Hands-on: Firefox for Android may become your favorite mobile browser
arstechnica.com
arstechnica.com
- Is it possible to zoom to a readable level without pinch-to-zoom (double tap is more of a mini-zoom)?
- The text size settings seem to not have any effect, I even hard-restared the app, yet the font size seems the same?
- When zooming with pinch, the text doesn't adapt to the new zoom level, so it's either unreadable text due to the size or unreadable text due to having to scroll for every word.
I have a feeling I'm really terrible at using this app, but so far I haven't discovered anything in the menus that would help me.
Chrome is downright unusable on the Ray compared to the stock (don't know if it's the low memory of the Ray or just the "beta" status of Chrome), so I'm still left wandering around for better choices, was hoping this would be it as FF is my browser of choice on the desktop. So far, not looking good :).
This means that when you double-tap on some text, it should zoom to the width of the text and that text should already be at a readable size. The "text size" preference determines how much the text is enlarged. It may not work on some pages because we use lots of heuristics to determine whether reformatting text will break the layout, and we are still working on tuning those heuristics.
All 4 sites load what seems like 10 times faster than the stock, so the thing definitely flies in terms of loading. Based on that I'd switch in a heartbeat, but the zooming kills it. Do you think there will be any options for word wrap and the like in the future? Though I realise I might be in an extreme minority, as the Ray has an hdpi resolution screen despite it being only 3.3 inches, which amplifies the issue.
firefox will refuse to adjust text size. and trying to zoom will click all links under my fingers... just too weird
loving the recent firefoxes, although aurora seems to crsh a bit for me-- by far the best mobile browser now IMO. The tab selection could be better in landscape though; 80% of the width is unused. Idea: press tab button and move finger l/r to 'scroll' through tab selections (select on release)? Also i wish there was a refresh button in the same spot as 'stop'.
Besides that, changing a tab is at least a 2-tap process. The Chrome browser allows tab switching by swiping the edge of the screen; Dolphin HD allows tab switching by pressing the volume buttons; even the default browser allows faster tab switching than firefox as the navigation bar can be accessed by pivoting on the edge of the screen (not on by default).
I use firefox on the desktop, and I'd love to use it as my default browser on android as well. For now, I'm using Chrome. Works well enough for me.
My initial reaction is that its its incredibly smooth and responsive - something I have found lacking from other browsers
The stock browser is reliable, but it tends to render pages weirdly and sometimes UI elements can become counter intuitive - probably because most web developers aren't targeting it
And the latest update for the Beta Version of Chrome is completely unusable on the prime, it was crashing not more than 5 minutes into every browser session
This is pretty nice so far, and I'll continue to use it until I find a good reason not to.
What Android device are you using? Is only the & symbol affected?
Are you using Android's default virtual keyboard or a third-party virtual keyboards? Every third-party keyboard has its own unique "quirks", so working around them is like playing Whack-A-Mole. :)
That is a strange problem. I'm not sure why SHIFT+7 would be treated any differently than SHIFT+6 or SHIFT+8. Part of the challenge of Android development is getting a hold of all the devices that need to be tested. :)
Sorry! <:)
Note that Opera has little sluggishness on the same phone, even with a bunch of tabs open.
Unfortunately being pre-Beta means it's buggy and I encountered some issues in the first minutes of usage, but I can't wait for it to get to the final release.
Chrome can't compete on phones it doesn't run on.