Apple's second developer preview of Safari 6 fixes crashes

Posted:
in Mac Software edited January 2014
Apple this week supplied developers with its second preview build of Safari 6, fixing an issue that would cause the pre-release software to crash.

The update, officially identified as "Developer Preview 2," came quickly after developers were supplied with the first preview of Safari 6 last Monday, following the Worldwide Developers Conference keynote. The installer allows developers to test Apple's next major update to its Safari Web browser within OS X 10.7 Lion.

People familiar with the updated build indicated that it addresses a crash that would occur when typing a string ending with two periods in the address field. In the first developer preview, typing two periods or auto-completing an address with two periods would reportedly crash the software.

One of the biggest features in the forthcoming Safari 6 update is iCloud Tabs, which syncs open websites across devices such as Macs and iOS hardware. Another new feature, called Tabview, allows users to zoom in and out with multi-touch gestures to see all of their tabs currently open in Safari.

For developers, Safari 6 features a new application programming interface for "Web Audio." It will allow them to create and customize audio effects in interactive Web applications that have rich media content, such as games or instrument simulators.

Safari 6


New CSS filters are also built in to Safari 6, allowing developers to create advanced filter and pixel effects, like blurs and gradients. HTML 5 support has also been enhanced with web notifications, timed text tracks, and media synchronization.

Safari 6 also sports improved javascript support, with the latest version of the standard, ECMA 262 version 5.1 It also has a feature that detects when Private Browsing is enabled, and gives developers the ability to build extensions that use stylesheets and scripts to change the appearance of articles viewed in Safari Reader.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    How often does that come up? I didn't even know it crashed…

    Still crashes for other reasons, though. :lol:

    And I like the idea of Tabview, but the implementation is absolutely horrendous. It needs to be a GRID, like on the iPad before iOS 5 (or was it 4). I don't want to see a smaller version of ONE tab and like a third of two other tabs on either side. That's idiotic. I want to SEE my tabs, otherwise there's no point to having that mode at all.
  • Reply 2 of 20
    For me it used to crash every time I would start a URL with "r"
  • Reply 3 of 20
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    Safari 6 in ML beta 4.1 has been very stable. In fact it's been the best version of Safari since ML first appeared.
  • Reply 4 of 20

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post



    How often does that come up? I didn't even know it crashed…

    Still crashes for other reasons, though. image

    And I like the idea of Tabview, but the implementation is absolutely horrendous. It needs to be a GRID, like on the iPad before iOS 5 (or was it 4). I don't want to see a smaller version of ONE tab and like a third of two other tabs on either side. That's idiotic. I want to SEE my tabs, otherwise there's no point to having that mode at all.




    I see your point. I think Apple's implementation is more about eye candy than functionality. In Firefox Tab Groups is more useful and lays out in a grid. I think Apple wanted to make it's tab layout unique from Firefox and Chrome for the Mac. I like Chrome's implementation for the Mac the best. It's not enabled by default.

  • Reply 5 of 20
    ghostface147ghostface147 Posts: 1,629member
    crisss1205 wrote: »
    For me it used to crash every time I would start a URL with "r"

    That's the biggest problem I had under Lion with preview 1. Even on ML preview 4 it would crash every now and then when typing in letters in the address bar. The recent preview update fixed it.
  • Reply 6 of 20
    slurpyslurpy Posts: 5,382member


    I've been searching high and low how to download this. Any hints?

  • Reply 7 of 20
    normangnormang Posts: 118member


    Why is it even a story, it's beta software for crying out loud, finding and fixing these issues is the purpose of beta, but it winds up as headline here, what for?

  • Reply 8 of 20
    Usest to crash on address beginning with R for me too.

    btw what is the build number of this Developer Preview 2 ?
  • Reply 9 of 20
    aaronjaaronj Posts: 1,595member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by normang View Post


    Why is it even a story, it's beta software for crying out loud, finding and fixing these issues is the purpose of beta, but it winds up as headline here, what for?



     


    To inform people about changes in the beta?

  • Reply 10 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    slurpy wrote: »
    I've been searching high and low how to download this. Any hints?

    Become a developer.
    wwinter86 wrote: »
    Usest to crash on address beginning with R for me too.
    btw what is the build number of this Developer Preview 2 ?

    Sure, it's 12A248 for DP 4.1. Two was a long time ago.

    Unless you mean the "update of Safari", in which case it's Safari 6 (8536.19).
  • Reply 11 of 20


    Safari 5 has been a joke - I hope Safari 6 is better. I like the browser but is wish it wasn't such a memory hog.

  • Reply 12 of 20
    Yes I meant Safari 6 DP2, thanks.

    btw Mine says 7536.19 is that right?
  • Reply 13 of 20
    agramonteagramonte Posts: 345member


    well have to give it to Apple for effort - this thing has to be one of their biggest fail.

  • Reply 14 of 20
    2stepbay2stepbay Posts: 116member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by macadam212 View Post


    Safari 5 has been a joke - I hope Safari 6 is better. I like the browser but is wish it wasn't such a memory hog.



     


    I agree...a massive memory hog. That's been Safari's achilles from its early days. Eye candy such as web previews just add to the bloat and memory factor.


     


    Also, very disappointed Apple is removing the RSS feature. That's just plain stupid. The notion of having to use another reader to access RSS content brings up some very nasty thoughts. :(

  • Reply 15 of 20
    I like Safari, but I agree it uses a lot of memory.
  • Reply 16 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    agramonte wrote: »
    well have to give it to Apple for effort - this thing has to be one of their biggest fail.

    Instead of being the troll you always are, mind explaining how bug fixes are failures?
  • Reply 17 of 20
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    This is very off topic but I'll use iCloud Tabs as my soap box. Since this feature that will sync open windows/tabs across devices will be available in iOS 6 and Mountain Lion I would love for Apple to finally implement iTunes to iPod syncing between devices. It can even use the same iCloud backend for coordination.

    What I mean by iTunes to iPod syncing is being able to stop a song, podcast, audiobook, whatever on one device and start it right where it left off (or just a couple seconds back depending on the time between stop and start) on another device. I'd even settle for this being only available for those who pay for iTunes Match as knowing what you have in your library would greatly facilitate the speed and efficiency of being able to send the simple date of the start time within the file, the file, and any specific album or playlist information to permit the same flow (especially important for audiobooks that are heavily segmented).
  • Reply 18 of 20
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    "Remember at 2880 x 1800 there are simply more pixels to push and more work to be done by both the CPU and the GPU. It’s even worse in those applications that have higher quality assets, the CPU now has to decode images at 4x the resolution of what it’s used to. Future CPUs will take this added workload into account, but it’ll take time to get there.

    The good news is Mountain Lion provides some relief. At WWDC Apple mentioned the next version of Safari is ridiculously fast, but it wasn’t specific about why. It turns out that Safari leverages Core Animation in Mountain Lion and more GPU accelerated as a result. [...]

    Whereas I would consider the rMBP experience under Lion to be borderline unacceptable, everything is significantly better under Mountain Lion. Don’t expect buttery smoothness across the board, you’re still asking a lot of the CPU and GPU, but it’s a lot better."

    • http://www.anandtech.com/show/6023/the-nextgen-macbook-pro-with-retina-display-review/

    That's good news, especially for the machines without Retina displays.
  • Reply 19 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    solipsismx wrote: »
    What I mean by iTunes to iPod syncing is being able to stop a song, podcast, audiobook, whatever on one device and start it right where it left off (or just a couple seconds back depending on the time between stop and start) on another device.

    I'd just like QuickTime to remember where I stopped playing a video, like iTunes does…

    OH, YEAH, and I'd like QuickTime and iTunes to have the same freaking controls. It's inexcusable that they don't. I'm bothered by the fact that Apple has allowed this to happen.

    In iTunes you have to HOLD fast forward/reverse to get it to go. In QuickTime you can just click it. I always forget what's what, but I shouldn't have to remember at all.
  • Reply 20 of 20
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    I'd just like QuickTime to remember where I stopped playing a video, like iTunes does…
    OH, YEAH, and I'd like QuickTime and iTunes to have the same freaking controls. It's inexcusable that they don't. I'm bothered by the fact that Apple has allowed this to happen.
    In iTunes you have to HOLD fast forward/reverse to get it to go. In QuickTime you can just click it. I always forget what's what, but I shouldn't have to remember at all.

    1) Movist will actually remember the position of the last thing you played even if you close out of the app but it will lose that "videomark" if you play anything else. This seems like just an easy thing to add. Apple's DVD Player just had a /Library/Application Support folder that would have a file for every disc you played. I assume that iTunes uses an XML file. I'm no developer but the logistics of this feature, too me, seem very simple.

    2) Adding to all those I'd also like Apple to add the the iPod scrubbing to iTunes when you click and hold the mouse button and move the mouse pointer up and down in the window. And I'd also like what I think is a very unique feature: Mediamarks. Not for songs, but for at least podcasts, iTunesU, and audiobooks so when I hear or see something I want to be able to get back to quickly — just like with eBook bookmarks — I can pause then flag a certain certain either by a GUI element or telling Siri.

    3) iTunes has long allowed us to store media files in the app that it can't load onto our iDevices due to codec or specific profile support. I would like Apple to extend this to allow any media that we choose to be stored in iTunes so I can finally use the app for more than just audio and the occasion video file I want to move to an iDevice, which means I also keep it organized in ~/Movies in Finder. But that's only half the problem, to make this work they also need to allow QuickTime X or some other video player on the Mac to be the default player when you click an item in iTunes. I want to use iTunes to store my videos but they make it so damn unappealing. Doesn't iPhoto launch QuickTime for video playback?

    4) I'd also like iTunes to be a little more intelligent about video uploads. When I add a video that is only 22 minutes long assume it's a TV show or at least ask me where I want it placed, give me a preferences setting to configure how they are placed based on duration, and/or use a local or server-side DB to determine the placement based on the file name.
Sign In or Register to comment.