Can I install WebKit to get the same functionality as Safari 4?
Asked by
verily (
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)
June 26th, 2009
I am on OS X 10.5.2 and don’t want to upgrade to 10.5.7 which is required to run Safari 4. I heard Safari 4 is just a specific branch of WebKit. Can I install the latest WebKit and have the same features as Safari 4? (Top Sites, etc.).
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4 Answers
Features like Top Sites are what the actual browsers add. Webkit is just a rendering engine. Why not just download it and find out? Most people find the nightly builds to be too unstable for regular use though. Why not upgrade to 10.5.7? Or at least 10.5.6?
Just update to 10.5.7. I’ve never had any issues with it.
There are lots of WebKit-based browsers.
Furthermore, Wikipedia explains…
The WebKit framework provides a set of classes to display web content in windows, and implements browser features such as following links when clicked by the user, managing a back-forward list, and managing a history of pages recently visited. WebKit greatly simplifies the complicated process of loading web pages—that is, asynchronously requesting web content from an HTTP server where the response may arrive incrementally, in random order, or partially due to network errors. WebKit also simplifies the process of displaying that content which can contain various MIME types, and compound frame elements each with their own set of scroll bars.
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The additional features, like Top Sites page, are browser-specific. If you’re interested, you can get an addon for Firefox to do the same thing.
If you download Webkit.app it will tell OS X to launch your current version of Safari, but with the newest webkit engine.
In other words it will look exactly like when you launch safari.app
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