If You’re Not, You Should Be–Browsers

The format is going to be a little different this week. It’s no secret that there are plenty of browser options out there. If you’ve never done so, it’s definitely worthwhile to compare you options and choose the one that’s best for you. Personally, I’ve been using Firefox for years. In addition to allowing a myriad of extensions to be added to expand the capabilities of the browser, it was also the first to allow users to sync their history, passwords, open pages, and preferences across multiple computers, meaning you could easily keep your home, work, laptop, and smartphone all linked.

One area where Firefox did stumble was in its mobile version. The browser worked, but suffered from being bloated and overly slow on most handsets. The release of Chrome for Android is what really sparked this post. The beta version came out a couple months ago and was easily the best mobile browser available on any OS. Like Firefox, it also allows users to sync all of their Chrome installations, but this presented a problem for me. To get the most out of my browsers, I needed to be using the same one across all of my computing environments. Using Firefox on my desktops and Chrome on my phone negated one of the key features of both browsers. As a result, I began a three week experiment, exclusively using each browser across all platforms for a week. I began with a week on Chrome, then back on Firefox, and finally, just to be thorough, a week with Internet Explorer.

My week with Chrome started off a little rough. Rather than using Adobe Reader, Chrome renders pdf files natively. As a result, the very first pdf I tried to use refused to open. This is the only time throughout the week that I ran into this problem, but it was still not a good way to start. After that, my issues were mostly just a matter of re-thinking the way I do things. I was used to opening the browser on the home page as opposed to the first pinned tab. Pocket (formerly Read It Later) is one of my most used services and its implementation is not quite as elegant in Chrome. Both of those were fairly easily overcome. My biggest issue is one that could not be corrected – there’s no option to run a download without first saving it somewhere. This feature has long been built into Internet Explorer, but is not native to either Firefox or Chrome. With Firefox, the extension OpenDownload² can be used to add the option, but no such extension exists for Chrome. Considering how useful this is, I don’t understand why it isn’t a universal feature.

I appreciated the added speed within Chrome, as well as many of the add-ons. The Task List, the Google+ +1 and Notifications, Pin to Pinterest Right Click, and Mighty Text are all great. The new tab page allows for apps and sites to be pinned for easy access, or you can pin them to your task bar. Finally, it’s helpful that the Incognito mode allows you to keep the standard session open simultaneously.

Going back to Firefox I found that I missed much more about Chrome than I felt I gained by returning to the Fox. The “Run” button on downloads was great, as was the fact that when one tab is already locked to one side of the screen pulling out a second tab automatically resizes it to the opposite side of the screen. On the other hand, I was frustrated when it would slow down, I missed being able to specify search engines from the address bar without using the mouse, and I missed those extra extensions.

Just to be fair, I also did a week in Internet Explorer, with some time in Safari as well. The two are essentially interchangeable at this point so I’ll focus on IE. The last time I’d seriously used IE was back with IE 6. In the time since, the browser has finally evolved to the point where it is a solid product, able to keep up with the basic features of its competitors. Like Chrome, it allows you to pin some sites to the task bar for quick access, and its “Accelerators” can be helpful for quickly conducting searches from various engines with the right click. Beyond that, though, IE (and Safari) are very bare bones. They get the job done nicely, but that’s about all. If you spend any moderate amount of time online, they are not going to be the best choice for you.

So what did I settle on? As is probably obvious from the above, I’ve switched over to Chrome as my default browser on all devices, and it’s the one I’d recommend for everyone else as well. It easily syncs to all of you devices, offers lots of add ons if you’d like to do that, it’s fast and easy to use. On both Android and iOS it is easily the best browser. (It should be noted that on iOS, due to Apple’s refusal to allow for any browser engine but their own, you don’t get true Chrome, merely a Chrome skin over the stock browser, but you do get the sync and improved usability that Chrome offers). Regardless what program you currently use to access the internet, it’s definitely worth your time to download a couple alternatives and try them out for a few days. You may be surprised what you were missing out on.