Monthly Archives: March 2011

iTunes Store – Connection Problems with SSL

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I have to connect through a corporate proxy server from where I am at the moment. I recently discovered that my iTunes was not connecting properly to the store – I couldn’t buy anything and I wasn’t able to check for downloads! It was incredibly infuriating – all my https proxy settings were correct, and it had been working for the past couple of months. Of course, there was always the chance that they had started to block the iTMS. But, it was still working on other people’s computers (macs).

It had to be something to do with the SSL security chain. Pushing https through a proxy never works well; somehow, all of my SSL connections are routed through the proxy server by using the proxy’s own certificates(?!)

Anyway, to solve the problem, quite simply, I had to visit the following sites in Safari, and when the warning popped up about the SSL connection not being trusted (because the proxy was intercepting it, I guess?), just click continue. Because in Mac OS X, all certificates are kept in one place for all apps to access, allowing it in safari will allow it for all other default applications.

Simply visit the following sites with the https:// prefix:

  • itunes.apple.com
  • ax.itunes.apple.com
  • ax.init.itunes.apple.com
  • albert.apple.com
  • gs.apple.com
  • ax.phobos.apple.com.edgesuite.net

After clicking continue a few times on the popup, it started working!

You’d think that iTunes would have realised there was a problem and come up with a window itself, saying “SSL error”, but instead it just times out.

 

Javascript Benchmarks – March 2011

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Quite recently, Microsoft pushed out its latest release of Internet Explorer. IE 9, the brand new, all improved browser which is meant to be faster and more compatible with everything, was released to the general public a few weeks ago.
I’m not going to go into a detailed review of IE 9: I admit, it’s actually pretty good. What I actually want to look at is how fast IE 9 is compared to the latest browsers currently out there.
I decided to run two javascript benchmarks: Mozilla’s ‘Kraken’ and Webkits ‘Sunspider’. Kraken is designed to push the browser to its limits, testing future compatibilty, while sunspider tests more ‘everyday’ jasvascipt.
I ran all tests on the same Mac, as well as IE9, except this was in Bootcamp, obviously…
The results are here: (smaller bars are better)

For the overall score, I ranked each browser from 1st to 6th on both tests, then added the score. So firefox came 1st and 2nd, so gets an overall score of 3. Safari came 4th and 6th, so gets an overall score of 10.

 

Well, it seems clear that Safari, which was once near the top of the speed tests, is now lingering at the bottom. Firefox 4, the latest Mozilla creation, fares very well in both tests. Internet explorer 9 comes somewhere in the middle: It is much better than IE 8, now easily competing with all the ‘proper’ browsers. Infact, it came ontop of the benchmarks for the Sunspider test (although there are claims that Microsoft cheated with one of the units in this – try googling it!)

Anyway, if you want the best browser for now, it’s Firefox 4 (though it’s not yet a stable release, though RC status is pretty close). But if you’re looking for something slightly more stable, then Google’s Chrome is still the best current browser to be at the top of the benchmarks.