There have always been some issues with using the 64 bit firefox browser on Fedora Core. Mostly these issues have to do with the lack of plugins for the browser and with good reason. I have also written about this issue in the past. Well I can now say that the situation has improved considerably in the past few months. We now have access to some of the same plugins as we do for the 32 bit browser.
First I must tell you that Fedora Core 6 does not officially recommend that you use Firefox 2.0. Here is an excerpt from the Fedora Project website,
For a variety of reasons, we are not planning to update to Firefox 2.0. We are instead focusing resources on Firefox 3.0, which will provide much more substantial benefits.
So, you will have to load it on your own. You can do that by using yum with the development repository enabled.
yum install firefox --enablerepo=development
This will pull firefox version 2.0 from that repository. Note that if you have both the 32 bit and the 64 bit firefox installed, it will pull both and upgrade them. I have removed the 32 bit version of firefox long ago. So, this is not an issue for me. Also, if you are using the 32bit version of firefox, you don't really need the rest of this page anyway. :)
One of the first plugins requested by users is flash.Well, the good news is that we now have 2 options! I have already talked about both of them in another article. I think that both Gnash and NSPlugin for flash are capable. However, the good news is that NSPlugin now supports sites with Flash 9!! So, you can now visit Comedy Central or YouTube or any of the other Flash 9 sites. I have also reported that the memory issue has been resolved and so NSPlugin no longer takes over all the CPU resources. I have been in communication with the author and he is constantly improving upon it. I have no hesitations in recommending NSPlugin with the 64 bit Firefox.
You can also use the mplayerplug-in with the 64 bit Firefox. Now you can view all those movie trailers that you have been waiting for. Moreover you can also watch the CNN videos without any issues. One issue that I found out about was that if you care to watch FOX news, then you have to do some additional stuff as outlined in a post on the fedora-list (see resources). Basically, you have to install GreaseMonkey and a FoxNews friendly script from GreaseMonkey.
You can also use RealPlayer with the same NSPlugin that I mentioned above. So, if you have any sites that you visit which play music using Real Player, you will can now listen to them. However, note that some sites use the RealPlayer plugin through XPCOM using a Javascript and that will not work since it is not supported. I have had issues with those sites even with the 32 bit Firefox, and so I would chalk this up to those sites who don't necessarily comply with all Web standards.
Well, we would not be complete without the ubiquitous Java plugin. Well there does exist a Java plugin created by the folks at Blackdown (see resources). Installing it is as simple as simply downloading the binary file from their website, accept the license and you are on your way. I have noticed in the past that the Blackdown plugin has always crashed my browser. However, a post on the fc64.org site convinced me to install it one more time. I did so and was able to visit a site or two. However, it will still crash my browser on some other sites. I can replicate this on sites that require interaction. I have seen that these crashes occur while spawning a child process. I have submitted the error log to the folks at Blackdown, but have not heard from them. Moreover, there does not seem to be any development on on Java at Blackdown since November 2005. Again, you may have better luck then me. So, use at your own risk.
So, really I think that the 64 bit Firefox has come a long way with the help of these plugins which bring all the 32 bit conveniences to the 64 bit world without having to replicate all the 32 bits libraries in your 64 bit world. At least I don't want to do that. Your mileage may vary. But now you have a choice and that is what it is all about.