Firefox 3.6 Beta Next week

The Mozilla Firefox developers are planning to release the first beta of the upcoming web browser Firefox 3.6 next week (to be precise on October 14 which is also the release date for the beta of Firefox 3.5.4). Not that many Firefox users will take notice of these two beta version releases but those that do will notice performance improvements in Firefox 3.6 beta. The Mozilla team is not only concentrating on the usual options to increase the web browser’s performance (that is JavaScript mainly) but also performance of the web browser in general which would include loading times and responsiveness.

Over at Betanews they have tested the latest alpha release version of Firefox 3.6 and came to the conclusion that the new version increases performance by 22% compared to the latest official release version Firefox 3.5.3. This performance does not come near the performance of Webkit based browsers(google chrome) yet but it shows dedication to close the gap between the browsers.

It remains to be seen on the other hand if most users will notice the 22% performance increase in Firefox 3.6 Beta or if it is just more a figure without real values to everyday users. Performance is definitely not everything. The fastest web browser in the test, Google Chrome 3, does not pass the Acid 3 test which Opera 10 for example does.

I use google chrome 3.xxx on windows 7 RC, and it does have some issues with page rendering.

Flash Cookies

Security is getting top of the list for many these days. You should do all you can to protect yourself from these people and websites who want to ‘track your every move’. I use Firefox 3.5.2 so most of the following is angled that way.

Flash cookies placed by many of the most popular Web sites are being used to track site visitors, even going so far as to re-create http tracking cookies after they’re deleted by privacy-conscious surfers.

A new study released by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, and other universities found that the Flash cookies, or local shared objects, are used on 54 of the top 100 Web sites, as ranked by Quantcast. The Flash cookies are stored in a different location than regular http cookies, and are not removed if you delete cookies from within your browser. Per the report, “even the ‘Private Browsing’ mode recently added to most browsers such as Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3 still allows Flash cookies to operate fully and track the user.”

Read more at pcworld.com …

Ever wondered why you are still tracked though you tried everything to prevent it?
BetterPrivacy is a Super Cookie Safeguard which protects from usually not deletable LSO’s. It blocks longterm tracking on Google, YouTube Ebay and many other domains.

Flash Cookies is something the the Obama administration wants to put on your computer to enable tracking of your Internet activity. They want to use it on Government websites.

The Adobe Flash Security Panel is here:

CCleaner deletes all flash cookies, but not the microphone and speaker ones. So you need to do all the above, just to be safe.

Do all the above …

Firefox 3.6 Is On The Horizon

Firefox 3.6: Beta 1 in September, Final Release in November 2009.

More here.

Firefox 3.5

As was anticipated, the boys and girls at Mozilla have released the final build of Firefox 3.5 today. Firefox 3.5 — Now if the extensions would catch up.

Firefox 3.5

I have made no secret of the shortcomings of Firefox 3.0x, they are many and quite annoying. The SQLite ‘pause issue’ is right up at the top of the list. These problems are making Firefox unusable, and have been for sometime. I simply don’t see the need for a database in the browser and all the attendant problems that has caused. But, hey, It’s just me I am sure.

So I have switched for now, to Windows 7 and IE8. Yes that’s right IE8 on Windows 7 RC – And I find it to be better than Firefox. Blasphemy you say? No self preservation. Windows 7 with it’s no execute functioality is going a long way to solve the virus problem, which should never have been … But as I understand it right now, the “NX bit” support will only be in the 64 bit versions of Windows 7, so be advised.

But now Firefox has it’s chance to win me back — With Firefox 3.5. But will it do it? Don’t know right now, I have been testing it since the last week, when the near 3.5 release came out, and so far … But many of the plugins I used to use aren’t there yet, so stay tuned. I like the crossplatform nature of Firefox, and the XMarks plugin …

Mozilla expects Firefox 3.5 to be released to the public before the end of June. Although that gives Mozilla a week and a half from today.

So I am in testing mode for my clients for the next few days to see how it goes.

UPDATE:  The new features of Firefox 3.5:

This release candidate is now available in more than 70 languages – get your local version.

Improved tools for controlling your private data, including a Private Browsing Mode.

Better performance and stability with the new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine.

The ability to provide Location Aware Browsing using web standards for geolocation.

Support for native JSON, and web worker threads.

Improvements to the Gecko layout engine, including speculative parsing for faster content rendering.

Support for new web technologies such as: HTML5 < video > and < audio > elements, downloadable fonts and other new CSS properties, JavaScript query selectors, HTML5 offline data storage for applications, and SVG transforms.

Checkout: Mozilla Firefox 3.5 RC

Firefox 3.5 RC Released

Firefox 3.5RC1 has been released. “Firefox 3.5 (Release Candidate) is based on the Gecko 1.9.1 rendering platform, which has been under development for the past year. Firefox 3.5 offers many changes over the previous version, supporting new web technologies, improving performance and ease of use, and adding new features for users.”

Mozilla posts Firefox 3.5 RC1, announcement expected soon

The announcement has not yet been publicly made, but Mozilla posted a fresh build of Firefox 3.5 on its servers that it is officially calling Release Candidate 1. Not just “Release Candidate,” which implies that a second round is indeed possible. The pressure is obviously building to get a fix out for the pausing problem.

I have about had it with Fireofx 3.0 and the useless SQlite fiasco. So either this fixes it, and it may or may not do so, or I am going to be moving to a new browser platform. Chrome is beginning to look really good.

Firefox 3.5 RC1 for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 3.5 RC1 for Linux is available for download here.
Firefox 3.5 RC1 for Mac OS X is available for download here.

Firefox 3.5 was planned to feature a single Release Candidate, and then move straight to the gold version. However, following the availability of Firefox 3.5 RC1 for Beta testers, Mozilla has also started producing candidates for Firefox 3.5 RC2 and offering them for download via the FTP repository for nightly builds, indicating that there will be at least one more Release Candidate of the open-source browser. Stand-by.