Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#1

Post by mburns » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 10:50 PM UTC

Phoenix 0.1 was released September 23, 2002

Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)
mozilla.org

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#2

Post by dimitar » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 10:55 PM UTC

Early Firefox felt really responsive and it was more functional and safe than IE.

What happened? I still use it, but I definitely don't feel the same about it.

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#3

Post by ibotty » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:20 PM UTC

dimitar wrote: post #2

Early Firefox felt really responsive and it was more functional and safe than IE. What happened? I still use it, but I definitely don't feel the same about it.

because the web has changed. try to run an old firefox (or phoenix) again. really. try it. it won't feel fast. firefox got much faster in the meantime.

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#4

Post by sabret00the » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:25 PM UTC

Happy birthday. Thank you for serving me with my best interests at heart for so long.

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#5

Post by petercooper » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:30 PM UTC

dimitar wrote: post #2

Early Firefox felt really responsive and it was more functional and safe than IE. What happened? I still use it, but I definitely don't feel the same about it.

Phoenix was a really stripped down browser compared to other browsers of the day and you couldn't install lots of interesting extensions from day one. Firefox is still pretty barebones but so are other browsers now too, and most people install a ton of extensions that make it feel less snappy to boot.

A comparison via screenshots shows Firefox hasn't departed far from the spirit of Phoenix by default though. Phoenix 0.1: http://no.gd/p/phoenix-01-20120924-002927.jpg Firefox 16: http://no.gd/p/ff16-20120924-002834.jpg

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#6

Post by rangibaby » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:45 PM UTC

Already?! HB Firefox. And thanks for showing us that there was a better way than IE6.

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#7

Post by rangibaby » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:45 PM UTC

Already?! HB Firefox. And thanks for showing us that there was a better way than IE6.

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#8

Post by noibl » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:48 PM UTC

What, no gimmick? PR fail.

(Not that it seems to have done much for Opera, but Mozilla is in a better position to capitalise.)

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#9

Post by pan69 » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:50 PM UTC

The Firefox Wikipedia page states:

"Initial release November 9, 2004; 7 years ago" [1]

Maybe they're referring to the 1.0 release? I do remember using Firefox way earlier than that, it must have been 2000 or 2001. I guess those were 0.x releases. Wikipedia doesn't seem to say anything about that.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox

Re: Firefox turns 10 years old today (Phoenix v0.1)

#10

Post by varunsrin » Sun, Sep 23, 2012, 11:55 PM UTC

pan69 wrote: post #9

The Firefox Wikipedia page states: "Initial release November 9, 2004; 7 years ago" [1] Maybe they're referring to the 1.0 release? I do remember using Firefox way earlier than that, it must have been 2000 or 2001. I guess those were 0.x releases. Wikipedia doesn't seem to say anything about that. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox

Yes, I'm pretty sure I was using Firefox 0.7 in 2003 or early 2004, so that November date must be about 1.0 release.

EDIT: It was called Firebird back then, too