Apple drops clanger

Apple have pleased me today. They have brought out a version of their "Safari" browser for Windows. I have wanted them to do this for a long time so that I could see what my web sites look like on a Mac without spending 1500 pounds on a shiny new computer I don't need.

I went to the Apple site at http://www.apple.com/safari/download/ and downloaded the Beta 3 version of Safari together with Quicktime. I gave it somebody else's email address and downloaded the software without a hitch. It asked me if I wanted something called Bon Jour to help printer sharing and as I am using XP which is able to share printers across a network already I declined the kind offer politely.

It gave me a shiny new Quicktime icon in the taskbar (at the bottom of the screen) without asking, which I thought a bit rude, but otherwise installed OK. There was no swearing allegiance to the god of Macness.

According to the Apple Mac temple at http://www.apple.com/safari/ Quote:

The fastest web browser on any platform, Safari loads pages up to 2 times faster
than Internet Explorer 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2.

So I double clicked the new Safari icon on my desktop and counted. And counted. I got to 71 seconds before I gave up hope of the browser fully opening. It's still there on my taskbar saying "Apple - Start" with about a quarter of a web page - although a quarter of which web page I don't know because the address bar doesn't show.

I thought Macs "just worked", and so all of their software must do also. As I said this is XP I am using, not the half cooked Vista I use for most of my work. XP is the operating system developers should aim for before anything else; it is stable and popular. The machine has about an acre of RAM and has 270 Horse Power processor so it's not the machine's fault.

Apple have cocked up. They have bravely announced the arrival of a public Beta-version browser, way before it is ready. I am greatly amused by this, not because I like to see development fail, but because of the religious fervour of the Apple company and all who worship the Mac as god.

This should bring Apple down to Earth. The company and its software are no better than Microsoft or Windows. They are fallible. And this time they have wasted a huge opportunity to show the computing world how good a major part of their system is; and condemned themselves to occupying a niche market for a good while yet.

Meanwhile if you want to know what the internet looks like on Ubuntu click here - http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/