Why Is Firefox Running Slow - Why Firefox Is Slow And How To Fix It

Have you been using Firefox for quite some time and lately noticed that it is running slow? The loading of pages takes longer than usual and sometimes it just hangs. You've checked your internet connection but there is nothing wrong there. Everything else works perfectly fine yet Firefox is still running slow. The problem here lies in your Windows registry. The registry is the central storage for all settings of your operating system and installed applications. It contains information that Windows continually references during operation. It is the heart and brain of your system that is why registry errors have a tremendous effect on your computer's operation including that of Firefox.

Every time you open your browser, a record is logged in the registry. Over time, it will contain loads of Firefox related files and processes. Most of them become redundant and obsolete causing the registry to be congested thus the reason why Firefox is running slow. Windows doesn't automatically clean these invalid entries because there is no internal tool which does this task. In order to speed up your Firefox browser, you must first take all the junk from your registry.

One way to do this is manually. If you are very sharp with computers then you can manually sift through the registry and get rid of the invalid and redundant browser related files. Others may find that reinstalling Windows can perform the trick by giving you a clean slate.

But for the complete computer novice, I recommend getting a registry cleaner. With the right software you can scan your computer and speed up Firefox in minutes. Not only will you not have to ask why Firefox is slow, your entire system will be turbo charged.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com/Article/Why-Is-Firefox-Running-Slow---Why-Firefox-Is-Slow-And-How-To-Fix-It/1385886

Firefox Web Browser - A Users Guide

firefox blue Wallpaper
 
If you want a secure, stable and fast browser then you need to look no further than Firefox. Whether your new to Firefox or a current user looking for some tricks or tips you should find this article helpful.

You can run Firefox browser alongside other browsers such as IE and Chrome, so you can keep your existing browsers while you take it for a test drive. You download Firefox by simply going to their website and downloading it and following the install instructions.

When opening a new window, it is a good idea to use the 'tab' option as this will enable you to have many pages on one window, which is easier to navigate instead of having many windows. When you enter the URL of the site you wish to visit it is unnecessary to enter www. or http:// as just the name followed by.com or whatever else is the domain ending, e.g EzineArticles.com will suffice.

If you're searching for a website you can use the address bar to do a search much like you do when using Google. just type in the keywords and it'll look for websites that relate to the keywords. If your not sharing your internet connection with others then you can customize Firefox to get the full speed it can from the connection, follow these steps:

Type about:config in the Firefox address bar. Press enter and then ok. Next type network.http in the Filter box the and double click network.http.pipelining, next double click again on network.http.proxy.pipelining.

Then double click on network.http.pipelining and type 30 in the dialogue box and enter.. Find an empty spot in the configuration settings and right-click then select New- Integer. Here make the the new entry nglayout.initialpaint.delay and make it a value of number 0. Lastly click on x to exit Firefox. Your Firefox browser should now be faster at loading pages. I hope you have found the tips in this article beneficial.

Article Source: http://www.articledashboard.com/Article/Firefox-Web-Browser---A-Users-Guide/1736055

Firefox web 3D engine fosters image theft bug

An industry standard graphics engine recently added to Mozilla's Firefox browser allows attackers to surreptitiously steal any image displayed on a Windows or Mac computer just by visiting a booby-trapped website, security researchers have warned. The vulnerability, reported Thursday by UK-based Context Information Security, is unique to Mozilla's implementation of the 3D-accelleration API known as WebGL, but researchers with the firm said it's related to serious design flaws in the cross-platform technology. The report comes five weeks after Context first warned of data-theft and denial-of-service threats in WebGL, which is also built into Google Chrome and developer versions of Opera and Apple's Safari.
Screen shot from Context report

Apple on Thursday announced that iPhones and iPads will offer limited support for the technology when iOS 5 is released later this year.

The report, coincidentally or otherwise, came the same day researchers from Microsoft's Security Research Center published a brief analysis titled "WebGL Considered Harmful" that concurred that it suffers from a variety of weaknesses that will be hard to fix.

"The security of WebGL as a whole depends on lower levels of the system, including OEM drivers, upholding security guarantees they never really need[ed] to worry about before," the Microsoft critique stated. "Attacks that may have previously resulted only in local elevation of privilege may now result in remote compromise. While it may be possible to mitigate these risks to some extent, the large attack surface exposed by WebGL remains a concern."

Microsoft products that implemented WebGL would have a tough time passing the company's rigorous Security Development Lifecycle, the analysis added. Microsoft has instead relied on a home-grown technology known as Direct3D to make graphics faster in its applications. A Context representative said Microsoft didn't commission the Context report. A Microsoft spokeswoman declined to say if Microsoft provided any support. 

Exposing GPU memory to world+dog

The Context researchers have developed a proof-of-concept exploit that allows an attacker to steal images displayed on computers that do nothing more than use a current version of Firefox on a WebGL-enabled machine to browse a site with a malicious payload. The attack works by "spraying" memory in the computer's graphics card to collect data that's already been processed.

"The vulnerability we discovered enables any graphics image that has been displayed on the system to be stolen by an attacker by reading unitialised data from graphics memory," the Context report stated. "This is not limited to WebGL content but includes other web pages, a user's desktop and other applications." A video included with the report shows images from an encrypted session on LinkedIn.com being stolen from a computer running Apple's OS X. The exploit also works against PCs running Microsoft Windows.

A spokeswoman for Mozilla said the vulnerability will be fixed with the introduction of Firefox 5, due next week. A statement issued by representatives of Khronos, the firm that acts as the gatekeeper for the WebGL standard, said that the threat "is due to a bug in Firefox's WebGL implementation, and cannot be generalized across other browsers' WebGL implementations." The Context report raised other concerns about the security and stability of WebGL, including the failure of both Firefox and Chrome to pass a suite of conformance tests that prove their implementations adhere to official specifications.

"Between disparate platforms the browser must be exposing some aspect of the underlying graphics implementation to the web page for problems to arise, even if it is something trivial such as incorrect return values," the report concluded. The Context researchers also found problems in a previously-released extension designed to mitigate the effects of vulnerabilities that make it easy for websites to completely crash machines that have WebGL enabled. So far, only graphics cards made by NVidia support the GL_ARB_robustness extension, and even then it doesn't work on machines running Windows XP, the Context researchers claimed. Mozilla has responded with a forthcoming GL_ARB_robustness_2 extension, further calling into question the effectiveness of the current extension, they added.

The Khronos spokesman's statement said: "All browser vendors are still working toward passing the WebGL conformance suite. Only once they have successfully done so can they claim support of Canvas.getContext("webgl") instead of Canvas.getContext("experimental-webgl")." The statement continued: "Browser vendors are still in the process of supporting the GL_ARB_robustness extension, so it is expected that the previously reported denial-of-service issues are still present. It is expected that the reported denial-of-service issues will be solved with the integration of this extension."
 
Still in its adolescence

A Google spokesman said that Chrome doesn't run WebGL on some system configurations when lower level stack issues are identified and that many parts of WebGL, including the GPU process, run in separate processes that are sandboxed in the browser to help prevent the kinds of attacks described by Context.

Context researchers recommend users disable WebGL in both Firefox and Chrome, while the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team has suggested administrators review the Context findings and "update their systems as necessary to help mitigate the risks."

The two reports from Context, and the responses from Khronos, strongly suggest that WebGL is still in its adolescence and will require a more work among browser makers and hardware manufacturers for it to become mature. Disabling WebGL is probably an overreaction. Then again, at this early stage, users who turn it off probably aren't missing much. For those who decide to forgo the benefits of WebGL, Context's report provides step-by-step instructions for turning off the graphics-acceleration interface in both Firefox and Chrome.
 
News Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/06/16/webgl_security_threats_redux/ 

How to Switch to Firefox and Why You should

First things first, what is Firefox? Well, it's a browser. Ok but what's that? A browser is a computer program used to view web pages, to browse through the world wide web. In fact you are reading this article with a browser at the moment. Browsers are very useful. For a start, they can remember what pages you have looked at, you can even store your favourite pages as Bookmarks. Browsers can do much more depending on which one you have.

Firefox is a free browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation. The Mozilla Foundation develops open source software. Another excellent application is Thunderbird, an email program.

More than likely you are using Internet Explorer to view this webpage. This browser is part of Microsoft Windows operating system. To check which browser you are using:

    Click on the Help in your browsers menu bar. (It's the last option on the right hand side, after File, Edit...)
    Click on the last option in the menu that appears.

If it says Microsoft Internet Explorer® then you have the browser that between 80% and 90% (depending on who you talk to) use.

So why change?

Security: Most experts agree that you are less likely to be the subject of a malicious attack by "hackers" if you use Firefox than if you use Internet Explorer.

Firefox Extensions: There is a whole array of quick and easy to install extensions available for Firefox. Extensions add functionality to your browser. They are a bit like the added extras that you get with your car (except they're free!). Everything from Ad blockers to your local weather forecast.

Tabbed browsing: Instead of opening your browser more than once to view more than one page at a time, which can slow down your computer, tabbed browsing allows you to open many web pages, in tabs, in only one browser.

So how do you get the Firefox browser?

    Click on this link to go to the Firefox download page.
    In the top right corner of the page is a green area with a link to the free download.
    When the dialog box appears, click save.
    Select a location to download the file to.
    The file should start downloading to the location you selected.
    When the file has finished downloading, (it should be called something like Firefox Setup 1.0.5.exe) double click on it to open it.
    If you have Windows XP service pack 2 is installed, a dialog box may appear. Select execute.
    After Firefox has extracted, click next.
    Click on the radio button beside 'I accept the terms of the License Agreement' and then click on the next button.
    The standard installation is fine so just click on the next button.
    This screen just confirms the location that Firefox is to installed, so just click on the next button again.
    Click Finish to complete the installation and launch Firefox.

Source: http://goo.gl/j5Kss

Mozilla Firefox Breaks World Record

Mozilla Firefox 3.0, the resurgent browser developer has come of age with its latest offering. The new browser has been downloaded well over 8 million times in 24 hours as against the developer's target of 5 million and has entered the Guinness Book of World Records for maximum number of downloads in a single day of download history. There was overwhelming support, both from the United States and the Euro zone with downloads in excess of 2.5 million apiece.

The response for the finished Mozilla browser is largely on account of meticulous care the foundation has taken in providing solutions to expert suggestions. The new version was delivered after three and half years of extensive research and development which included of six months of public testing. The highly mutated form of earlier versions of the browser is set to change the way users organize and search the sites, they frequent more often. Back in late 1990's, the Netscape, the first browser developer virtually lost out to Microsoft's Internet Explorer, but with the third avatar of Firefox, they are making an attempt to garner the past glory.

After America Online took over Netscape, they created a non-profit Mozilla Foundation in 2003. The first offering from them, the Firefox, itself was able to catch the imagination of the internet buffs. It is estimated, Firefox has 200 million users worldwide prior to the launch of the new version and the numbers are still growing rapidly. Millions of users had downloaded Firefox and started using the browser in lieu of the default browser Internet Explorer clearly indicates its user-friendliness and application.

The new Firefox 3.0 browser is faster than Firefox 2.0. The latest versions of Internet Explorer, which has 75% share among the web users and other leading browser developers including Opera and Safari do not match the speed rendered by the latest Firefox version. Like its earlier version, this too has added security features to expunge any misuse. It has in-built features to instantly detect phishing and malware forays. Moreover, one's computer's resources are less drained while navigating on the internet with Firefox 3.0.

Consequently, Microsoft also unveiled the public test version of the latest edition of Internet Explorer, version 8.0. So far Firefox 3.0 has no competitor in terms of effectiveness and efficiency to strike any comparison. But the fine tuned edition of Internet Explorer which is expected to be released by the end of this year may become a potential competitor in the e-space. It is learned that even Apple's Safari browser has shrugged off its previous image of providing surf solutions to its own devices, and would be extending its compatible browsing services to other devices as well.

Stiff challenges in future is likely to improve the efficiency of browsers especially the subsequent versions of Firefox, which already offers exploring of multiple tabs or windows, complex pages and lots of embedded content without crashing. The exciting response on the download of new version, the most customizable browser ever to hit the net will certainly prompt the Mozilla Foundation to improve on.

Source: http://goo.gl/XgxVu