Do You Like Tabs on Top or Bottom?

[Rob Williams]

Being a long-time Mozilla Firefox user, the first time I gave Google's Chrome browser a shot, I felt myself lost. You wouldn't think that a small aesthetics change would be a big deal, but if you're familiar with a certain configuration, and use it day in and day out, even the smallest of changes can throw you for a loop and make the new experience less-than-comfortable.

Read the rest of our news post here and discuss it here!

 

[Tharic-Nar]

I find it kind of weird that you’ve had the tabs on the bottom. Every time I install Firefox, they’ve always been on top, from version 1.0 and up, they’ve never been on the bottom for me, never even seen the option for them to be on the base.

As for the switch from FireFox to Chrome, it’s a consideration of mine as well. Firefox since 3.0 or 3.5, has been heavily bloated at the best of times and very unstable the worst of times (excluding Flash). They’ve been doing some strange things that has resulted in page load times increasing significantly, app startup can be a few minutes when a lot of tabs are saved, websites that use javascript bloat memory to 600mb+ and the patches break plugin compatibility frequently. I don’t know if a lot of the blame can be placed on the javascript engine, since that was the major change from 2.0 to 3.0, and it’s the engine that keeps getting refined with patches etc. With version 4, they’re dropping the current engine and swapping to a hybrid based on the current engine and the one used by Safari.

I guess the poor old fox isn’t as quick and fiery as it used to be... probably jumped over too many lazy dogs.

 

[b1lk1]

I cannot even comprehend the idea of switching from Firefox myself. I have 0 issues with it here, although I never even think about comparing it speedwise to any other browser since I refuse to use any other browser. I have it set up just the way I like it and I am most definitely a creature of habit so making such major changes really are not part of my thought process. I am also becoming very anti-Google as I do not trust the sheer size of them and the amount of information they strive to suck out of you at every turn. I realize this is somewhat of a tinfoil fat view, but it is my view.

One thing I have noticed about Firefox stability issues. As long as your initial install goes well. It almost always will run perfect for the lifetime of your current OS install. If the initial install has problems and you do have stability issues with it, nothing short of a fresh OS install will fix it.

 

[Psi*]

I too have used Firefox for a few years and never realized that there is an option for putting tabs on the bottom. But, had I, I wouldn't have used the option.

I usually run the browser full screen height with width no wider than necessary for a full page view ... some web pages need a little more width than others & sometimes it is easier just to go full screen to see the whole page.

I also "Auto-hide the taskbar". Occasional picking close to the bottom, usually result in an over run & the taskbar slides up. *Annoyance* ... as it takes a moment to slide back down again. So, no tabs on the bottom!

Coincidently I also started using Chrome ~3 weeks ago when my normal communication box died. I had installed Chrome on the machine I am on now a couple of years ago, but never used it on the net. Now, it is the daily drive. I just noticed that Chrome creates a separate process for each tab ... hmmm ...

 

[Kougar]

Actually, I put my tabs on the far left and stacked vertically. It's more convenient and uses my 1920x1200 widescreen display much more efficiently so I scroll the windows much much less often when web browsing. Not to mention scrolling tabs is a thing of the past.

I only found one Firefox app/skin combo that actually imitated my default layout, but it was missing enough features (and broke with incremental build updates) that I stuck with Opera. This layout just works perfectly, to the point I even dislike using Firefox for more than ~5+ tabs.

I find it kind of weird that you’ve had the tabs on the bottom. Every time I install Firefox, they’ve always been on top, from version 1.0 and up, they’ve never been on the bottom for me, never even seen the option for them to be on the base.

It could have been worded less ambiguously, but he means the tabs are moved from below the address bar + bookmarks toolbar to above them. In the upcoming version of Firefox they will be moved to the very top of the window... What is funny is this small change annoyed the hell out of me as well, and put me off of Chrome fairly fast.