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Firefox on iPhone?

karenflower said:
Mozilla is creating a 'Mobile Firefox' as stated here. But as for on the iPhone - would Apple approve?
Click to expand...

Who cares if Apple would approve or not. Let's be honest, Apple OSX is using part of an OS that was made by people who weren't looking for permission to make a better OS.

Basically, approval is the biggest enemy for development to this day.

I say make the thing, put it into an open repository and let Apple do whatever they want.
 
Simgar988 said:
not happening

http://iphonetouch.blorge.com/2008/08/12/firefox-for-the-iphone-not-happening-says-mozilla-ceo/
Click to expand...


Well there's a voice of reason for ya. But, until about 5 months ago, no one even bothered to work that many alternate browsers forthe iphone because of the same reason. I looked, today, and found 2 alternates and 3 in production.

What you're counting on is the "makers" of Mozilla not making Firefox, but that doesn't mean a clone won't be built and that's all that really needs happening before it catches on and then the actual company (or Apple) realizes it will be a benefit to make it. It's all about popularity vs money vs production.

Happened the same way with Firefox for the Mac so don't be too sure of yourself about what's going to happen, it only shows you've either not been on the scene too long or you've got limited thinking on the matter.

After 26 years of watching people say "it won't happen" with software, i've learned a few truisms like being no such thing as bullet-proof security for software.

Plus you're really forgetting Apple's true nature, they tend to "steal" anything that looks really good to advance their look. Someone once said Apple would NEVER do a deal with Microsoft but what happened? Like i said MacOSX is based on a mixture of other OSs and it's killer, Apple didn't make it. They took someone else's idea and tweaked it a little, it's their trademark signature. :apple:

"MyFox", an alternate browsers for Safari, is already on Cydia and they will continue to upgrade it so, in a way, you've already been proven wrong. :eek:

Dont' count your bets in too soon on Firefox, a "fox" of some kind will come along and bite you for it. :)
 
Mozilla should just put Firefox on Cydia, or just have some guy who's "NOT ASSOCIATED" with Mozilla make the app and put it on Cydia, just like with what happened with GV Mobile.
 
immortalsoule said:
Well there's a voice of reason for ya. But, until about 5 months ago, no one even bothered to work that many alternate browsers forthe iphone because of the same reason. I looked, today, and found 2 alternates and 3 in production.

What you're counting on is the "makers" of Mozilla not making Firefox, but that doesn't mean a clone won't be built and that's all that really needs happening before it catches on and then the actual company (or Apple) realizes it will be a benefit to make it. It's all about popularity vs money vs production.

Happened the same way with Firefox for the Mac so don't be too sure of yourself about what's going to happen, it only shows you've either not been on the scene too long or you've got limited thinking on the matter.

After 26 years of watching people say "it won't happen" with software, i've learned a few truisms like being no such thing as bullet-proof security for software.

Plus you're really forgetting Apple's true nature, they tend to "steal" anything that looks really good to advance their look. Someone once said Apple would NEVER do a deal with Microsoft but what happened? Like i said MacOSX is based on a mixture of other OSs and it's killer, Apple didn't make it. They took someone else's idea and tweaked it a little, it's their trademark signature. :apple:

"MyFox", an alternate browsers for Safari, is already on Cydia and they will continue to upgrade it so, in a way, you've already been proven wrong. :eek:

Dont' count your bets in too soon on Firefox, a "fox" of some kind will come along and bite you for it. :)
Click to expand...

first bold: clearly directed at me i.e. flaming. I did some searching and provided a link to some information which no one else took the time to do. I'd say that link is a little better than the rest of the speculation people have thrown out whether it's definite or not.

second bold: I don't jailbreak, and could careless what apps are on cydia as I prefer my iPhone to be legitimate. I don't by any means consider a cydia app to be a legitimate creation for the iPhone. There are thousands of apps on Cydia that Apple would never approve.
 
Sad to admit this, but Apple would *never* allow Firefox on the iPhone. Shame.

I'm surprised that anyone would even bring this question up, especially after all of the draconian measures Apple has taken within the past year. It's a real shame. Tragedy really.

I do think Mobile Safari is still the best mobile web browser out there. But I'd LOVE some competition.

On the desktop, imho, there's still no competition for Firefox. I still think it's the best browser on PCs & Macs. Bar none. Safari is my "backup" browser, but at the end of the day, I *always* pick Firefox.

w00master
 
I think they might approve it. Firefox also runs on a Mac so why not on the iPhone?
 
iAppTime said:
I think they might approve it. Firefox also runs on a Mac so why not on the iPhone?
Click to expand...

Duplication of features.

This is why Apple pulled: MailWrangler and it's one of Apple's "excuses" on why they pulled the various Google Voice apps.

Shame. It's really a shame. It's why at this point I have absolutely *no* confidence on any one of my apps anymore.

w00master
 
w00master said:
Duplication of features.

This is why Apple pulled: MailWrangler and it's one of Apple's "excuses" on why they pulled the various Google Voice apps.

Shame. It's really a shame. It's why at this point I have absolutely *no* confidence on any one of my apps anymore.

w00master
Click to expand...

If they dont approve FireFox maybe the FCC will investigate lol.
 
You can already use Firefox from your iPhone!

It's easy to use Firefox with Flash video from your iPhone.

All you need is a well-secured PC (or VM) running MS Terminal Services with an accessible IP (or with some sort of firewall/NAT proxy tunnel), a fast wifi or 3G connection, and one of the many (well over a dozen) VNC or RDP/Remote Desktop apps already in the App store. Several are free.

Some web sites might come up faster over a remote browser than on the iPhone's native Safari.

Has anyone tried this using a VNC server on their Mac?
 
firewood said:
It's easy to use Firefox with Flash video from your iPhone.

All you need is a well-secured PC (or VM) running MS Terminal Services with an accessible IP (or with some sort of firewall/NAT proxy tunnel), a fast wifi or 3G connection, and one of the many (well over a dozen) VNC or RDP/Remote Desktop apps already in the App store. Several are free.

Some web sites might come up faster over a remote browser than on the iPhone's native Safari.

Has anyone tried this using a VNC server on their Mac?
Click to expand...

Why not save yourself all that trouble, and just walk over to your computer. No? ;)
 
immortalsoule said:
Well there's a voice of reason for ya. But, until about 5 months ago, no one even bothered to work that many alternate browsers forthe iphone because of the same reason. I looked, today, and found 2 alternates and 3 in production.

What you're counting on is the "makers" of Mozilla not making Firefox, but that doesn't mean a clone won't be built and that's all that really needs happening before it catches on and then the actual company (or Apple) realizes it will be a benefit to make it. It's all about popularity vs money vs production.

Happened the same way with Firefox for the Mac so don't be too sure of yourself about what's going to happen, it only shows you've either not been on the scene too long or you've got limited thinking on the matter.

After 26 years of watching people say "it won't happen" with software, i've learned a few truisms like being no such thing as bullet-proof security for software.

Plus you're really forgetting Apple's true nature, they tend to "steal" anything that looks really good to advance their look. Someone once said Apple would NEVER do a deal with Microsoft but what happened? Like i said MacOSX is based on a mixture of other OSs and it's killer, Apple didn't make it. They took someone else's idea and tweaked it a little, it's their trademark signature. :apple:

"MyFox", an alternate browsers for Safari, is already on Cydia and they will continue to upgrade it so, in a way, you've already been proven wrong. :eek:

Dont' count your bets in too soon on Firefox, a "fox" of some kind will come along and bite you for it. :)
Click to expand...

lol. all those other 'browsers' you see are basically just different skins of the safari engine. they're not new/alternate browsers at all. you have no idea what you're talking about.
 
I doubt it. If they approve FF the what about Google, Opera and others. Thats one + for Blackberry where the built-in browser sucks but there are about 3 to 4 other good 3rd party alternatives to choose from.

Where as the iPhone Safari is a solid browser, yet it wouldn't hurt to be able to play with others.

Nipz said:
I was just wondering do you think that the SDK could bring other browsers to the iPhone?

Not that i want anything other than Safari but thought there could be a possibility!

Thanks

Ben
Click to expand...
 
ummm... not yet

I don't want Firefox bloatware on my phone. I can imagine the plugins bringing the phone to a screeching halt. If they can offer a slim, optimized for speed version, then yes, some browser choice would be great. However, customized apps for various websites appears to be future of internet on phones, instead of the "view everything through a browser" approach on larger computer screens.
 
Karma said:
I hate to bring up a near dead thread, but wouldn't mobile Firefox have a working Flash player? Does Apple hate Flash so much they'd deny a viable, working browser App that has features Safari does not?
Click to expand...
Yeah, they can't even figure out how to make their own Flash, or let another companies technology actually run in their Browser.

And no, they won't let Firefox run on the iPhone because it is SO much better than Safari.
 
I hate to re-revive this (but it has only been a month), but I wanted to point out a few things.
Needless to say, I prefer Firefox over Chrome over Safari over IE over Opera (in that order), so feel free to disregard my view. Never used an Apple computer, but am still a fan of them. And these are just opinions backed with some facts pertaining to desktop browsers, not their mobile counterparts. It is also harder to compare the mobile browsers since they would not occur on the same OS or phone, or method of wireless transmission.

A few of you suggested Google Chrome as a mobile browser. It is hard to compare it to its mobile counterpart, as I have not used it, but I'm going to assume it inherited most of its desktop traits. Chrome is the fastest browser currently, as tested by PC World. That would be a great thing to have on an iPhone, but there is one problem that I am fairly sure Apple would reject it for (besides the fact that they are rejecting most other browsers unless they are parental control software, as far as I've seen).
Chrome is a memory hog. In fact, with 10 tabs open, it uses more than twice the memory of Safari, and nearly four times that of FF. remember these are all desktop browsers, not mobile, in the tests...
This is mainly because of Google's design of Chrome treating one tab like one browser. Every tab is really a new system process, and after 10 tabs, that gets pretty slow.

Firefox is probably an equally bad idea. I'd love using it, but if you've ever tried running FF 3.5 off a flash drive (in this case PortableApps version converted to a u3 smart drive file), it's very buggy, and freezes constantly. I would still expect better performance from an iPhone, but both run from flash memory, so performance is somewhat similar, although not limited by USB 2.0 speeds (can't wait for 3.0 in 2011 [I think] by the way).
Also, FF's main attraction, add-ons, would probably have to be abandoned for an iPhone version. Too many add-ons, and FF starts using more memory than Chrome, and page rendering gets slower, too. I don't really think it's necessary to have such features as Ad Block Plus, DownThemAll!, or changeable skins on such a small screen (Xmarks would be helpful, though, but it isn't just for FF anymore). Anyway, the SDK sounds too limiting, as you've said earlier, to allow add-ons.

And IE? You've got to be kidding me. If that for the iPhone is anything like Windows Mobile OS, it is horrible. But it is slightly faster than Safari.

Opera probably isn't a great idea either. It's really slow. So slow that it is half a second behind Safari on page rendering speeds. Memory-wise, it may be the best choice, but in terms of speed it's horrible.

Bottom line, we really don't have much of a choice. But face it, Safari is bad, IE a bit better, Chrome amazing but a memory hog, FF great until it's over-customized, Opera the slowest of all but lightweight.


So there's my view, but it's not really up to me. If "iFox" becomes the next instance of Google Voice, that's Apple's (or AT&T's) problem, not mine.
 
Firefox can eat up memory even if you don't add any customization. It's just poorly coded and the only thing that keeps people using it is USER MADE addons, nothing that mozilla is doing.
 
My last word in this.

Well, my whole point, before i was hit in this, was that it's a good idea to expand any original idea. Sure, you will make tons of BAD ones but you're bound to get one "good" one that will be improved on.

You can't really look at making FF for iphone at the point of view of the existing one now, they won't even be using the same code so there's the whole limited capabilities issue. The won't be using the same basis for memory or limitations of OS/processor the iphone uses. Everything will be different and, like the clones that already exist, they're going to never be "as good as the PC" for a lot of obvious reasons.

Still, i say try.

I give it a year and they will make a convert of Android OS that will be working on the iphone, they already have Linux that can be ported over. But these are people working this all out, not paid programmers. It will take longer and there will be a LOT of bumps.

I was a HTC person LONG before i became an iPhone person and i heard all of the nay-says giving reasons why mods to those phones shouldn't/couldn't/wouldn't be done.

It took 2 years and some dedicated people to prove them all wrong, which will probably be the case for this particular iphone/Firefox thread. I've got an HTC phone that's over 6 years old that looks and does AMAZING things that would make ANY iphone user say "Woah!"

These days, it being a matter of money isn't even in the equation anymore, it's all about time and desire. I actually did some coding of my own since this particular thing started and learned a lot about how the whole process works and every time someone says "won't happen" they end up eating crow.

The OS(s) smaller and more memory conservative and the programmers get more creative.

I mean, just LOOK at the phones that have come out since this thread even started, way better than what too many people (who weren't in the know) said wouldn't happen.

"Officially" means nothing and that's something i was trying to impress upon "certain" members of this forum, doing is doing it and there isn't any argument.

I mean, heck, Apple's Mac and Windows were all about taking other people's ideas and modding them and that's what it's all about.

It seems that making a actual point that sticks is pointless to some who have replied to my initial statement anyway. Dudes can say anything they want but i think my point has been made 100x over but i know there will still be people who will argue for the sake of just arguing so i digress.

.

Later people.
 
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