Notes - Internet Explorer has very good support (83%) for the most important web standard, HTML 4.01. In most educational systems an 83% would equal a "B" grade and without HTML the World Wide Web would not exist as we know it. - Source

This is pure BS. The real problem is that a lot of pages doesn't work in firefox because they are written to support IE and not following W3C standards.

[Shi Huangdi]

Cronos:

Most of what I have read in opinion pieces written by technical people about the browser suggest that Firefox is safer by design as well as by marketshare, largely due to ActiveX and the fact that IE and Windows are closely tied together.

But to me, I really don't give a **** if Firefox is safer because of marketshare or because of design. The fact is that is a lot safer to use and that's all I care about.