The Mozilla developers have released the first beta of the long awaited Firefox 4.0 web browser. Regular readers might know that this version was offered as Firefox 3.7 previously and has now been renamed to Firefox 4.0, a release of the final version is expected at the end of this year.
Firefox 4.0 continues where Firefox 3.7 has left off. It sports a new interface design, something that many veteran Firefox users may have problems adopting with.
Browser tabs are now located on top of the address bar by default with the option to revert the changes so that the interface resembles the old Firefox design.
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A second major change is the addition of the Firefox button, which will be shown if the user decides to hide the menu bar in the browser. This option looks similar to the one-button menu option of the Opera web browser.
Firefox 4.0 comes with a new add-ons manager, which is not completely available in the beta release. It is for instance not possible to search for and install add-ons directly from the manager.
The HTML5 capabilities have been improved, with support for web standards such as WebM video and other HMTL5 related features. Firefox 4.0 now scores 189 and 9 bonus points out of 300 in the HTMl5 test, an increase of 50 points and 5 bonus points over Firefox 3.6.4.
Firefox 4 still lacks behind speed wise in most browser benchmarks but it looks like the developer’s have concentrated on interface and feature additions so far.
This version features protection against an attack known as CSS fingerprinting which uses lists of popular websites to determine if a user has visited them in the past.
Interested users can watch a WebM video about the new release, read the release notes, take a look at the first run page or download versions for Mac, Windows and Linux below.
- http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/4.0b1/win32/en-US/Firefox%20Setup%204.0%20Beta%201.exe
- ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/4.0b1/linux-x86_64/en-US/firefox-4.0b1.tar.bz2
- ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/4.0b1/mac/en-US/Firefox%204.0%20Beta%201.dmg
Thanks HDW for the tip. Have you tried the browser already? Let us know what you think about it in the comments.
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Don’t forget:
XPCOM
Retained layers
App Tabs
More coming soon…
An awful course of development of both Firefox and Opera, why should they copycat the terrible piece of wood called Chrome? Firefox 4 does not look good. I am not apt to correct its terrible design with the use of themes. The tabs are anti-ergonomic. It seems that Firefox and Opera will force me to make either Safari or K-Meleon my default browser. A great disappointment.
1st. I wish they allowed us to acces bookmarks easily without having to use the menu bar.
2nd. It was amazing , even though slow, and I hope we will see the last RC sooner than October.
I love the new design and more than that, I like the render speed. All I need is speed :).
it’s an option watch the video.
I’m a big fan of firefox…and ofcourse I hate it sometimes..when it gets crashed…but ofcourse it works great for the most of the time…eagerly waiting for 4.0 version…hope issues with the previous version would be fixed now… :)
As a Mozilla freak I couldn’t resist to install the beta. Had already the 3.7a installed earlier but went back to 3.6.x cause I had trouble with my ~40 add-ons. The same with 4.0b1. Error messages all over. Installed 3.6.6 over it, and I’m back with 3.6.6. Happy browsing, the time will come.
uhh, why do I get a twitter ID? I don’t have one and didn’t enter something… Strange
I’m using it at the moment. The layout with the tabs is a lot like chrome which is better.
As usual Firefox rocks. But why they are trying to copy the Chrome ?
Chrome as people say consumes less memory is absolutely wrong. When I run FF with my 50+ add ons , and tried to do the same with Chrome and it eats more than double the RAM memory .
FF is nice , like lot of people think that chrome shows up more screen property but its very much annoying to see a blinking status bar than having one stable one to add more add on buttons and more things into it …
Firefox please stop following Chrome … be FOX always
Anyone interested in the firefox 4 UI should take a look at the videos here:
http://blog.mozilla.com/faaborg/