acid3

HTML gurus modernize Acid3 browser test

Two browser experts have pared back Acid3, a test that browser standards fans held up to spotlight Internet Explorer's shortcomings, so the test won't hold back development of those standards.

Ian Hickson, editor of the HTML specification, and Håkon Wium Lie, chief technology officer of browser maker Opera, decided to make the change, and Hickson announced it on Google+ on Saturday.

"Håkon Wium Lie and I are announcing that we have updated the Acid3 test by commenting out the parts of the test that might get changed in the specs," Hickson said. &… Read more

Firefox 3.5: Excellent for fans, but competition getting tougher

Firefox 3.5 brings the world's second-most popular browser up to speed with current browsing technology and trends, and perhaps nudges it just a bit ahead of the competition. However, it is by no means the leap ahead that its predecessor Firefox 3 was, and it's clear that the competition isn't going away anytime soon.

Available for Windows, Windows Portable, Mac, or Linux, Firefox 3.5 nevertheless represents the best Firefox we've yet seen from Mozilla. This comes as no surprise, and with a testing process that involved four beta builds, three release candidates, and a … Read more

Opera 10 alpha: Compliant and faster--but not fastest

A correction was made to this story. See below for details.

Testing Opera 10 alpha confirms it can boast that it's the second browser in development that is fully compliant with the Acid3 benchmarks. It's also markedly faster than Opera 9.62 at processing JavaScript, but it's half as fast as the fastest Web browser currently available.

On both Windows and Mac OS, it was no surprise to see the Acid3 standards test come up 100 out of 100 since that was the big news from Opera Software earlier today. The browser is also three times faster … Read more

Opera 10 alpha claims Acid3 perfection

Thirteen-year-old Opera has been the perennial underdog in the browser wars, but Opera 10 alpha brings some unexpected firepower to the field. Unlike Google Chrome, Firefox 3, or any other browser on the market except for Safari 4 Developer Preview, Opera 10 will comply fully with the Acid3 test, according to the Norwegian publisher.

Expected to be available now for public testing, Opera 10 is powered by an update to its proprietary rendering engine. Presto 2.2 is supposed to be 30 percent faster than Presto 2.1, the engine driving Opera 9.5. Presto 2.2, says the company, … Read more

Chrome tops IE, Firefox in Acid3 test

Google's Chrome browser is outperforming the latest "stable" builds of both Firefox 3 and Internet Explorer 7 in the popular Acid3 test. The Acid test, for those who do not know, tests how well a browser complies with a given set of Web standards. While all three browsers pass the Acid2 test, Chrome currently clocks in at 78 out of 100 on Acid3, while Firefox and IE7 stand at 71 and 14 respectively. The only release quality build to beat Chrome is Opera, which scores an 83.

Even though Google has the stable builds edged out, we … Read more