Web News and Internet Information
Over the last 72 hours you may have heard numerous victory cries from long suffering web designers & developers. At the end of January, Google joined the long growing list of companies ceasing support for older browsers such as IE6 by officially announced that they were phasing out their support of the browser, Read more…
New statistics from NetApps show that Google’s Chrome web browser has climbed above 5% market share in January, to move ahead of Apple’s Safari web browser. Firefox has remained stable around 25% market share, while Internet Explorer 8 continues above 62%, gaining a slight increase due to the recent popularity of Microsoft’s new flagship OS, Windows 7 giving users a reason to upgrade from Windows XP. Read more…
For the majority of people who are concerned with proper browser functionality and of course security, Internet Explorer would certainly not be a preferred browser choice. For many web designers Internet Explorer remains a headache that must be catered for because of the large number of users out there who refuse to switch or are unable to upgrade from long outdated versions such as IE6, which have many problems with modern HTML/CSS code.
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Mozilla has released a critical update patch for Firefox 3.5.x today.
“We strongly recommend that all Firefox users upgrade to this latest release,” Mozilla said in a blog posting about the security issue.
The first vulnerability could let an attacker run arbitrary code on a person’s computer by sending specially crafted authentication information called certificate.
The second vulnerability, disclosed last week, involves a flaw in certificate authentication technology that could potentially let an attacker gain access to encrypted information or issue a bogus update to Firefox.
HTML5 is the next major revision of “hypertext markup language” specification – the core markup language of the world wide web. The specification of HTML5 is ongoing and expected to continue for many years, however parts of HTML5 will be finished and implemented in browsers well before HTML5 reaches final recommendation status.
SmashingMagazine.com have put together handy little primer for web designers and developers looking to stay ahead of the curve. Interesting reading as there is already quite a bit to get a jumpstart on for the future. From new structural element and tags, to extended API’s opening up huge possibilities for web applications with application cache and offline data storage.
Google is making extensive use of HTML5 features with their online collaboration software Wave, while Apple’s latest Safari browser has also implemented several HTML5 features. Apple has also been busy on the iPhone side of things, taking advantage of HTML5′s application caching features and database support to speed up the end user experience with iPhone OS3.
Firefox is constantly evolving, and for that reason it has fast become one of the web’s most favoured browsers – now estimated to account for over 22% of the total market share for browsers.
Version 3.5 has been released for little under a week and already there are some extensive guides up for tweaking every last drop of performance out of it.
Here at AUSWEB we’re all about performance! Whether you’re a first-time user or a FireFox veteran, this comprehensive guide will give you detailed descriptions of all the major tips, tricks and tweaks for speeding up your FireFox. Take a look over at Tweakguide.com
After being in release candidate stage for several months now, the latest release version 3.5 of Firefox is finally available. Promising a host of improvements to speed and usability. Here’s a full list of what’s new in text or video rundowns to checkout while you download!
Also worth a mention Mozilla Labs have also released the latest version of Weave which requires version 3.5. Weave is handy service which allows you to securely encrypt and synchronise bookmarks and personal info across multiple browsers, allowing for automatic syncing your of Firefox at home and work or wherever.
With plans to support automated website logins, pretty handy! The new release includes automatic logins and OpenID support (for supported sites), and can sync your browser preferences across systems which is a big advantage over cross-browser solutions like Xmarks.
The 404 Not Found error page is probably the most common error most web users will come across. Most designers and webmasters however, often choose to leave the default settings for these error pages, resulting in the generic unimaginative 404 Not Found error text we’ve all seen many times.
These basic error pages are automatically served up by the web server. However, if you prefer you can create and edit custom error pages from your cPanel. Once logged in you will see the option for “Error Pages”, which will let you easily manage and edit all your available error pages.
There are many roads to take, from the stylistic approach, matching the aesthetics of your site’s design, the informative, with custom search or suggestion options for where the visitor should be looking or even taking the humorous route with custom images, it’s all up to your imagination. The folks over at CSS-Tricks have compiled a handy guide with several ideas and tips for adding a little extra flair on your site, head on over to their 404 Best Practices post for some ideas!
Miscrosoft’s new search engine Bing has generated another successive week of healthy buzz, with usage in Australia leading the way. The numbers creating all the buzz come from online metrics firm ComScore.
According to ComScore “Bing continued to increase its position” throughout the week of June 8 with usage interest mainly coming from Australia, with India and China not far behind.
It does look like the service has successfully passed the tentative launch stage and decent numbers of users are giving it a try. Good news for Microsoft you might say as the search market (ie. Google), has been one of the bigger mistakes made by the boys at Redmond.
Only time will tell and of course the quality of Bing’s search algorithm, if search leader Google should be worrying about any market shifts out there. As always though, extra competition is always a good thing and testing the variety of a few search results on both services might lead to some interesting results! Give it a try here: Bing
With Apple’s latest WWDC developer conference event held earlier this week, most of their announcements were of course overshadowed by news of the latest iPhone 3GS. Amidst some other major announcements such as Mac OSX SnowLeopard, and some shiny new MacBook Pro’s, Apple also released the latest version of their Safari web browser. Bringing it up to version 4, along with the status of “the fastest browser in the world”.
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