Safari 4 Beta: First Impressions

The beta version of Safari press and blogs greeted with undisguised enthusiasm. "Techcrunch" statesThat "finally, there was a reason to go back to Safari," and CNET writesThat the browser is Apple's 42 times faster than IE7, 3.5 times faster than Firefox and the third even more bright "chrome".

Fourth Safari Nitro engine thanks to a really fast handles JavaScript. In these web-based applications like Google Reader, Gmail, Google Docs apple browser behaves just amazing. Good and new Web inspector - if you previously used the FF just because of the extension Web Developer and Firebug, Safari 4, you will certainly enjoy.

From the perspective of the average user the situation is not so unambiguous. Worse was the work with tabs. If earlier to change the location of the tabs, you can just drag and drop them, it is now necessary to "aim" in the upper right corner.

I did not like, and how Apple has implemented the idea of ​​a list of popular sites that appear on the blank page. It is doubtful that all these reflections effects, pseudo interface has at least some benefit. The same applies to bookmarks and history - well done, that added full-text search, but the big advantage of Cover Flow is not visible.

Other changes (smart address bar, search with Google Suggests recommendations and a list of recent searches) - a series of "why not before?".

On this topic:

• Hidden Safari settings 4 Beta
• Safari 4 - Kirill Tikhonov's Blog.