On Firefox 3

I HATE that Campbell-Ewald won't allow me to run Firefox 3 and hate it even more that I'm not allowed to update my iTunes to 7.7, largely because both releases of these applications are just that good.



Here's my rundown on why Firefox 3 is "the balls."

1. It's Fast, Fast, Fast

Did I mention it's fast. It's light years away from Firefox 2 in my opinion. Thanks to the Gekko 1.9 engine, the browser renders pages so much faster faster and uses fewer system resources overall.

2. Changes to the location bar

I know a LOT of people find this feature annoying. I however have found it to be incredibly useful. Previously known as Smart Location Bar searches through your history as you type in a URL. This bar searches through your history and bookmarks simultaneously and presents a drop-down list of recently accessed pages with that same keyword. It works even if you already know the URL.

Best of all, if you hate it and you have even a moderate amount of coding background so there is a way to disable it requiring a small tweak to the about:config file. An Add-On further allows you to learn which of the search results you want to always be on top.

3. OPEN SOURCE!

As a former add-on (i always preferred "extensions") and theme developer, I love how accessible the browser is. I really dig that there are so many adopters of a browser I've been using as long as I remember it being out there. Firefox 3 is Acid 2 Browser Test compliant , which makes it standardized alongside Opera 9 and Safari 3. Read, get with the fucking program already IE . Anyone who reads this blog knows I'm a stickler to adhering to web standards in both page design, coding and programming.

4. Security updates

As said in the CNet review "There are also numerous security features such as Malware and Phishing protection, Instant Web site ID, support for the Extended Validation Secure Socket Layer (EV SSL), enhancements to the Password manager, and greater security for Add-Ons."

Nuff said there.

5. Web developer specific tools!

For developers there are new Web-based content handlers, greater search engine keyword support, a new password manager, the Firefox 3 Extension Manager (EM) and oodles more.

My favorites are the beginnings of the Firefox intentity network, better integration with Mac OS X's look and feel and site specific preferences that are now integrated directly into the browser sans extensions. With Firefox 3 you also get an early look at FUEL (Firefox User Extension Library), a JavaScript library designed to make it easier for extension developers by minimizing XPCOM formality and using more "modern" JavaScript ideas.

Go download it. Immediately.

On Yahoo's: Shine

I've been meaning to review Yahoo's new portal for women, Shine, for some time now. After spending about 15 minutes a day on it for the past two weeks, I think I'm ready to pass judgment.



Here's the rundown:

Shine is in essence Yahoo's first target of a specific audience as opposed to its usual topical approach (Sports, News and Entertainment), but operates under the same principles.

What you get with Shine is an aggregation mash up of original blogs, user generated content and content from major publishing partners including Conde Nast, Hearst, and Time.

Yahoo's press release says:

The idea is to provide women between the ages of 25 and 54 with information "most relevant to their daily lives.

So, how well is the mash up executed?

Average at best. This is yet another attempt by marketers to tell women who they are as opposed to allowing them to tell the brand who they are.

While I like the cleanliness of the design, the massive font is distracting and looks unprofessional. Navigation, sucks it, big time. When you click on a content channel like, say Love and Sex, a secondary navigation bar opens with Related Topics. The thing is when you click on one of them in any channel you are taken to a list of posts in that topic back on the front page design and the topic navigation goes away. Changing the design colors and taking users off channel is a big no no for me and most designers who want their users to actually be able to find their way around. This seems typical for Yahoo though.

Content is dull. Many of the topics and bloggers write in an incredibly sophomoric style and focus solely on gossip, avoiding being overweight and the proper way to leave your husband if he's cheating. Sigh... I realize that I'm not a woman, but they have to be interested in more than Hollywood, affairs and soap operas.

Don't get me wrong, I like my fair share of "lifestyle" and "fluff" content every once in a while, but Shine isn't doing anything new here. It's just boxing it different and front paging some really terrible advice from its users.

Granted, I'm not in the demographic, but if this is who real women are, I'm glad my fiance isn't one of them.

Go back to the drawing board Yahoo! Retool this beast, get away from dedicating prime real estate to the perfect pair of jeans, the next chick flick and get a little substance. Either that or go with a new masthead that says Yahoo:360 - Desperate Housewives Edition. This just doesn't show any innovation. It has potential but needs a soul.

On Visual Search Engines

My mom sent me a link to Searchme.com yesterday. I had heard about this being in secure beta testing, but wasn't aware it was now open for regular viewing.

If you've never checked it out, it's probably worth a quick test drive. It's not necessarily anything revolutionary, but it caters to those who love to browse through something more visual than a big list of hyperlinks and meta descriptions.



The Likes:

• It's just plain beautiful. It's fast on my G5. The icons to sort subjects that can be taken in many ways is both helpful and beautiful.


• I dig that it highlights your search term right on the actual screen capture. It's something I've not seen with other visual search providers.


• I enjoy the iTunes like presentation style and like that you can skin it to a light or dark setting.


• The meta description data still pops up if you hover over the visual window.

The Dislikes:

• I get that it's still Beta, but there are clearly problems with the search algorithms within this search engine. As I normally do with any new search engine I get a look at, I used my last name as the initial search test. I was sort of shocked to see that a lot of the results were really old... digging up stuff that I was connected to in the late 90s and early part of 2002 and 2003. It only had one connection to my recent work - which was my editor's letter in Cobalt Mag. I get that it's beta, but it didn't even pick up Danieleizans.com.


• I'm left underwhelmed with the use of flash. It's nice, but they could have jazzed it up and done something at least a little bit different than the same cover switch that iTunes uses. The visual style is not impressive enough to make me want to ditch Google. I do love the use of icons to narrow the search down though. That's quite impressive.


• Finally, I'm left wondering why they didn’t partner with Google to drive the queries. It's not as if that wheel was broken. It seems it would have been just as easy to put the pretty paper on the best tool out there.

Overall verdict: I'm reasonably impress, but won't switch my daily engine, but this is nice for people who might not remember anything about a site aside from what it looked like. It's stunning in the way it gives me ideas for digital magazine presentations and for anyone who wants to have more fun with a search engine, but I think these visual search engines are a bit campy.

On the new Modernista! site

A few days ago, someone referred me to the new Modernista! Web site. For those of you who aren't familiar, Modernista! is an agency with offices in Michigan and elsewhere. The new site is bold, very bold actually.

It totally embraces Web 2.0 by utilizing Wikipedia as the background. They've created layers to have their Wikipedia entry and all of the links to portfolio work go to other Web 2.0 applications like Flickr and YouTube. They've also embraced 2.0 link labeling and allowed for even their flaws to become a part of their site.

It's nice to see an agency putting their money where there mouth is.

I wish...

Google Maps would have done my Google Streetview on a day when the corner of my lawn wasn't dead.


View Larger Map

That is all.

On iPod Shuffle

On the iPod: "Grave's Disease" - Matt Pond PA

I'm testing two products today, first is the "Turbo" blend from Burger King. Despite it's claim to be turbo charged with caffeine, I'm not entirely convinced it's all that different from their "regular" blend. Now don't get me wrong, it's not terrible coffee, but I don't get the turbo factor, nor do I find it to be particularly eye opening. I've always been more of a Tim Horton's coffee guy.

The second, and more exciting, is the iPod Suffle. I got one with a gift card that was about to expire. It took two days to get here. I got the orange to match with my Firefox laptop bag. So far, I love it. I put about 190 songs on it last night. My only real gripe is with how long it takes to "sync" the iPod with iTunes. It's frustrating that it takes so long to move the songs from the library to the iPod and that it seems to hang the software.


What I really love is the size of the thing. It's really light, clips to clothing, etc. It eliminates the annoying scratches that are on my older and larger iPod and it's incredibly portable. I normally run my iPod on shuffle anyway, so it's perfect. I can see myself working out, shoveling snow and walking around the office with this iPod. I think my big dog will be used more for organizing and long flights at this point. I'm really happy with the quick $78 purchase.

Quick post, site reviews

On the iPod: "Cartwheeels" - The Reindeer Selection

PingMag did a really nice piece on the beauty of infosthetics, earlier this week. It sort of gets you thinking about how even hard data can be made beautiful if you do it right.

In net applications, I'm testing a few of Google's new personal web home themes. I guess i never expected Google to jump on the cutesy theme bandwagon that Yahoo! has been doing for years and years.

The one I'm testing at the moment is below.



This one is called starry night and it changes throughout the day with the change in the weather and time. You enter your Zip code when you add the widget so that it can monitor sunup and sundown.

More later.

On iPhone

On the iPod - "Sound As Ever" - Track A Tiger
Below is one of my recent columns. Drooling for the iPhone.

Contrary to some of my readers' beliefs, I'm actually quite fond of a lot of Apple products.

I've been an iPod user for years, have long been a fan of the iLife suite's flexibility for audio, video and image management and have been using a MacMini for some personal projects in recent months.

All that is aside from the fact that I'm of the belief that Mac offers much more stable operating systems in comparison to Microsoft's Windows platform.

Still, nothing has gotten me more giddy than iPhone. Everything is still spec, but the geeks at Apple have managed to cram a computer, phone and an iPod all into one deliciously small device.

Visit the site above. I can almost guarantee that you'll want to toss your Blackberry, Blackjack or your Treo out the window.

It senses when you flip it over, organizes your phone book like you organize iTunes. It's not in production yet, but the possibilities are more than exciting for a geek like me.
Apple iPhone will be available in the state this June for $499 or $599 for the 4GB and 8GB models respectively with a two-year service agreement from Cingular. You can bet I'll be waiting outside my local Cingular store for a trade-in.

And if you're curious about what other metro Detroiters like in the way of their phones, Crain's Detroit Business did a nice addition to our wireless section this week. Click here to read the main section story, and here for the skinny on your peers phone habits.

And if you still can't find something you like from the links above, you can always check out Mobiledia.com. The site reviews just about every available cell phone on the market and offers numerous links to plans and outlets to buy the next driving distraction of your affections.