Firefox vs Chromium
Recently I read some reviews saying the Google Chrome uses a lot of RAM, and some even prefer Firefox on Android rather than Google Chrome. Nonetheless, recently I am using Chromium for browsing more frequently than Firefox. Then I found there are a lot of differences which make me feel that each of them has its uniqueness and advantage. Depending on the users need, each browser can do the things that are totally different.
Evernote in Linux
Previously, I used Zotero to take note all my favourite quotes, academic studies, and some other information discovered when surfing net. Recently, when using Zotero in my academic writing, I found that it is messy due to those non-academic notes. This makes me feel that my Zotero is not purely academic. As a result, I want to purge my Zotero notes to make it purely academic for citation. In order to achieve this plan, I have to move my non-academic notes to somewhere which is similar to Zotero that allows synchronisation, taking note from the web (using web browser), automatically stating date and time, URL, and allows writing extra notes. At the end, I have no better choice but Evernote.
Firefox and the variants
With the recent update of Pale Moon, I found a trouble with Pale Moon. That is the problem of FoxyProxy Standard addon on Pale Moon. Actually it is a known issue of the incompatibility. Thus, I think soon I will stop using Pale Moon.
Similarly, GNU IceCat (in Arch Linux) has a little difference from Firefox. It can be obviously noticed when using Google Search, there is no instant search. This is because of the user agent showing that the browser is IceCat instead of Firefox. By changing the default user agent to Firefox, then IceCat can use the Google Instant Search. However, with the recent update (in Arch Linux AUR), IceCat user agent is now Firefox.
Firefox, IceCat, Pale Moon
As my favourite web browser, Firefox, with the powerful extensions, (in my opinion) no other web browser is better than it. There are a lot of web browsers based on Chromium or using WebKit engine. Namely Google Chrome (based on Chromium), Opera (WebKit engine), Safari (WebKit engine), Konqueror (KDE web browser), Epiphany (currently called Web, GNOME web browser), and other less popular web browsers such as Midori, QupZilla, etc.
However, Firefox uses another layout engine, that is Gecko. That is why the rendering of the webpages may have some differences comparing to the WebKit engine. For the web developers, they can always see the differences.
FlashGot: Firefox extension
The main reason that I am still using Firefox instead of Google Chrome, is because I need those extensions, which Google Chrome cannot support.
FlashGot, this is one of my favourite extensions (add-ons). Previously, FlashGot does not help me a lot for my surfing experience. This is because FlashGot only provides the feature that we can use external download utilities, instead of built-in download from Firefox itself.
So, what is the strength now? It is able to grab the flash video file: flv or f4v. Yes, I can download the video from YouTube using FlashGot. Previously, I need to use DownloadHelper to do so, but now, FlashGot itself is able to handle this problem.
Moonlight: Silverlight alternative for Linux
Recently, I visited the China website for listening some songs using Firefox 7.0, and found that I need a plugin called Moonlight, since I am using Linux.
So, this Moonlight is the Silverlight alternative for Linux. If you visit the website such as 1ting.com, then this is what you need.
However, Moonlight xpi file is not compatible to Firefox 7.0. Thus, some modifications towards the xpi file is needed. If using Arch Linux, it is available in AUR (submitted by me).