Browser Wars, Part II

And the Acid3 100% Compliance Certificate Goes To...

Opera!

The Opera web team was the first to score 100% on the tough Acid3 browser rendering standards test, and posted the proof of compliance (the 100% Acid3 graphic many of you first saw here) earlier today. The 100% score on Acid3 was reached using WinGogi, Opera's name for its Windows reference builds. Opera expects to have a prerelease build available for download at its Opera Labs website "within the next week or so."

So, How Important Is Reaching 100% on Acid3? That Depends...

...on who you ask. The MozillaZine Forums hosted a heated discussion of this topic earlier this month when Acid3 was introduced. MozillaZine poster "Euchre" summarizes the problem with standards-based testing versus real-world web pages:

I don't think the Acid tests are the be-all, end-all measure of a browser - but they do showcase how thoroughly and completely a browser can handle standards based behaviors. I haven't seen a person try to make a test for NONstandard behaviors. Maybe that would be a better way to make all browsers fall into the same line of function?

The "What is the Best Browser?" page at Tech-Faq.com provides background information on rendering engines and the browsers that use them.

Stop Running Safari on Windows! You're Violating the EULA!

Hardly anyone ever reads the end-user license agreement (EULA) for software, and sometimes that statement also applies to software developers themselves. The Italian IT website setteB.IT reports that the license agreement for Apple's Safari browser "allows you to license and use one copy of the Apple Software on a single Apple-labeled computer at a time." Oops! The ChannelRegister website displays a screengrab of the License Agreement window to prove it.

According to an attorney interviewed for the ChannelRegister website, though, Apple can't enforce an "impossibility issue." That's good news for the two or three users out there who really take EULAs seriouly, but bad news for Apple Computer decal and sticker sellers who could have made a killing converting PCs into "Apple-labeled computers."  After the pummeling Apple's taken for the sneaky way it's pushing Safari 3.1 to Windows users, you'd think Steve Jobs and Co would be trying to avoid any more bad news. But wait! There's more!

No Need to Go on a "Safari" to Find Safari Security Flaws

How can you tell when a browser's made the big time? When security researchers start looking for - and finding - security flaws in the browser. The browser is Safari 3.1, and Argentinian security expert Juan Pablo Lopez Yacubian has discovered two major vulnerabilities:

•  
  • A JavaScript vulnerability that can inject fake content into a page
  • A memory access error that can be triggered by attempting to download a ZIP file with a very long filename, causing the browser to crash.

The JavaScript vulnerability could allow an attacker to display a legitimate URL in the address bar while the actual website being visited could install malware or phish for personal information. Until these problems are fixed with an update, better stay away from unknown websites, or, as our own Will Smith says, "think before you click."