Oft times I take a while to mull things over before posting things to the site, which is why I don’t tend to post on stuff as soon as they happen. One of the largest drop times has been the release of Mozilla Firebird (ex-Phoenix) version 0.6. This is the most “use it as a browser all the time” version of Firebird so far. In that I mean it’s stable and has all the features you would expect. The UI has also seen significant clearing out since the 0.5 release. This release has also shifted me from Opera, the first release to do so.
What the…? This doesn’t sound too good. Microsoft are planning to stop making a standalone browser after Internet Explorer 6 SP1. IE6 was released back in 2000, and has rather a lot to do in terms of standards and other such things. Basically it is quickly becoming a Netscape 4, and will be the browser holding back the improving standards of the web for many years to come, by the looks of things. Most XP users will probably stay with IE6 for ever, and will not switch to Mozilla or Opera. The next version of Windows, Longhorn, will be the first place to get an updated IE. That means that IE6 is going to be with us for at least two years as Longhorn isn’t sceduled for release until 2005. Even then most users will not upgrade, so IE6 will be with us for a very long time yet.
I was thinking about why it is that programmers seem to be able to code for very long periods of time once they get started on a program. Everyone’s heard the story about the programmer who codes all night with cup of coffee and music for company. Other subjects just don’t seem to have this; the only time people stay up all night is when they have a very imminent deadline. CompScis, on the other hand, seem to do it quite often.
Something I’ve been meaning to post here for a while is The CSS Zen Garden. I’ve been taking some timeout to visit this site every couple of days to see what new designs are up. It’s a great example of how CSS can be used to produce very different layouts from the same basic XHTML markup. An excellent showcase for the power of CSS, and an effort I fully support. Maybe I’ll have a go at a design, though my graphic design skill isn’t that great I may be able to come up with a nice colour scheme or such that will come up to the high standards needed. I think my CSS skills are there, just need to polish up my design skills.
Woohoo! Matrix Matrix Matrix! off I go to see it today!