Why Firefox on Linux looks different than Windows/Mac?

Question

Beyond each platform toolkit of course.

How come Firefox UI looks, mmhh well, not that good on Linux, it's pretty decent in Windows and it definitely rocks on OSX?

Is it a single product recompiled for different platforms? Is it coded completely in JavaScript?

Does anyone else have the same perception?

EDIT

I think a clarification is needed.

I was referring to the performance/ behavior of course, but also to the GUI.

It is quite different on those platforms.

Linux:

Windows:

_{I don't have a Vista/7 screenshot at hand, that's why I use XP}

Mac

Answer 1

Apparently, it's because Linux users want it that way:

The reason Linux isn’t shown above is that all of the feedback we’ve received so far indicates that Linux users would be happier with a theme that uses native GTK icons in the navigation toolbar, which rules out this type of customized visual treatment.

Answer 2

Firefox doesn't suck on Linux. It might eat up some resources, indirectly, if you don't use Gnome or GTK and have limited hardware. Or perhaps you've lucked out with a bad build/hardware combination. But from my limited experiences, I don't see a problem.

Edit: Looking at your updated question, I'll say this much: that's different HTML. I get the same image (balloons) every time, so it's not just random. For some reason they chose to have a different background image and layout for each platform; maybe the fonts are slightly different but that's a non-issue.

Or if you're talking about the GUI itself, well, I'm glad it changes per platform. UI integration is always a good thing.

Answer 3

It's a single core code base but there are different pieces of code for platform specific features (UI, for instance). No it's not completely Javascript. There's plenty of C++ in it.

Answer 4

Each version uses a different front end. For example on Mac OS X firefox uses a Cocoa UI - which means it can integrate with other Cocoa applications and the system more easily than if it were written with another API.

Depending on what GUI APIs are used on Windows on Linux (I don't know about windows, but I assume Linux is GTK+) you will see different levels and experiences of integration.

Answer 5

I wouldn't say it rocks on OS X... it's slow, the UI doesn't match the rest of the OS, and so on... I'm using Safari and it works well. I use FF when things don't work (not very often) or when using a download manager to speed up large HTTP downloads.

Answer 6

I was never a huge fan of the icons on Firefox Linux, so I installed the Camifox skin, which is really nice. I'd also suggest reducing the system font size (System > Preferences > Appearance > Fonts). The default on Ubuntu is very large compared to Windows. In that dialog you can also play about with the theme, which Firefox will inherit.

There are loads of other browsers you can install on Linux. Opera is a solid choice, though its default skin is worse than Firefox. Google Chrome v3 is also available - technically in alpha stage but I haven't had any problems with it.

If you really want to you can install IE6 on Linux! Look up ies4linux.

Answer 7

there have been have been some comments on changing gtk or gnome themes, however firefox still behaves differently in many aspects, for example in windows when you first click the address bar it highlights the entire address in fedora it does not.

it is things like these that need to be addressed, or perhaps someone could clue me in ^.^