Apple releases Safari 4 beta

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LCfiner said:
You on OS X?

I'll be testing that page when I get back home but it was always dog slow with safari or the webkit nightlies.
Click to expand...
Yes, gifs are much better now. (OS X)
 
gifs play back a lot better here on OS X, very nice

i noticed they took out the "clear recent google searches" option at the bottom, seems kinda odd

Tobor said:
Does this beta install over my Safari 3 or separately?
Click to expand...

installs over it, and requires a restart, but it includes an uninstaller. i backed up my ~/library/safari folder (bookmarks etc) just in case
 
another small thing i noticed. there is no stop/ reload button in the toolbar. now it's like the iphone safari. the spinning progress indicator within the address bar becomes a stop/reload button when you hover over it.

personally, i prefer the old way. you didn't have to hover over an icon to know where the stop function was located. it was more obvious.
 
They nuked the OS X styled font rendering and Safari is now back to the horrendous Windows default font rendering. Everything else seems okay, but that alone makes it a near deal breaker for me.
 
Safari 4 seems to play back GIFs a bit better than S3, but it's still not nearly as fast as Firefox.

I really like what they did with the whole "Top Sites" and coverflow'd bookmarks and such. The new tabs are terrible, though. Did they really have to trade usability for an extra half-centimeter of vertical space? Ditching the in-line loading bar for no reason is a regression, too.

Honestly I'd rather just stick with Firefox.
 
To put the tabs at the bottom like Safari 3

Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop false

To put it back at the top

Code: 
defaults delete com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop
 
hey, can someone check what happens to the tab bar when you load up, say, 40 tabs in OS X.

On safari 3, an arrow on the edge of the tab bar would pop up showing you the extra tabs in a list but the tabs themselves would stay large enough to allow for reading the title.

I'm curious if they still kept that disclosure arrow now that the tab bar is the title bar or if tabs get as small as old Win 98 taskbar items...
 
very fast loading pages, im not quite sure im going to stick with it tho, the theme i have on my xp, doesnt mesh with safari

EDIT: is there a way i can input what i want as my top sites, instead of waiting for it to auto do it?
 
Macam said:
They nuked the OS X styled font rendering and Safari is now back to the horrendous Windows default font rendering. Everything else seems okay, but that alone makes it a near deal breaker for me.
Click to expand...
You liked the horrible fonts Safari had before?
 
Macam said:
They nuked the OS X styled font rendering and Safari is now back to the horrendous Windows default font rendering. Everything else seems okay, but that alone makes it a near deal breaker for me.
Click to expand...


there should be an option to bring back the safari rendering (they talk about this on the site). poke around in preferences.
 
Does it support Inquisitor plugin? I know smart search is probably the same thing, but just in case it sucks, I want to know if I can safely give up on Safari 3.
 
LCfiner said:
hey, can someone check what happens to the tab bar when you load up, say, 40 tabs in OS X.

On safari 3, an arrow on the edge of the tab bar would pop up showing you the extra tabs in a list but the tabs themselves would stay large enough to allow for reading the title.

I'm curious if they still kept that disclosure arrow now that the tab bar is the title bar or if tabs get as small as old Win 98 taskbar items...
Click to expand...
It's still there.

tabmountains.png
 
I'm playing with it now, though I (gladly) uninstalled Glims and (sadly) uninstalled Gears to make it work.

Basically, they adopted the Chrome UI memes, but did it with Core Animation and in a more Apple-y way.

What's the point of Chrome on OS X now?
 
giga said:
It's still there.
Click to expand...


ok, thanks. glad they kept that.

@ Juice. I think Chrome still has the "each tab is a process" way of doing things that is unique. Safari hasn't gone on to do that.
 
Juice said:
I'm playing with it now, though I (gladly) uninstalled Glims and (sadly) uninstalled Gears to make it work.

Basically, they adopted the Chrome UI memes, but did it with Core Animation and in a more Apple-y way.

What's the point of Chrome on OS X now?
Click to expand...
Separate tab processes and an address bar that searches titles.
 
Holy crap the "Top Sites" home screen's "Search History" field is awesome. It does an in-text search of all your history. I just searched the word "Brink" and found an article I read weeks ago. PERFECT.
 
Useless Sunspider stuff.

Windows 7

Safari 4: 1546.8ms +/- 4.6%
Firefox 3.1 latest trunk: 1393.6ms +/- 3.4%

For T7700 laptop.

On battery performance mode, though.

Safari 4: ~ 2.5K ms
Firefox 3.1: ~3.5K ms.

I wonder if they have tests for general rendering (since Safari is noticeably faster.)
 
LCfiner said:
ok, thanks. glad they kept that.

@ Juice. I think Chrome still has the "each tab is a process" way of doing things that is unique. Safari hasn't gone on to do that.
Click to expand...

I meant thing a normal user is going to care about for reasons other than Google love. I don't know about you, but I'm not sure I've gone to a page with Safari that froze the tab, much less crashed the browser in the last year.

giga said:
Separate tab processes and an address bar that searches titles.
Click to expand...

I'd still prefer to see the Omnibar. Apple apparently doesn't want to have to educate its users on using one or Google patented the process.
 
Juice said:
Holy crap the "Top Sites" home screen's "Search History" field is awesome. It does an in-text search of all your history. I just searched the word "Brink" and found an article I read weeks ago. PERFECT.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure this also works in the main search bar within the title bar. results are broken up via web/ bookmarks, history/ found on page.

not yet sure if it's doing the full text search when searching from there or if that's reserved only for the history/ top sites search fields.

edit: I can get safari to slow down to a halt (and slow down the switching to other tabs) pretty regularly by opening up a gif heavy site. *cough*GAF NPD*cough*.

Folks in this thread say that Safari 4 has mostly fixed this but the one page I checked before I left for work had a 2 MB gif that didn't render correctly and then crashed my browser right away :(
 
LCfiner said:
I'm pretty sure this also works in the main search bar within the title bar. results are broken up via web/ bookmarks, history/ found on page.

not yet sure if it's doing the full text search when searching from there or if that's reserved only for the history/ top sites search fields.
Click to expand...

Not text inside the pages of articles, just the start of the title in the address bar or similar google searches in the search bar
 
Juice said:
Not text inside the pages of articles, just the start of the title in the address bar or similar google searches in the search bar
Click to expand...

aah. I guess they figured the results list from a full text search would be huge when people started typing so they kept it to titles only.
 
Unlimited4s said:
Try installing the latest security update with Software Update.
Click to expand...

That did the trick, thanks!

It's not quite as fast as Firefox, but on the other hand I really like the Top Sites page. I think I will use them both for a while to decide which one I like best.
 
How to make stuff like Safari 3 again (copy and paste into Terminal):

Get the old tab bar back (Tabs under address bar)
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop false

safari3tabse989f.png


(change "false" to "true" to change it back to new way)

for the rest, 0 = Turn it Off / 1 = Turn it On


Get the old toolbar back (Separate Add Bookmarks icon, etc.)
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeToolbarRedesign 0/1

CoverFlow View On/Off
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeFlowViewInBookmarksView 0/1

New URL Completion Menu On/Off
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeFancyURLCompletionList 0/1

Google Suggest On/Off
Code: 
 defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeGoogleSuggest 0/1
 
Sean said:
How to make stuff like Safari 3 again (copy and paste into Terminal):

Get the old tab bar back (Tabs under address bar)
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop false

safari3tabse989f.png


(change "false" to "true" to change it back to new way)

for the rest, 0 = Turn it Off / 1 = Turn it On


Get the old toolbar back (Separate Add Bookmarks icon, etc.)
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeToolbarRedesign 0/1

CoverFlow View On/Off
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeFlowViewInBookmarksView 0/1

New URL Completion Menu On/Off
Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeFancyURLCompletionList 0/1

Google Suggest On/Off
Code: 
 defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4IncludeGoogleSuggest 0/1
Click to expand...

Or - how to take all the fun out of new software that's been sorely overdue for an update.
 
Juice said:
Or - how to take all the fun out of new software that's been sorely overdue for an update.
Click to expand...

perhaps, but not all the changes in Safari 4 make it better than before.

I think the old tab bar and old toolbar buttons are actually better and easier to use then the new ones.
 
I like the iPhone style refresh button. As an iPhone user it makes sense. I'm still getting used to the tabs on the top, but it's not terrible. So far, so good.
 
Timan said:
To put the tabs at the bottom like Safari 3

Code: 
defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop false
Click to expand...

Thank you! Now they just need to bring back the progress meter and I'll be happy.
 
Juice said:
Or - how to take all the fun out of new software that's been sorely overdue for an update.
Click to expand...

I'm only actually using the tabs one, just thought others might be interested.

new Safari 4 tabs are a huge step backwards imo - harder to see, harder to grab/move (since you can't drag the entire tab like safari 3), etc. but now that i've got it working the old way I'm loving all the other changes and speed improvements.
 
I agree about the tabs. Another feature lost is the ability to create a new tab by simply double clicking anywhere in the empty space. On the new ones you have to click the "+" button. Also you can only drag the new tabs on the right corner. These are steps backwards in functionality.
 
Tobor said:
I like the iPhone style refresh button. As an iPhone user it makes sense. I'm still getting used to the tabs on the top, but it's not terrible. So far, so good.
Click to expand...


I like the refresh part of it but i don't like how they use that space to implement the stop button. it only shows up when you hover over the page loading spinner.

ok, sure now we know where it's located since we've poked around but it's less obvious than having a big X button on the tool bar.

My preference: have the X button in the address bar, where it is now, but replace the spinner with the old blue bar loading within the address bar. it still saves space but it keeps the functionality obvious.

plus I love the blue bar. with the spinner, we don't know how much of a page is left to load.
 
LCfiner said:
I like the refresh part of it but i don't like how they use that space to implement the stop button. it only shows up when you hover over the page loading spinner.

ok, sure now we know where it's located since we've poked around but it's less obvious than having a big X button on the tool bar.

My preference: have the X button in the address bar, where it is now, but replace the spinner with the old blue bar loading within the address bar. it still saves space but it keeps the functionality obvious.

plus I love the blue bar. with the spinner, we don't know how much of a page is left to load.
Click to expand...

They should just copy the iPhone completely. The refresh becomes the x instead of the spinning wheel. I'd be willing to bet the opposite is true though, and the next iPhone firmware will remove the blue bar and match it to this. :lol
 
Tobor said:
They should just copy the iPhone completely. The refresh becomes the x instead of the spinning wheel. I'd be willing to bet the opposite is true though, and the next iPhone firmware will remove the blue bar and match it to this. :lol
Click to expand...

yeah, that's what I was trying to explain. the iPhone way is better since it keeps the progressive loading indicator and still has a visible X button.

but i think you're right and the iPhone browser bar will get slightly less usable and become more like the Safari 4 address bar. :lol
 
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