My Quick Pick of the Week: Safari 4
I have chosen not to do a full write-up of Safari 4 beta which was released to the Mac and PC masses yesterday, as Ars Technica have covered everything beautifully and intensively. However, I will instead give my very brief thoughts on Safari 4 instead of doing a formal review.
I love it.
Okay, so I’m not going to be that brief. But, that pretty much sums it up. On first opening I wasn’t sure about the new tabs placement at all, which are now located at the top of the browser window as opposed to under the bookmarks bar as in Safari 3 and earlier. For a while I kept double clicking on the bookmarks bar to open a new tab out of habit, but in actual fact I adapted very quickly to the new layout. The + icon at the top right of the browser window to open a tab feels more natural and intuitive. I like it.
The buzz on Twitter seems to be that people are missing the blue progress bar. Big time. Would you believe that I didn’t actually note it’s absence until I saw the masses of complaints. But yes, I think that might be something useful to have back as the little spinning indicator graphic isn’t really indicative of how much time we have to wait for a site to load.
Overall I’m very happy with Safari 4 Beta. Apart from the UI changes and some of the 150 new features, the speed increase is quite an improvement over an already speedy browser. I miss Inquisitor heavily as I can’t set GoogleUK as the default for my search results, but I’m sure there will be a new version along for Safari 4 soon.
So, have you tried Safari 4 beta yet? What are you liking and disliking about it?
There’s even people frantically looking for hacks to put the tabs back where they were. Some people *really* don’t like change of any sort but they should give themselves a few days to get used to it at least.
Over all I quite like the new Safari.
Glad to hear you’re enjoying it.
Oh, I am definitely loving the new way tabs have been done. It seems more beautiful and elegant than the tab bar. And the little plus icon is far more intuitive and obvious than double clicking the tab bar, granted I use command-t most of the time.
My other huge love is Top Sites. I love being greeted with that for every new window and tab launch. I used to be greeted by google.com, mainly because it’s a fast loading site.
And my word, the SPEED! Simply amazing how my Mac can contain a Time Machine, and a warp engine!
This is the best browser yet, and I’m glad 1Password was patched so quickly. I, too, miss Inquisitor, but it’ll be back soon, I’m sure of it.
Oh, and Apple, I want that progress bar back. Or some kind of progress indicator. How about a little pie-wedge filly-uppy thingy like the built-in browser in LittleSnapper? That would work. Just not the gear spinner. Please?