Flock browser is nice but not there yet
Early last month Flock released the latest version (0.9) of their browser. This release moves them “significantly closer to their 1.0 release”. Some of the features that’s included with the 0.9 release are:
- MyWorld: a dynamic home base for all your favorite sites, feeds, and media streams
- Flock’s Media MiniBar provides fast access to both photos and videos on Flickr, Photobucket, Youtube, and Truveo.
- The new Accounts & Services sidebar offers easier configuration and enhanced discovery and activation logic
- Improved Favorites with folders and support for Ma.gnolia and del.icio.us
- Blogging: Improved UI, integrated Clipboard, support for all major Blog services including Blogger, WordPress, Typepad and Livejournal
- Security improvements
- In-line spell check
The Flock browser has gotten a lot of media attention since day one and I’ve been a frequent user of their browser since early on. When this latest release came out I was very excited about the new feature and the possibility of switching from Firefox permanently. At first glance the Flock browser looks great and all of the unique features are easy to figure out. I really like the Media MiniBar as it’s a great way to see my friends Flickr photos and video. Additionally, I really like the convenience of the uploader tool which makes it real easy to upload your latest photos to flickr. Now I know that this is not their 1.0 release and that they’ve come a long way since their first release. But, I’ve been using this browser “full time” on my laptop for more than a month now and have threatened every day to move back to Firefox becasue of how incomplete this version is. First of all, I use two different computers everyday and if I’m going to use the Flock browser I’m going to need some sort of way to sync the two. As you might imagine, it’s pretty frustrating when you save something on your laptop but when you flick on your desktop computer you have to start all over. I would be happy to signup with Flock for an account and sign in to my browser just so everything can be synced. That shouldn’t be to hard, should it? The other feature that needs some work is the “star this page” or favorites. I use Del.icio.us for my bookmarks, which Flock favorites is integrated with however they’re lacking in execution. For example, you have to many steps (2) to enter a Del.icio.us tag and you don’t get a list of the previous tags that you’ve used. The most frustrating thing about the favorites is actually trying to locate one of your saved Del.icio.us bookmarks. If they were to copy how del.icio.us does it then it would be perfect. Another feature on Flock that will need more attention is the RSS reader. It’s fully integrated with the browser and is a great feature, however there are a few improvements that should be made that would make it even better: For example when you add a new RSS feed to the reader you don’t have any option to organize that feed. You have to wait untill it’s added to the list and then find and then drag it to the folder that you want. Additionally, there’s no way to edit the feeds. The last thing that I’m going to bitch about is the Blog Post tool. I can’t use it until it has a post to draft.
All in all I see a great future for Flock but I think they still have a ways to go before I can make the switch. As of writing this post I’m switching back to Firefox and will be anxiously awaiting the next release of Flock.
