So this happened last week, and I’m just getting around to posting it, but it’s still a big deal. Firefox Beta 3 was released. You can download it here, and check out the release notes here. It’s noted that this is a test version and not recommended for public consumption. If you’re interested, check out the known issues so far.

Seems like there are still lots of bugs, so it’s probably not quite ready for release. Still, Beta is a good sign. I have only heard good things about version 3 so far. I can’t wait to test it, but I’m not quite ready to give it a try yet. If you find any bugs, be sure to report them.

I have been looking for a source for stats on browser marketshare, and what do you know, I’ve found it. There is a site called Market Share that apparently publishes this information on a monthly basis. So now I have some concrete information to go on. In fact you can see September 2007 browser stats here. Here is a snippet of info.

Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 - 42.75%
Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0 - 34.60%
Firefox 2.0 - 13.57%
Safari 41 - 3.91%

As you can see, IE7 is still second to IE6 with Firefox coming in far behind in third. So if you ever doubt that you need to check your work in IE6, it is still the most used browser out there.

Update - 10/16/07: Microsoft is issuing an automatic update today that will install IE 7. We should be able to see the effects of this if we watch the browser stats in the next few months.

On Tuesday of this week, Michael Arrington of TechCrunch pointed out on the TechCrunch blog that Wal-Mart had mistakes in the code of their brand new video site that prevented the CSS from loading in Firefox. The blog post has a screenshot of what it looked like. It would appear that whoever designed the site did not even check it in Firefox before launch, and reportedly the mistakes were easily fixable.

Well, today I just went to the site and found something that you will not believe. Not only has Wal-Mart not fixed the site, they put in a browser sniffer to shut all other browsers, except IE, out completely. Now if you go to the site, http://www.walmart.com/videodownloads, you see this message:

Our website requires the browser Internet Explorer version 6 or higher. It appears that you are using Firefox, Safari, or another browser that Wal-Mart Video Downloads doesn’t currently support.

So, rather than fix their mistake, which was apparently easily fixable, they decide to just say screw it and support no other browsers except Microsoft? I guess I should expect this from them, but come on. Wal-Mart is not living in the stone ages here. They are trying to compete with the likes of Netflix and iTunes. This is in effect a slap in the face to Firefox and Safari users, who in fact just might be the types of people that would use an online video downloading service, the very people you would think they would be trying to target.

Maybe the question we should be asking here is Wal-Mart somehow in bed with Microsoft on this?

Update: It appears Wal-Mart has taken the site down altogether. Now if you go to the site it says,

Site Temporarily Unavailable
The Wal-Mart Video Downloads store is currently unavailable due to temporary site maintenance. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Please try again later.

It looks like all this attention provoked some action on their part. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Update 2: Now it’s back to what it said at first when you look at it in Firefox.

Unsupported Browser
We’re sorry …
Our website requires the browser Internet Explorer version 6 or higher. It appears that you are using Firefox, Safari, or another browser that Wal-Mart Video Downloads doesn’t currently support. Click here to get Internet Explorer for free from Microsoft.

Thank You

If you use Firefox and you are a designer, you should be using ColorZilla, which is an add-on for Firefox. ColorZilla adds an eyedropper icon into the status bar at the bottom of your browser. When you click on it, the arrow turns into a crosshairs while you move it around on the screen. The cool part is that it displays the hexadecimal values in the status bar for whatever color the item is you are hovering on. In addition, it displays the RGB values, plus the CSS selector for the item.

It’s very useful because it will tell you color values right from from your browser, and it even works on images and backgrounds. There are many times when I want to color match something, or I am too lazy to fire up Photoshop and use the eyedropper tool. It really is a huge time saver. So, download ColorZilla today and get using it, if you aren’t already.

I ran across an excellent Firefox plug-in today if you design or build a lot of web sites. It could actually be used for print as well.

Doing web site builds, I always need Lorem Ipsum, or dummy text, to fill out the content areas of the sites I am building. A while back, I found a web site that I normally use for generating Lorem Ipsum text, http://www.lipsum.com/.

It works very well. But, whenever I use it, I have to search for the web site in Google. Then, I run the program that generates the text. Then, I copy and paste the text in my web page. It works very well. But, I remembered hearing about a plug-in for Firefox that generated Lorem Ipsum text.

Today, I decided rather than go through all those steps again, I would try to find the plug-in and see how well it works. Well, I found it and after trying it out, I think it works great!

The plug-in, LoremIpsum Content Generator, can be found at https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/198/. Once you download and install the plug-in to Firefox, it is very easy to use. Just go to the tools menu, and click on the generate Lorem Ipsum text option. There it brings up a window which gives you several options. You can generate text by character, words or paragraphs. After that, all you have to do is click the button to copy the text to the clipboard and paste it into your work.

I recommend this plug-in to anyone who uses Lorem Ipsum text on a daily basis. I think you will it is a small step but is worth it to increase your productivity!