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12 June 2007

Safari, No Good I haven't been much of an Apple enthusiast. In fact, it was my lack of experience working with Macs that made me extra-curious about the Beta test of Safari for Windows. [More:]I was wondering if it might give me a little more insight to the whole "Apple Experience" and how it differs from the "Windows Condition". So I downloaded. I installed. I clicked it on. And, well, it certainly does look different.
≡ Click to see image ≡there is no text. Now that really IS a different way to experience the Web, but not necessarily one I'm eager to experience. A little Googling and I see I'm not the only one with this particular glitch, but no one has reported a fix yet. After some random clicking within the Safari window, I ended up at Google, where the text was visible, but was certainly not in the same fonts as in Firefox.
≡ Click to see image ≡ ≡ Click to see image ≡ No wonder no text showed up on Apple's homepage. I don't have the font from the titles to "The Partridge Family"...
posted by wendell 12 June | 04:05
I don't even like Safari on the Mac. I think Firefox is better on both platforms.
posted by grouse 12 June | 04:36
Yep, I've heard a few tails from Windows users that Safari is just not working (at all|well). Makes you wonder why Apple released it when it was in such poor shape.
posted by TheDonF 12 June | 04:38
It's working perfectly for me so far. Fonts looks different from what I see on Firefox, but that's a well-known Mac/Safari thing and I have the same issue on my iBook. Some people like it.

After a few open/quit cycles, Safari pops up very quickly on my PC. Pages load quickly, but not quickly enough to make Firefox look slow.

I'll stick with FF (on PC and OS X) because I'm used to all the keyboard shortcuts, search bar choices and various add-ons. Though I really like the clean, favicon-free look of the Safari bookmark toolbar.
posted by mullacc 12 June | 05:44
i was actually excited about this, so i switched my dual-boot over to windows xp, downloaded safari, installed it, played around with it for a few minutes, said "meh" and uninstalled it. it worked fine, no glitches or anything, but i just didn't care for it. i like firefox better.

i do like the idea of there being another alternative to internet exploder exploiter explorer, but in order for apple to really grab a significant chunk of the "browser market share" (whatever that's worth - market share doesn't really mean shit when you're talking about a free download to begin with), they really should have rolled out a windows port of safari a couple of years ago, especially around the time that all of the security problems with ie6 were being discovered. their timing stinks.
posted by syntax 12 June | 07:49
I'm sure the safari/windows rollout is designed to boost iphone sales somehow.
posted by craniac 12 June | 07:55
echoing grouse; i got a mac over a year ago and i use firefox or a combo of firefox and opera for pretty much everything. safari seemed limited and somewhat crippled to me; about the only thing it does well are RSS feeds.
posted by lonefrontranger 12 June | 09:31
Yeah it's buggy. It'll be nice when they getting it working well. It's beta software thought right?
posted by bigmusic 12 June | 10:01
Safari was based on KHTML from the KDE project, and I think the KDE project browsers are better.
posted by King of Prontopia 12 June | 10:10
Makes you wonder why Apple released it when it was in such poor shape.

Because this week is the big developer conference in SF. Downtown is crawling with people who tilt at windmills for a living.

My biggest complaint with all Apple software on Windows is that they refuse to use the Microsoft-provided windowing toolkit and instead do all the windows, menus, dialog boxes, everything with their own (slow & buggy) code. To put it in simple terms, not only does Apple want to paint the canvas, they want to build a carved and gilded wooden frame around it, and use their nail to hang it on the wall. Everybody else paints the canvas and uses standard Microsoft-provided frames (which are extensively tested and heavily optimized) for their art.
posted by Triode 12 June | 12:20
Agree with most of this, but I do use Safari and I love it. Except for the dodgy find which they appear to have fixed in the next version. The way I see this is that it's pretty much a matter of taste. I'm just happy to live in a world with enough browsers that I can choose based on personal preference and not on which one is least buggy.

Wendell. There do appear to be some font based problems with the windows Safari. Wait a while, update and then try again. It's enough of a problem that Apple will probably get it sorted pretty quickly.

And triode - You've hit the nail on the head. If Windows iTunes spent less time pretending it was an Apple App, it'd probably run a hell of a lot faster.
[NOT WINDOWIST OR MACIST]
posted by seanyboy 12 June | 16:28
Also, it's working well for me at work. Windows 2000 also - If you'll believe that.
posted by seanyboy 12 June | 16:30
I can believe it... I'm on XP, some other users with font failure are on Vista... still haven't seen anyone come up with an explanation why it happens on some machines... but when I realized it was converting Verdana to BradyBunchFont, it was the funniest software bug I'd seen in a long time.
posted by wendell 12 June | 16:36
My biggest complaint with all Apple software on Windows is that they refuse to use the Microsoft-provided windowing toolkit
Yeah - I'm no software expert, but this bugs me too. I think, though, it is an understandable attempt at maintaining ownership of their software and, as people get used to using things like iTunes and Safari, the Apple software interface becomes more familiar and the shift from Windows to Apple's OS smoother, so they have a (slight) chance of getting more people to switch.
posted by dg 12 June | 17:13
Well, it's beta software released at a developer's conference. Beta software is supposed to be buggy (but not this buggy.)

I suspect the main reason they did Safari for Windows is that applications can be developed that work on Macs, PCs, and the iPhone.
posted by kirkaracha 12 June | 17:19
Triode hits the nail on the head. The fact that itunes uses its own custom windowing system instead of hooking into the standard Windows, er, window code annoys me to no end. Its inclusion accomplishes nothing, and makes the control buttons not exist where they're supposed to.
posted by deadcowdan 12 June | 18:43
What's your niche? || What's on the music menu?

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