Filed under: Internet Tools
GrApple themes bring Safari's UI touches to Firefox
For those of you who aren't looking forward to Firefox 3's default new look today, might I suggest an FF2 theme called GrApple Yummy, from Aronnax. It makes Firefox a dead ringer for Safari. In fact, Aronnax claims it looks three times more beautiful than Safari. Your mileage, of course, may vary.GrApple Yummy is available in two flavors, blue and graphite. Blue contains three-color window controls, while graphite, as you might imagine, has gray window controls.
Both themes are donationware.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jayden said 8:17AM on 6-17-2008
Am I the only one who got the Firefox 3.0 update automatically a few days ago?
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slackero said 8:19AM on 6-17-2008
But TUAW.com should be patched for coming FF3. There is a big problem with fixed background image under Windows - scrolling is soooooooooooo slow there. Seems to be a bug which is not yet solved but known.
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D.R said 5:35PM on 6-17-2008
I ditched FireFox 3.0 RC2 because it was slower than molasses on fixed backgrounds.
I see this bug has NOT been fixed on Firefox 3 Final!
I think I could hand draw this page faster than it takes Firefox to scroll though this page! How could the final release still have such a huge flaw?
I just tried IE, and I can scroll through this page a light speed by comparison.
conigs said 8:22AM on 6-17-2008
While on the topic of fitting the Firefox UI to the mac—I ran across this the other day (from Daring Fireball): http://www.sanneblad.se/johan/?p=180
While a bit nit-picky, it does a good job of expressing why Firefox 3 just didn't feel right when I first started using it, mainly the gradient that Firefox uses.
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Think Adrian said 8:43AM on 6-17-2008
Yes, this is useless in a couple of hours :)
Still, I think that Safari has better RSS management and bookmarking (except for the tags feature in FF3), and when Safari 4 comes out with SquirrelFish it really will kick ass!
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James said 9:06AM on 6-17-2008
Sure the basics are in place but the attention to detail is weak, still feels like a theme for a windows app trying to look like their interpretation of OS X.
And why do the right click menus and combo boxes look nothing like OS X?
I mean they looked out of place in Tiger because the spacing and fonts were all wrong, now they look even worse against leopard.
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Max said 9:12AM on 6-17-2008
These themes have always been first-rate. I've been using Yummy since FF beta 3.
Note that (for me, anyway) the graphite theme does NOT change the window widgets -- you need to change your OS Appearance to Graphite for that.
However, even in OS Blue, the Graphite theme changes some highlight colors to graphite, which is nice. I also have Fission installed, so I get a graphite progress bar too.
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rogermugs said 9:26AM on 6-17-2008
ooooh... pretty... adding this makes firefox not make me want to vomit.
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marc cardwell said 10:24AM on 6-17-2008
umm, instead of making FF _look_ like safari, i'll just stick with safari.
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Dave said 12:31PM on 6-17-2008
Safari doesn't work with some things. For me, it almost always fails when uploading files through an HTTP POST form.
Brent Traut said 10:29AM on 6-17-2008
I still don't understand why Firefox has a reload and stop button. It's like having Play and Pause and separate buttons on an MP3 player. Couldn't they take a hint from Safari?
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Dave said 12:30PM on 6-17-2008
Check out this tweak to combine the Reload/Stop buttons:
http://mozillalinks.org/wp/2006/09/merge-firefox-reloadstop-buttons-extensionless/
Just remember to right-click on the toolbar and swap the default order of the two buttons (easy thing to overlook, but the tweak won't work with the default order).
I like GrApple Yummy. I've been using it since Firefox 3 Beta came out. Great theme. Combined with this reload/stop button trick, I hardly notice that I'm not using Safari.
Fritz Laurel said 1:18PM on 6-17-2008
That's one of the only things I hate about Safari is they use the same button for two different things. That's really horrible UI.
In a perfect world, it might be okay, but in a world where Safari suddenly stops doing anything for no known reason, you have no idea of knowing if your click on the Stop button was received because there's no feedback. And if you click it again, you've just exponentially increased your frustration when finally catches up and to your clicks and tries to reload a page that only caused you great pain and suffering in the first place.
Long live separate reload and stop buttons!
Dave said 1:35PM on 6-17-2008
Funny... I like it as it seems an efficient use of space to me. There's no feedback, but the icon does change depending on what it -will- do when you click it.
But I have experienced similar frustration as yourself when sites stall. To me, the clean look out-weighs the frustration. Everyone has their own preference.
Zimmie said 2:08PM on 6-17-2008
@Fritz Laurel:
So use the Escape button. It *always* means stop.
John.B said 1:43PM on 6-17-2008
I used Yummy (blue) for about a day, then switched to Delicious (blue) instead. Its not _exactly_ like Safari but then I suppose I don't need it to be.
My main requirements for FF3 were (1) to get rid of the new FF3 theme (which I hate!) and (2) to have a "themed" FF3 that would look and feel more like a Mac app. Delicious (blue) delivers on both counts.
Frankly, as a long-time FF2 user I find so many little things about Safari maddening, but the dealbreaker is that Safari doesn't have FlashBlock or AdBlockPlus with EasyElement+EasyList. I can see why Safari users might not like FF3, with or without the GrApple themes. I just don't personally understand why anyone would find the Safari UI that preferable or the lack of quality add-ons tolerable. That doesn't make Safari bad, its just not for me.
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Eric said 12:29AM on 6-18-2008
does anyone kno of a good safari theme for windows?!?
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