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Shiira 2.0 makes a good Safari replacement
We last mentioned the Shiira web browser for Macs in August of last year, when the first beta iteration of Shiira 2.0 was released. Since then,Shiira 2.0 has hit full release status, and is succeeding at fulfilling its mission statement: "Shiira is a web browser based on Web Kit and written in Cocoa. The goal of the Shiira Project is to create a browser that is better and more useful than Safari. All source code used in this software is publicly available." (Emphasis added.)So, what's to like about Shiira? Firstly, it looks fantastic, and seems to belong on the Mac desktop. Firefox has come a long way in terms of looking more like an actual Mac app when running on a Mac, but it doesn't approach the seamless Mac look and feel provided by Safari, whereas Shiira does.
Probably one of the best things about using Safari on a Mac is how speedy it is at rendering pages compared to most other browsers, and most notably the pokey Firefox. Shiira may not be quite as quick as Safari, but it's definitely in Safari's class; you won't notice much of a difference between the two.
Shiira's claim to fame is the natural way it handles tabs, whether you choose the new Page Dock interface or the more traditional tabs. Shiira was clearly designed from the ground up as a tabbed browser, and it shows. In addition to elegant handling of tabs, Shiira throws in a bit of bling: you can hit F8 to show an Expose-style view of your open tabs. Our favorite feature of Shiira is the full-screen mode. You can hit Option-Command-F and switch to a kiosk-like full screen mode, showing absolutely no browser chrome at all. Great stuff.
Shiira is a free Mac download.
Comments
3
Subscribe to commentsrinksJun 4th 2007 2:19PM
I don't like Firefox on the mac- it's freakin' slow. But it runs Google's Docs and whatnot, and it has Delicious support. Does this have either?
Wolfman-KJun 7th 2007 2:47PM
Agreed, Firefox is a dog in OS X and it beats the crap out of your resources, especially with lots of tabs open. But its got grease monkey, Delicious plug ins, and support for all the Ajaxy goodness of the web. Until the others get that (Safari included) Firefox will still be my main browser.
Jason ClarkeJun 7th 2007 4:31PM
@Wolfman-K - yep, you nailed it. I can't get away from Firefox (although I use BonEcho and it's marginally better performance-wise) due to the reasons you cited.