Apple Releases Safari Technology Preview 141 With Bug Fixes and Performance Improvements

Can confirm… it is still Safari 😔

just release 12.3 Monterey final before WWW III starts. so we can all download it and save it for a backup.

As a software engineer, I'm amazing that _every_ release of the Tech Preview has "performance improvements" over the last, as if somehow it's getting faster and faster and faster and faster.... but then I remember that performance doesn't necessarily have anything to do with speed, but overall execution of a task. For example, a performance improvement in bed doesn't mean you got the job done faster. 🤣

I have been having trouble with Safari for some time. It constantly goes into never-never land. I can sometimes fix it by using VPN. What works best is to shut it down and clear its cache.

Safari feels rather clunky compared to Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome on my M1 Mac mini and M1 Pro MacBook Pro. But it's still my preferred browser, especially on my MacBook Pro as rest of the browsers can't compare to Safari at all when it comes to battery use. It's shocking how big the difference is going through a workday using Safari compared to Chromium based browser or Firefox. This is less of an issue with the new M1 Pro MacBook Pro's because of their overall amazing battery life, but still. I do also enjoy how it integrates with iCloud Private Relay, a feature that works really nice without forcing me to use a VPN. My second browser of choice is Microsoft Edge with vertical tabs.

But whenever not using Safari I try to stick with Firefox. A world where everyone is using a chromium based browser is not ideal. It puts too much power into Google and Chromiums hands. And we already see it a lot where many web developers develop for Chromium first, and often end up not keeping web standards in mind at all. If it works in Chromium, it's good enough has become the mantra which is quite sad for the web as a whole.

Microsoft Edge became much better when Microsoft decided to move from EdgeHTML to Chromium, but it was a sad day for the web as a whole. Now Apple and Mozilla are the only ones left. Apple has huge marketshare due to iOS and iPadOS, but on desktop Safari isn't really competeing at all. Neither is Mozilla. WebKit will stay with us for a long time, but all it's focus is on mobile. Gecko is fighting a uphill battle, Mozilla is growing more frustrated by the day as a result of so many websites using non-standard Chromium specific features that has yet to be adopted as a part of the open web standard making Firefox run worse not as a result of the browser being bad, but as a result of how web developers are pretty much enforcing Chromium to be the best. The same issues Microsoft had when trying to push EdgeHTML and even a company as big and resourceful as Microsoft simply had to give up and move to Chromium to stay relevant and competetive.

That all sounds too exhausting of a thought process to consider. I need to use the browser to get stuff done.

Safari makes it harder in many ways than other browsers. It is simple as that for me. I do not care if the Internet defaults to Chromium browsers as long as baby seals are not being killed or water is not being poisoned.

Agreed. If the whole world is Chromium, from a consumer point of view, it does not matter. I just want things to work without problem without constantly switching browsers. Companies can integrate their own privacy controls if people really care about their privacy when using the Chromium engine.