Working together for standards The Web Standards Project

As the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference kicked off today, Steve Jobs announced the availability of the Safari 3 Public Beta — for both Mac and Windows. Download it here.

I’ve only just installed it on Windows XP, but it has frozen once and crashed once already. There are complaints of blurry fonts and security bugs. It’s not rendering the Acid2 test correctly. (In fact, it’s not rendering the WaSP site correctly either. I assume the same is true on the Mac, but can someone verify?)

Don’t forget to send in your bug reports via the WebKit bug reporting form or the browser itself (Help > Report Bugs to Apple).

Your Replies

#1 On June 12th, 2007 1:31 am Seyora replied:

I’ve been seeing lots of mixed reviews. On my XP SP2, it’s working fine and I have yet to see it crash. Others aren’t so lucky.

The Acid2 test renders fine on my machine.

#2 On June 12th, 2007 1:47 am Sebastian Gräßl replied:

The Mac Version of Safari 3 takes the Acid2 Test without any problems, but the Windows version seems to have really big Problems rendering a page even the search result of google

#3 On June 12th, 2007 2:07 am Dušan Smolnikar replied:

The windows version obviously has some problems with fonts. See this thread for more info and a fix:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=992780&tstart=0

I can confirm that mac version renders pages correctly. acid2 is also shown correctly.

#4 On June 12th, 2007 2:20 am Sebastian Gräßl replied:

I found out that Safari3 for Windows has problems rendering bold fonts. this is the reason why the WaSP site isn’t rendering well

#5 On June 12th, 2007 3:52 am Dušan Smolnikar replied:

Also, safari 3 seems to be the only browser I know of that renders text-shadow in the WASP top-menu. Didn’t even know it was there before.

#6 On June 12th, 2007 4:08 am Safari 3 Beta for Windows — Aja Lapus: Blogging with Standards replied:

[...] Last time when I was reviewing new releases of Windows Web browsers, I was hoping I could get my hands on a Mac—or at least the money to buy one—so I could review Safari as well. But, I don’t think I would be salivating for it any sooner. I was browsing my Live Bookmarks when I saw a post from WaSP announcing the release of Safari 3 Public Beta for Mac and Windows. Yes, you heard it right … Safari’s new public beta is made for Windows as well! [...]

#7 On June 12th, 2007 4:46 am Arjan replied:

I had some problems with Safari on my PC, but after a reboot all is fine, no crashes and no more render errors. The Acid 2 test renders fine.

#8 On June 12th, 2007 5:44 am Nathan Bannister replied:

http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/7245/picture1ai5.jpg

It renders fine on OS X on an C2D MacBook

#9 On June 12th, 2007 5:54 am Christian Sullivan replied:

Acid2 renders perfectly in safari 3 for windows XP.

I am curious, what are the build versions that people are using, has Apple updated already?

My build is Version 3.0 (522.11.3), this was tested on a Mac under Bootcamp

#10 On June 12th, 2007 7:43 am Kenneth Himschoot replied:

rendering it all fine here too, on xp – have to find the first bug yet

#11 On June 12th, 2007 9:05 am Joost de Valk replied:

It’s great at CSS3 though :)

#12 On June 12th, 2007 9:07 am WaSP Member lloydi replied:

Oops. I just went and published a story on here myself, then realised that you’d already beaten me to it, Kimmie (hadn’t spotted in my feeds!). But I thought I’d add some of my points here in the comments anyway:

But what does this mean to the world of web standards? The browser wars were played out a long time ago – does this mean that the ceasefire has been broken? Is it a new front being opened up or is it simply a minor skirmish that the rest of the world can turn a blind eye to?

I don’t have the answers – I was surprised as many people, blindly assuming that Safari would always and ever be a Mac-only piece of software – and I can’t claim to be massively excited about the prospect of using Safari on Windows. Or at least not until such a time as Firefox extensions, such as the indespensible Web Developer Toolbar, can be made to work in Safari but that’s like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. But that said, I think it’s a good thing:

• No more will testing for Safari be left until the last moment (or at all) – finally developers can check their work early on
• If it really is faster to render pages, that can only be good for the user
• Mac users will benefit too, as it will become more difficult to reject support problems on Safari with a simple "Ah but that’s just a certain percentage (Safari users) of an already small percantage of users (Mac users)"

So, what’s your take on this announcement? Exciting? Will it change the browsing landscape massively? Or are you just thinking "meh, whatever".

#13 On June 12th, 2007 9:09 am Safari 3 on Windows // Words and Interwebs replied:

[...] http://www.webstandards.org/2007/06/12/safari-3-public-beta-for-mac-and-windows/ [...]

#14 On June 12th, 2007 10:07 am James replied:

I haven’t come across a single problem on my Mac OS X install of Safari 3.0.

Acid2 renders correctly for me.

I’m hearing through the grapevine that Safari 3.0 for Windows only works perfectly on “Clean installs” of XP.

#15 On June 12th, 2007 10:56 am Safari on Windows | K-Squared Ramblings replied:

[...] Update 4: The Webkit team and Web Standards Project have weighed in. The Windows version of WebKit should be available later today, which will be nice for following progress on issues as it moves from beta toward final version. It turns out there’s a regression and at least the Windows version no longer renders the Acid2 test correctly. Share this link: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]

#16 On June 12th, 2007 11:00 am Kenneth Himschoot replied:

ok, found the first bug; http://www.orr.be renders fine in safari 2; not in safari 3 (both on mac). hmm

#17 On June 12th, 2007 11:51 am Scott Ahten replied:

Both the Windows and Mac OS X version of Safari 3 correctly renders the Acid 2 test. However, there have been reports of installation conflicts on Windows when other third-party applications have been installed.

Acid 2 Screen Shot

Safari 3 also supports additional CSS borders and background properties, which makes creating rounded corner boxes much easier.

CSS3 Goodies – Borders and Backgrounds

CSS 3 Screen Shot

#18 On June 12th, 2007 12:06 pm Ryan Ottele replied:

I have been checking out the Safari 3 beta on the one Windows computer we have in the house and it seems to work fine for me. I had no problems installing it at all and all the plugins seem to work fine for me. I have it on my iBook also and it works just fine over there as well. Acid2 does pass and the website looks fine to me.

#19 On June 12th, 2007 1:26 pm Fyrd replied:

I think it can only be a good thing. It might, MIGHT even encourage Microsoft to work a little harder at improving IE. Especially when you think of how they used to dominate the Mac browser field with IE5/Mac, then ended its support when Safari came along, and now Safari’s sitting in their own back yard, virtually taunting IE with its excellent standards support.

Only thing I raise my brow at is their speed claims…what kind of test puts Opera as the slowest browser for page rendering? And isn’t IE often faster than Firefox?

#20 On June 12th, 2007 1:56 pm Ralph Brandi replied:

The WaSP site renders correctly in Safari 3 on both Windows XP and Mac OS X 10.4.9 for me. There’s a problem with navigation text, but Safari is actually rendering what’s in the CSS properly. The CSS just needs to be updated so that the text-shadow is a different color than the text.

#21 On June 12th, 2007 5:01 pm Kevin replied:

It renders fine in my safari for windows:
http://www.lockergnome.com/nexus/kteck/2007/06/12/safari-for-windows-acid2-test

#22 On June 12th, 2007 6:32 pm WaSP Member lloydi replied:

@James – What is a ‘clean install’ of XP? Does such a beast exist? :p

#23 On June 12th, 2007 9:38 pm La domo de karotoj » Safari 3.0 replied:

[...] La novaĵo de hodiaŭ ŝajne estas, ke Safari 3.0 eldoniĝis. Ĝi estas havebla ne nur por Makintoŝo sed ankaŭ unuaokaze por Vindozo. Tamen ĉe la malbona flanko estas, ke ĝi ne konvene regas la TTT-normojn, almenaŭ ne ĉe la versio vindoza. [...]

#24 On June 13th, 2007 1:12 am Willeisen replied:

Works fine for me on WinXP and MacOS 10.4. No errors yet, and correct Acid2 rendering. All other people I know that have it installed haven’t reported any problems either.

#25 On June 13th, 2007 5:12 am Arun Kumar replied:

Installation and general functioning if fine reg. Safari for Windows Beta. I am really getting to love Safari. I have never had a chance to see a Mac screen, much less play with it, but now I am beginning to understand that Mac should indeed be a very good piece of software.

Coming to bugs, I couldn’t open my gmail login page. Further, on this page, when I move my mouse cursor over these boxes (Name, email, website url) and this reply field, the cursor shows a hand, as if I am picking up a hyperlink. Is this the expected behaviour?

#26 On June 13th, 2007 8:14 am Kenneth Himschoot replied:

google documents are a nogo here and a few usability issues with gmail so far too

#27 On June 13th, 2007 8:28 am Pekka Kivikoski replied:

On an XP SP1 with Safari build 522.11.3 the ACID tests works properly…. but otherwise Safari is hardly rendering any page correctly…and crashes all the time… (e.g. try to view bookmarks folder)

#28 On June 13th, 2007 8:48 am Dominik Schmid replied:

Tested Safari 3 on a box with XP SP2 with the latest security and what-not patches from Mircosoft using the beta Apple released on Monday, NOT using any newer (nightly build) webkit. Result: Acid2 renders perfectly fine. There’s a lot of other websites which render in different states of botchedness, but Acid2 ultimately is not a problem.

#29 On June 13th, 2007 1:15 pm Stan Grabowski replied:

I’m running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2002 SP 2. So far I’ve had nothing but problems with Safari. None of the menus have text on them. The only thing I see is hyphens and some bullets. When I hit the report bug button, the program freezes… I can’t surf because it won’t let me type in the address bar. It’s not even rendering Apple’s site correctly. I can’t tell if fonts are blurry because I can’t see any fonts! None are showing up. Anyone else seeing these problems?
Take a look at this screen shot to see what I’m describing.

#30 On June 13th, 2007 9:05 pm Sultan Qasim Khan replied:

Acid2 renders fine on vista in safari 3 for me – see my

#31 On June 13th, 2007 11:14 pm Patrick Garies replied:

I have the same problem as Stan (comment #29). Safari is completely unusable because I can’t see text in the UI or on Web pages. I wonder if it’s a coincidence that I’m also using Windows XP Media Center Edition 2002 SP2.

#32 On June 14th, 2007 6:42 pm John Wong replied:

You know, I’m having none of the problems you guys are mentioning. The WASP loads fine, the Acid2 test page loads fine, and everything else is fine.

However, my problem is that Safari, on PC at least, loads at the pace of speeding snail. It’s kinda like on being dial-up all over again.

All the other browsers I use load around the same pace (Firefox 2, Opera 9.5, IE7).

#33 On June 14th, 2007 11:42 pm David replied:

I am running XP Pro SP1. Installed Safari today and had no text at all in the task bars and no icons either. The Apple home page and links off those pages render fine. Obviously the install was unusable. This is the only time an install had blank task bars in my experience with this PC.

#34 On June 15th, 2007 2:47 pm Joe S replied:

I installed Safari on my workstation Windows XP pro machine. Acid 2 test is working fine and I have not had any hiccups, crashes or freezes.

#35 On June 15th, 2007 6:57 pm Eric Barbosa replied:

I have 2 macs and installed Safari 3 Beta on both of them, no problems except like post #16 said, the link to http://www.orr.be/ does show incorrectly.

I also wanted to test it on Windows, so I tried it in VMWare, but it got an error before installing saying that it requires Windows Installer 3, and when trying to download that I found out that my Windows had to be genuine, which it is not. :P

So I downloaded it on my Dad’s PC and it runs great. Did not get to test WaSP or acid2 test on that computer though.

#36 On June 16th, 2007 7:26 am Mike replied:

Apple have released Safari for Windows v3.0.1 in a response for all the security issues it had.
They haven’t fixed it all, I see no point in releasing a patch that fixes only half of the security issues..
Read more

#37 On June 16th, 2007 4:14 pm Troy replied:

I’m having the same text problem (i.e. no text at all, anywhere) as #29, #31, and #33. Anyone found a fix?

Somewhere – though I’ve since lost the link – someone mentioned that it may be an issue with having certain fonts installed; if I recall correctly, it was alternative versions of Helvetica. Could that be the common denominator?

I’m running Windows XP Professional SP2, and I’ve heard from others with the same problem running different versions of XP, so I don’t think it’s the OS version that’s causing this.

#38 On June 18th, 2007 4:12 am Joern replied:

The Safari 3 on Mac works perfect and it runs the Acid Test perfektly…

#39 On June 18th, 2007 9:11 am Stan Grabowski replied:

@Troy (#37)
It could be the font, but I know it couldn’t be Helvetica. I don’t have it installed on my computer.

#40 On June 19th, 2007 11:18 am Patrick replied:

Safari 3 works great for me. I haven’t had any of the problems other people have had with it.

It passed the Acid2 test on both Mac and Windows, which isn’t surprising since it has passed it since ’05. Haven’t had any crashes yet, but since it IS a beta and has never been available on Windows I fully expect it to crash at some point, so I don’t plan on abandoning it just yet. :) Safari is noticably faster than Firefox and IE at rendering every page I’ve been to so far. I haven’t tested it against Opera so I can’t comment on that.

For those that want to check out Safari’s plugins and plugin support you can go to pimpmysafari.com. There are quite a few plugins available for it, though I haven’t tried loading any of them on my XP version of Safari yet so I have no idea if they work with it or not. If there’s a plugin you like on Firefox but it isn’t available on Safari then by all means feel free to port it. The Web Developer plugin is an excellent example of one that should be ported if it isn’t already available.

#41 On June 19th, 2007 12:12 pm qing2 replied:

hmm.. I’m a chinese and use a chinese system windows 2003 enterprice edition . safari can work on my pc but i can’t type any chinese in it..
:( wait for updata..

#42 On June 19th, 2007 2:05 pm Curtis Harwell replied:

I have installed and done every fix possible I have seen. Nothing works on any of my company desktops. At this point this is a failing grade for Apple. They should have waited until they had at least a beta product. This may not even be alpha. Very disapointed.

#43 On June 19th, 2007 9:00 pm alfred replied:

am in india have xp, xp sp2, xp media 2002, xp media 2005 am having the same probs as #33 on all the systems but the xp sp2 …..maybe its a media centre pc issue

#44 On June 26th, 2007 11:50 am Liquidmark replied:

Renders fine on Mac Version of Safari 3.0

#45 On June 26th, 2007 10:34 pm Paveo replied:

It passed AICD2 test :)
BTW,Safari 3.0.2 is out now and support east-asin languages well,that’s cool.

#46 On June 27th, 2007 9:13 am Kirill replied:

http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/safaribenchmarks.html

Are there this script problemms

#47 On June 27th, 2007 9:14 am Kirill replied:

Are there this script problemms in mac version?

#48 On June 28th, 2007 8:15 am hanif replied:

actually Safari 3 does not pass the acid test, if you ksrink your window the smiley starts to crack.

#49 On June 28th, 2007 9:42 am tercüme replied:

I installed Safari on my workstation Windows XP pro machine. Acid 2 test is working fine and I have not had any hiccups, crashes or freezes. ..

#50 On June 30th, 2007 10:05 am Videoüberwachung replied:

i installed Safari on a XP, but coudnt use it because every five minutes the machine crashed down

#51 On July 3rd, 2007 4:06 pm Onlinekatalog replied:

@#50

yep. Mine, too. My System crashed every 10 minutes… very buggy…

#52 On July 4th, 2007 7:55 am edobaka replied:

If you want to crash safari open http://www.miniclip.com and open two or three games in a new tab in the same time.

But yes it is faster, and it is very good rss feed reader and default offline html viewer. But for the lonf run it will never replace firefox.

This is all part of evil master plan. Apple is planing to replace windows with macosx leopard. Bet my ass that’s why leopard is delayed.

Releasing safari is just part of marketing strategy. But somehow, as a windows user, I feel excited, it’s vista’s fault.

#53 On July 6th, 2007 8:57 am Armin replied:

I am deeply disappointed with this piece of software… Saving the bookmarks let the browser crash… Why gives Apple such a “banana software” to public?

Banana software = Software that matures on the customers computer… (instead of make a wide alpha/beta field test)

#54 On July 6th, 2007 10:00 am Curt replied:

I’m running Windows XP SP 2. After installing Safari I have no text in the task bars and my icons are gone.

#55 On July 7th, 2007 4:14 pm Tom replied:

Safari 3.0.2 for Windows fixed all the bookmarks-crashes and font problems for me. Haven’t had any problems since that update!

#56 On July 8th, 2007 1:30 am Assistive Technology replied:

Tried if but not stable enough to keep it installed. Filled bugreports… hope it helps. Thanx for posting the updates.

#57 On July 8th, 2007 11:47 am Matthias replied:

There something not right with this sh… shiny Safari. I installed it on XP and now my system is as instabil as my self-confidence! I’m glad if my system doesn’t crash for 15 minutes!

#58 On July 14th, 2007 3:04 am rural sheds replied:

Wow, that’s a huge improvement on the old version, heaps easier to use…

#59 On July 15th, 2007 1:14 pm Anna replied:

The Safari 3 on Mac works perfect and it runs the Acid Test perfektly…

#60 On July 16th, 2007 6:34 pm Mr.Dale replied:

Just installed Safari 3.0.2 for Windows XP SP2 today. The fonts are very bold and blurry. It hurts my eyes on my LCD.

Safari has crashed/frozen up on me once so far.

Overall Safari is alright. I haven’t figured out how to have whatever i type in the address bar appear in a new tab and really dislike not having buttons to add new tabs like every other browser and a Go button since there’s a lot of times where I’m just reading at night and operating nothing but the mouse.

#61 On July 18th, 2007 4:43 am Marc M. replied:

Acid2 renders very fine in safari 3.0.2 for windows XP. Haven’t had any problems since that update.

#62 On July 19th, 2007 10:35 am Photofuchs replied:

Thanx for posting the updates. Haven’t had any problems since that update. I use safari and it is very good.

#63 On July 20th, 2007 3:27 am Espresso Junkie replied:

Even if the Acid2 tests succeeds the rendering of Safari is awefull. Just try to style your input boxes with CSS …

#64 On July 22nd, 2007 3:45 pm David replied:

I have the Safari web browser 3.0 beta for Windows XP, and it is running perfectly, and passed the acid 2 test with flying colors. Safari web browser is the fastest, most accurate, web browser in history. Opera passes the acid 2 test also, but is rated as the slowest web browser in history. As proved by Apple, Safari is the fastest web browser out, and now also passes the Acid 2 test, Safari, the only, the fastest, the most accurate, the best, web browser ever created!

#65 On July 22nd, 2007 3:48 pm David replied:

I havn’t had any problems running Safari 3.0 beta on my Windows XP SP2 system. It’s fast, it’s accurate, and it passes the Acid 2 test easily!

#66 On July 22nd, 2007 4:25 pm CableGuy replied:

Safari Beta 2 had big problems on german websites. Since Beta 3 pages with german content look fine.

#67 On July 24th, 2007 3:18 pm Bayerischer Wald replied:

Wow, that’s a huge improvement on the old version, heaps easier to use…

Gretting from Germany

#68 On July 27th, 2007 12:21 am Carl Witlicki replied:

Safari 3.0.2 Acid2 Test w/Windows XP: orange bar over eyes, red rectangle right of orange bar.

Safari 3.0.2 Acid2 Test w/Windows Vista, perfect, then do a reload: orange bar over eyes, red rectangle right of orange bar.

All the other browsers, except Opera, have some problems with Acid2. So what? As long as I have no problems with the sites I visit.

Safari for Windows, once the bugs are worked out, may be a champion.

#69 On July 30th, 2007 2:24 am Laurentiu Morariu replied:

Before I experienced the same problems on Romanian language sites yet since the last beta things a lot better.

#70 On July 30th, 2007 4:46 am Larry Conway replied:

looking for upgrades for easier web navigation

#71 On July 30th, 2007 4:16 pm Gerd replied:

i have a XP SP1 with some Updates and the same problems like # 33 and also crashes

#72 On July 31st, 2007 10:10 pm Bob Munch replied:

Safari is great. Best of all, now I have a place for another Google account.

#73 On August 1st, 2007 12:08 am Amy replied:

Safari IS great, but not on XP (yet). SP2 with all the updates crashes too often to be of much use for testing. Looking forward to a more exhaustive update.

Testing on another XP machine with similar specs produced zero problems and no crashes. Perhaps it’s the Windows gremlins after all.

#74 On August 2nd, 2007 9:07 pm Event Planner replied:

I would say Safari is a nice alternative to what we have today from Microsoft (IE), but that would be better not to stop on the already achieved. Navigation is something developers will always have to work under with. In general, Safari is a pretty thing to navigate with. I doubt there is a better alternative on the net at the moment.

#75 On August 4th, 2007 5:44 am Biblio World replied:

I re-re-installed Safari on myWindows XP pro SP2 machine. Acid 2 test works swell and there have been no headaches except the speed of my PC ..

#76 On August 5th, 2007 10:48 am Absinthe replied:

What I wanted to add, that being a person who deals with lot’s of blog management tasks, I always have to keep in mind that cross-browser features are something I need to check every time. Is there a chance to create something unique in browsers like Google in search? Open source is a nice solution for all the Net applications and I believe we should use them for developing a more flexible platform for navigating the Net.

#77 On August 5th, 2007 12:13 pm Aukcje replied:

Safari web browser 3.0 beta for Windows XP SP2 is running perfectly, Acid 2 test no hiccups, no crashes no freezes…

#78 On August 5th, 2007 1:59 pm ritzenhoff replied:

I don’t like the browser on my Mac. Why should a Windows user, who has access to all this wonderful browsers (Firefox, Opera and … yes IE7 ;)), use this buggy Safari thingy ?!

What this Apple browser really needs is some styling abilities for web forms – perhaps this should be part of Acid3 ;)

#79 On August 7th, 2007 6:26 am AA replied:

Safari 3.03 seems to pass Acid2 now.

#80 On August 9th, 2007 7:25 am Klavierbank replied:

The Safari-Browser for Windows runs perfectly. We need this to develop cross-browser websites and now we don´t need to test it under MacOS.

#81 On August 11th, 2007 2:50 pm Ted replied:

I have tried all the browsers on all operating systems and Safari is the best in a cross platform way (except Linux but Safari’s Webkit is used in Linux browsers).

I would like to use Firefox for day-to-day but it is really hacked on the Mac. I use Firefox at work on my pc solely for the Firebug plug-in. Safari’s Inspector is catching up but still has a way to go.

Even though I have Firefox (and the obligatory ie) open on my pc at work I use Safari for all other browsing since it works very well and is very standards based.

Firefox is pushing XUL and their own js extensions, IE is pushing proprietary ie-only browsing and Opera isn’t as standards compliant as Safari.

With the release of the iPhone, web sites can no longer ignore Safari without alienating young, rich potential clients. Imagine a fancy restaurant with a slick Flash based site losing out to another restaurant because the potential customer could check the address or phone number on the standards based competitor’s site using her iPhone.

As I wrote this I had fully spell checking and the ability to stretch the size of this text field so I could see the entire post. Cool, advanced features added without breaking standards. That’s the way to build a browser.

#82 On August 12th, 2007 2:51 pm boersenspiel replied:

I havn’t had any problems running Safari 3.0 beta on my Windows XP SP2 system. It’s fast, it’s accurate, and it passes the Acid 2 test easily!

#83 On August 12th, 2007 2:55 pm boersenspiel replied:

Acid2 renders perfectly in safari 3 for windows XP.

I am curious, what are the build versions that people are using, has Apple updated already?

My build is Version 3.0 (522.11.3), this was tested on a Mac under Bootcamp

#84 On August 20th, 2007 11:28 am framer replied:

In case we all do not pray for Mac – Mozilla is the best I think. A huge amount of plugins and add-ons are really great. But!! I agree with you guys that on Mac – it’s another story. I think – the future of all the systems is in hands of several men who are to decide: is it enough to have $40+ billions and try to make the life of ordinary users more difficult, or it is a real chance for them to be remembered as the first who had a great idea – unite all in one and build a real standard for both PC and Mac. Don’t kill me here – that’s what I really think

#85 On September 1st, 2007 1:33 am sensitiv replied:

The technical data is impressing, and indeed Safari is very quick. Anyhow, the blurred fonts do really disturb the nice picture.
Also some of my sites do look different in Safari. One might argue this a problem of development, but infact it is impossible to go along for all browsers.
So I´m sceptic both in view of user and publisher.

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