Standard browser not displayed in preview pan

[rodiusd]

WeBuilder2011:
We have a four standard browsers setup. When requesting an internal preview only the IE & FF browser buttons are show.
Do we miss some configuration here?

[x3po]

Go to Options > Configure Browsers...

[FrankC]

Go to Options > Configure Browsers...

I have 4 browsers configured there. Should they all have a preview knob, or is that reserved for IE and FF?

[davenz]

Hi FrankC

No, four browsers won't create four preview options within WeBuilder's preview area. The internal preview is based either (I think) on the currently-installed Trident engine (Internet Explorer) which covers all the IE-based browsers or the optionally-installed Mozilla control which represents Firefox based browsers. I agree it is slightly limiting having only those two, but most HTML editors only have one, if they have preview at all. I have found that properly coded pages will show well in both views and those pages will then also render fine in my default browser (Opera 12) and the other browsers I have installed and configured in WB (Comodo Dragon/Chrome and Aurora/Firefox). I can see how the page looks by hitting F2 (or F10 on my machine,shortcuts which can be assigned in Options, Keyboard shortcuts), which opens the currently-edited page in Opera or alternatively by selecting Tools, Preview In.. to preview in any other added stand-alone browser.

I think it would be too difficult to integrate the different browser engines into WeBuilder and considering those engines are constantly tweaked and updated, we would always have to be updating WeBuilder as well. I imagine the IE preview uses the current installed version of Internet Explorer because programming-wise is easier to incorporate that in in third-party tools like WB and the Mozilla control, while not updated as regularly as the browser, still retains the core functionality and behaviours of that browser (and others based upon the Mozilla core) so pages previewed in those two controls should be fine for all available 'real' versions of the browsers.

WeBuilder is not without its quirks, but compared to other tools I have tried is is very intuitive and a dream to use. The pages I have made with is have been far better than those I didn't simply because I am forced to use proper, standards compliant code, which means the pages look as similar as possible in all browsers.

Welcome to the forums by the way.

[FrankC]

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the reply.

I don't mind that WeBuilder only previews in IE and FF mode. I was just wondering whether it was by design or by bug that I had only two browser knobs in the preview pane while I had configured four. It is indeed true that only very few code editors have a preview option. In fact, I only know two that have IE and FF preview mode, of which one is WeBuilder. It is even so that not even one WYSIWYG editor has a - real - preview. The pretend to have it, but they don't parse javascript, for starters.

And I agree that if a site renders correctly in FF (and IE), the rendering generally is OK in Chrome and Safari, too. (I don't test in Opera because that is hardly used over here.) It would be a good thing, however, if WeBuilder's FF preview would be updated from its current FF 1.7 engine(!), which would seem well doable with the Mozilla XUL Runner application: https://developer.mozilla.org/en/XULRun ... ease_Notes. FF versions earlier than 3.0 have some serious issues (I've come across faulty float rendering), which make the preview unreliable.

With that, and an improved/debugged Auto Complete/Call Words function, I think WeBuilder will become The Ultimate Code Editor!

[davenz]

Hi again FrankC

Can I ask where is 'here'? I am in Christchurch, New Zealand (only five earthquakes today!)

Opera is the most standards compliant browser there is, painfully so because many sites look criminally bad in it; the thing is if something doesn't view properly in it, it isn't coded to standards, which means if my site looks OK in Opera, it's a good bet it should look fine in everything else. You wouldn't believe how some sites by so-called professional developers render in Opera (though you probably would!). I use it because it is very fast, very secure, incredibly configurable, has both voice and spatial (mouse gesture) navigation, is lightweight, supports all the latest web standards and to my knowledge is the only browser to score 100 in the acid3 test out of the box with standard settings; (the current beta build has let the side down by slipping to 97/100 - Internet Explorer currently scores 12/100 (!) and Firefox Aurora (a new beta build of Firefox) scores a pretty excellent 90/100). Opera includes a very good built-in email client (and chat for those who use such things) and is generally bloody excellent. I have used it since version 1 and though it has its moments, I can't use anything else. The features I am so used to simply don't exist on other browsers and there are no extensions or add-ins to cover them, so I'll stick with this one. In cases at work where I am forced to use Internet Explorer I cannot for the life of me figure out how people put up with it.

The Mozilla control is a sticking point and we would all like to see it updated to the latest core. However, several people here have already tried to incorporate the XUL runner controls and other programming pixie dust but have only succeeded partially in updating it. I agree it is extremely buggy and probably gives WeBuilder an unfair reputation as being buggy as well but to be hones most crashes I have submitted bug reports for have been Mozilla control related. As far as I am aware it is extremely difficult to incorporate other engines into applications, especially since frequent updates can greatly change things around and if, like Blumentals, software developers use these engines in their programs, they too would be having to keep up and end up spending half their application development time trying to accommodate the constant shifts in thinking that goes with browser engine development. In that respect also they have to put up with whatever crumbs the browser developers want to throw to others, especially when the engine behind the browser is proprietary and thus commercially sensitive. Blumentals use that version of the control because that's all that is available save reverse engineering the latest Firefox and using their core for it, which I'm not sure they'd be too keen on.

Anyway, glitches aside, WeBuilder is already better than most I've used so full marks to the devs and full speed ahead.

Cheers

Internet Explorer- The best damn browser around for downloading a better browser.

[FrankC]

Hi Dave,

"Here" is in the Netherlands.

You wrote: "As far as I am aware it is extremely difficult to incorporate other engines into applications". I don't know much about that, but why would that not apply to Internet Explorer? It seems to me that Webuilder just loads in the IE engine that is installed on the machine in question?

(About the improvements I suggested, I meant Auto Replace, i.e. a before + after caret option in the Auto Replace editor, just as in the Library editor. I will also enter this under Requests.)

[davenz]

Hi Frank

The Netherlands is a nice place. Europe in general sports more Opera users than anywhere else funnily enough.

I agree with you about the auto-replace improvements, make a feature request and it may be implemented.

The reason Internet Explorer's Trident engine is so easy to integrate into other tools is because it has been developed as part of the Windows core and already used within Windows, so calling the relevant APIs and other code and using it in an application is far easier than, say, using Opera's rendering engine, which would have to be pulled out and developed to run as a stand-alone engine, just like the Mozilla/XULrunner control and no one can do that (legally) but Opera. Even if they did, a license would likely have to be paid for it's commercial use and that would hike the price of WeBuilder which is probably why Blumentals stick with what is currently available. Mind you, I could also be full of you-know-what and this is nothing like what is going on at all.

Regardless of what I think, hopefully someone in the Mozilla group will update that control at some stage; if I could, I would, but I can barely code HTML so that type of programming is way beyond my simple mind.

Have a good one.

[FrankC]

I agree with you about the auto-replace improvements, make a feature request and it may be implemented.

I just posted it under Request. Assuming the folks at Blumentals don't read all the discussions, please consider lending support to it under the post.

a license would likely have to be paid for [XUL Runner's] commercial use

Would it? The Mozilla web page that I linked gives the impression that it is a for-free service, in my eyes. And Firefox now standard comes with an xul.dll in its root folder. It would just seem to be a matter of tuning WeBuilder into it, even though I cannot write much else than web design language either.

hopefully someone in the Mozilla group will update that control at some stage

They already did. In fact, the preview inclusion up to version 1.7 was done with an ActiveX control that was written by someone else. Only a few years ago did someone at/for Mozilla write a successor, in the form of the XUL. Which already for a while now is available in a version that resembles Firefox 3. Maybe it is indeed difficult to implement, I don't know. But in that case, Blumentals should consider removing the Firefox preview. Better none than an unreliable one, I would think. Anyhow, they should clarify the matter in the Help file.

Having said all that, I still think WeBuilder has the best chance of becoming The Ultimate Code Editor.

[davenz]

FrankC

My apologies for being vague; I meant Opera would likely charge for use of their internals if they offered such a thing, but they don't so they won't. Mozilla would never charge a fee for theirs.

I also meant updating the XUL control to the very latest Firefox build in a way it could bi integrated within WeBuilder (for a preview of Mozilla's latest and greatest check out the Aurora beta project; that is going to be a seriously good browsing engine).

The Mozilla control is a sticking point for some in WeBuilder, however as far as I know it is an optional install for those who want to deal with the quirks it introduces. It isn't perfect and I have several ways I can crash it on demand, however I just work around those procedures (which isn't difficult as they are not 'natural' work flow anyway) because I like having the facility to check using both engines. My coding is lame enough that even simple things like centring an item using CSS takes me ages and find that often what works with Firefox/Mozilla just doesn't using IE, so it forces me to learn to code for both, which can't be a bad thing from that perspective. Of course, we shouldn't have to if certain vendors stuck to agreed web standards, but they still want to wag the dog by the tail, no matter how compliant they claim IE to be.

I'm heading over to the request forum now to see what's happening there.

Cheers

[briancolton1]

I think opera does its best job for web browsing, that's how i think & I think Google chorme is much better than other !