Firefox and Camino (Was Re: [P1] Safari driving me crazy!!)

[Mike Wallinga]

On Thu, 15 Jul 2004 10:52:04 -0400, "Mary C.Youra"
<mcyoura at ix.netcom.com> said:
> I do like Firefox. It's very quick, and has a Google window like 
> Safari, which has become indispensable to me. As Eva mentioned, give it 
> a try. It's also Mozilla based. Would someone explain the difference 
> between Camino and Firefox? Or the history between the two?

I'll give it a shot...

Firefox is meant to be a replacement for the browser component of the
"original" Mozilla suite, and Thunderbird is meant to be the replacement
for the email client component.  The actual Mozilla suite is still alive
and kicking (currently at version 1.7, I believe), but I think the plan
is for the Firebird/Thunderbird combination to take over as the standard
cross-platform products (with versions for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux,
etc.) sometime in the future.

Camino is a separate project that uses the same basic code for the web
browser to display HTML, but the entire interface and stuff like that is
re-written from the ground up, using Mac OS X-only code.  It is meant to
be a more "pure" Macintosh application, and is free to follow Mac OS X
style and interface guidelines as much as it wishes, because it does not
have to worry about providing an interface that looks and works well on
other operating systems, too.

I tend to use Firefox because I work on a variety of operating systems,
including Mac OS X 10.3, Windows XP Pro, and Linux, and I like being
able to use the same web browser with the same interface no matter what
computer I'm using.  But, other people prefer to use browsers that
provide native interfaces for the specific operating system they use.
With Firefox and Camino, Mac users can choose whichever style they
prefer.

I apologize for the somewhat long-winded answer, but I hope it helps!
- Mike W.