Firefox -vs- IceWeasel

[Carlosinfl]

I am just wondering if there is any and all differences between using Firefox or Iceweasel for a web browser on Debian. To be honest, I dislike Iceweasel even thought it may be identical to the "T" to Firefox but the icon is just so ugly. Yes, go ahead and release your sigh at that comment now as I know its vain and petty but I much prefer to use Firefox as I like the logo far better and my Debian just feels much more manly sporting the orange Firefox logo on the Desktop.

Thoughts? Comments? Suggestions?

[Boomslang]

As far as I've been informed, Iceweasel is just a rebranded Firefox. No functional differences, just logos and name have changed. This is because Firefox did not exactly fit the Debian group's requirements for inclusion in their distro. For example, having a trademark on their logo caused the Debian team to conclude that there were elements of the software that weren't free, thus it was in disagreement with their policies.

[Whatsisname]

sigh

[Stellar]

You can get plenty of custom Firefox/Iceweasel icons at
http://art.gnome.org
http://www.gnome-look.org
http://www.kde-look.org

[sc3252]

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IceWeaselIcon
Lots of nice pic's.

[tdg]

I just stick with Firefox, proprietary icons and plug-ins don't taint my juju as GNU/Debian believes they taint a OS.

[unhappy_mage]

I just stick with Firefox, proprietary icons and plug-ins don't taint my juju as GNU/Debian believes they taint a OS.

The Mozilla project trademarked their logo. Even other Mozilla products have to use other logos - see for example this page (http://kb.mozillazine.org/Mozilla_Suite_:_FAQs_:_Status), which mentions the rationale behind naming Seamonkey. The DFSG (http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines) doesn't allow use of trademarked items. Whether you agree with this or not, from a legal perspective it's safer. If you work in a corporate environment, it's useful to know that all the software you're using isn't going to cause you problems because it's only allowed to be used by home users.

A good summary of this issue is here (http://web.glandium.org/blog/?p=97), or see here (http://cbeard.typepad.com/mozilla/2006/10/mozilla_tradema.html) for the official Mozilla take on it.

In short, I'm sorry you feel that way about Debian - but they've got principles, and they're sticking to them. That's more than I can say for some others.