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A Field Guide to Firefox 3: A Full Inventory of the Goodness

dria.org — Deb, long time mozillian, gives a hefty outline of all the juicy new goodness in Firefox 3 in preparation for the final release next Tuesday.

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  • Johnath, on 06/12/2008, -1/+61It's amazing to see everything come together in one post like this. If it were an actual book, I'd buy copies for friends. This is going to be a great release.
  • Kn1ghtmare, on 06/12/2008, -0/+45This is probably the most informative Firefox 3 post I have ever seen. It makes me that much more anxious to see the finished product. I can't wait.
  • tintintraveler, on 06/12/2008, -6/+4I've always wanted a field guide - how cool is that!?
  • deusx, on 06/12/2008, -5/+3Sounds like a print-on-demand opportunity here :)
  • dolske, on 06/12/2008, -2/+23Does the field guide specify what the air-speed velocity of an unladen robot is?
    • Johnath, on 06/12/2008, -0/+6Clearly this information needs to be added to about:robots in the next revision.
      • Youssif, on 06/12/2008, -0/+3There's no ROBOTS in the NEXT version !!
    • comrade693, on 06/12/2008, -1/+12African or European?
      • ElBeh, on 06/12/2008, -1/+4Are you suggesting that coconuts migrate?
    • asskicker32, on 06/12/2008, -10/+2you guys are all lame.
  • Ramzy, on 06/12/2008, -1/+28Great guide. Comprehensive and informative.

    Less than 5 days to go till official release, so if you're thinking of downloading Firefox 3 on release day, make sure you pledge your download here:
    http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/
    • mehan, on 06/13/2008, -6/+5what the ***** does it matter if I pledge or not?
      • hiPpymIck, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3theyll probly remind you.. in case you forget
  • moblati461, on 06/12/2008, -0/+3The best, Well put together guide on the new features of FF3 Ive seen so far. Very nice, Im already using the rc2 and its awesome. Very pleased with Mozilla's new browser.
    • Youssif, on 06/12/2008, -2/+4RC3 is already out, don't care if you don't use MAC
  • cannonball, on 06/12/2008, -6/+211. buy milk
    2. build an offline demo
    3. write a blog post
    4. ???
    5. profit
  • TheJalu, on 06/12/2008, -0/+2Great Great Great =) Can't wait more after seeing this guide!
  • bincoder, on 06/12/2008, -2/+3RC3 is very much faster than the older versions on windows.
    Hopefully, Mozilla will make the thing easier to install on Linux without having to update libraries and install this and that on the side for the final release.
    I went to put RC3 on Debian and went back to the old original 'Iceweasel' for the reason that I don't want to spend hours trying to hack Linux to run Firefox when installing it should be a simple operation that happens in 20 seconds flat like on windows. (and this is an old windows, that hasn't been updated for years)

    • bzbarsky, on 06/12/2008, -0/+3Unfortunately, the newer libraries are needed for the better OS integration Linux users were clamoring for.

      The difference with Windows is that even older versions of Windows had the infrastructure in place to make this stuff work... On Linux it's all brand-spanking-new on the OS side.

      As it is, Firefox is including some libraries that might not already be installed on the user's desktop (e.g. newest-as-of-now cairo) and the distros are complaining about that.
    • dullnation, on 06/12/2008, -1/+3A test I did (sunspider)
      Firefox 3 RC2 Total: 2543.2ms +/- 1.4%
      Firefox 3 RC3 Total: 2500.8ms +/- 1.4%

      Conclusion:
      Firefox 3 RC3 doesn't really bring any speed improvements over RC2 but by this stage, you should really be expecting that. It's mostly polish.
      • JohnM5, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3That is because they are the same. At least on linux and windows. There was only one change added to mac and that doesn't even affect every mac user.
    • 3242130193, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1From the Mozilla Blog:
      "The third Firefox 3 Release Candidate is now available for download. It contains a single change for Mac OS X users only; there is no change for users running previous Firefox Release Candidate versions on Windows or Linux."
      http://blog.mozilla.com/blog/2008/06/11/third-fire ...

      You're probably misinformed
  • randomtexan, on 06/12/2008, -0/+23Not only informative, but all on one page. Damn nice.
  • Lawrencesss, on 06/12/2008, -12/+3Long live Netscape Navigator
  • bluesforpablo, on 06/12/2008, -1/+3Speed and memory is a big difference in FF3. My only groan is having these web apps that continually want to run JS scripts for updates. It would be great to be able to stop these scripts until I have the tab in-focus.
  • hakz, on 06/12/2008, -0/+28Firefox 3 is ***** awesome. I'm loving the address bar features.
  • jakerudy7, on 06/12/2008, -6/+10is anyone else always correcting people that say "foxfire"?
    • Darkhacker, on 06/13/2008, -0/+5Not to sound sexist, but in my case, it's always women who say this. No man I know makes this mistake but a good portion of women I know keep saying Foxfire.
    • Kinnkster, on 06/16/2008, -0/+2No but I did once meet someone who called it "such a crappy game."
    • user12345x, on 07/22/2008, -0/+1That's nothing! There are many people who do not even know what browser or OS they are using.

      Clearly they are FAIL + Luddite!
  • bbliss17, on 06/12/2008, -0/+5great guide to the best browser
  • Poltron, on 06/12/2008, -18/+1Opera 9.5 got me hooked.
    • lcmatt, on 06/12/2008, -1/+15You may love Opera but this article is related to Firefox so stop with the immature fanboy posts.
      • specialK16, on 06/13/2008, -5/+1Would agree, but is not like he's going all "OMFG OPERA RULESZ" or anything of that matter.

        I was going to say, in my personal opinion Opera has the speed and the robustness. Firefox has tagged bookmarking and add ons.
        • Darkhacker, on 06/13/2008, -1/+4Unfortunately, most Opera users do the "OMFG OPERA RULEZ" crap. Remember when the Digg comment system was first released and it caused Opera to crash? There were actually Opera fanboys on that story trying to claim that it wasn't an Opera bug. Hell, even today, on the release of Opera 9.5, I saw two different people report a couple of minor bugs (one crash and one rendering bug) and they were getting dugg down while someone with a comment along the lines of "It's not Opera's fault you ***** up your computer" was getting dugg up.

          Look, I love Opera. I'm not trashing it in any way. It's an amazing browser. Their fanbase however is composed of the most insane people I've met. They deny any and all bugs. I've even seen legitimate bugs in the browser dismissed as pebkac and users who report the bug on social news websites or forums get insulted or called trolls.

          Out of all the browsers, Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari, Opera users are the only ones I know who would blame a browser crash on the end user or website rather than an actual bug in the browser; even when the same page works in all other browsers correctly on the same person's computer.
        • thegreatanti, on 06/13/2008, -0/+2@Darkhacker:

          That's typical Opera user behavior. They just can't help themselves. They need to get help.
      • GrantTLC, on 06/13/2008, -1/+1Yes, Poltron, please leave the immature fanboy posts to the Firefox evangelists in this thread.
  • bluntphallus, on 06/12/2008, -1/+10"as with other add-ons in Firefox 3, if a plugin is found to contain a security vulnerability, Firefox will automatically disable it and tell you where to get an updated version."
    I didn't know it had that feature. Very useful. Take a hint, Microsoft, and disable IE completely.
  • samotage, on 06/12/2008, -1/+2Love FF3, been using 3.0b4 for ages now, it's rock steady and great. Love the page scaling, and particuarly the address bar search - no need for those painful "favorites"

    Rock on Mozilla!
  • Callaway7, on 06/12/2008, -5/+4Sigh, is there a way to turn off the "Awesome Bar" feature? Don't get me wrong, it's without a doubt a very useful feature (read the carrot cake recipe example in her link). However, when I'm typing in digg.com I don't want Firefox to go begin showing me all the bookmarks with the word d*ck in them (think porn).
    • mvent2, on 06/12/2008, -0/+4Maybe you should stop going to so many porn sites.
    • zwaldowski, on 06/13/2008, -0/+4Stop going to porn sites that have "dick" in the name. That's black-hat search engine appeal, and overall bad design.
    • kozicka, on 06/13/2008, -1/+5Stop looking at gay porn then?

      Alternatively use a different browser for the hand shandy stuff, Opera is my choice :)
    • snapcase, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1I honestly would like to see a way to disable the bookmark searching in the "awesome bar". Default on, but the option to toggle off. A lot of people seem to love it but I kinda find it annoying.... especially on a shared PC.
    • indisguise, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3all you have to do is mouse over to an entry you don't want and hit the delete key, same with the searches firefox remembers
    • Herostratos, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1I agree completely. I switched back to FF2 because I don't want to browse my bookmarks all the time, I want to browse my search history.
    • bewareofcabbage, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3An "about:config" option existed to disable the AwesomeBar, which was removed in bug #407836, it will possibly return as an actual option in the user preferences. In the meantime, you can use an addon such as "OldBar" to use Firefox 3, but retain the old style FF2 address bar.
  • SierraAlpha, on 06/12/2008, -7/+1I'm running FireFox 3 RC3 and it crashes on every 10th page just about. It never did this before I reformatted... I tried reinstalling and everything. Any solutions anybody?
  • ptFoe, on 06/12/2008, -1/+1Is there anyway to stylise the Awesome bar using userchome.css?
  • OmegaWolf, on 06/12/2008, -5/+1So it'll be out this week? Is that a promise? They're certainly taking long enough with this update. It'd better be worth all the crowing I'm reading about it.
  • boardthis, on 06/12/2008, -0/+6best damn post ive seen on digg for quite a while. thank you very much for bringing me the info on the new fox. :)
  • jfg84, on 06/12/2008, -3/+1I've heard you should disable your add-ons but that really defeats the purpose of using Firefox. Hopefully, the developers will act fast to get their stuff to work with FF3.
    • JohnM5, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3Many addons are updated for Firefox 3. If they aren't then they will be disabled for you. Don't worry too much about it. You can still use most of your addons with Firefox 3. Maybe even all of them depending on what you use.
  • superkickstart, on 06/13/2008, -5/+4Great submit and very informative article but wasnt most of these in opera already?
  • jwoulf, on 06/13/2008, -1/+3I've been using FF3 for a few weeks now and I love it.

    The developers really need to give us an easier way to disable the so-called "Awesomebar". For now I'll use the oldbar extension.

    Also, I do not like to have to modify all my addons in order to force them to install, we need an easier way of bypassing the addon compatibility checker. And the automatic disabling of outdated addons annoys me. I have my addons for a reason, and anything that messes with them is going to be a serious problem.
  • jwoulf, on 06/13/2008, -2/+1Also, Remember, to force addons to install and not check for compatibility; Rather than modifying the addon, you can also enter About:Config in your URL bar and look for "extensions.checkCompatibility" Set it to "False" and FF will ignore compatibility warnings. Sadly, this will cause firefox to put a nag message in the addons window...

    We should be able to do this through the preferences or in the addon screen though. The same goes for disabling the so-called "awesomebar" WAKE UP, DEVELOPERS!
  • d1gg3r1, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1Great job! Bookmarked for later review :)
  • jumboshrimp11, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3So, let's say that I want that pretty XP theme on my Linux Firefox version... how can i go about that?
    • ry4nsm1th, on 06/13/2008, -0/+4I was wondering the same, I like the green arrows over the Vista blue.
  • hojin994, on 06/13/2008, -0/+0do we get to switch themes?
    i use windows XP with Vista transformation...
  • pault107, on 06/13/2008, -6/+1MAN THE HARPOONS!

    http://zuubu.runhost.net/?username=Lawrencesss&sel ...
    • pault107, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1Umm, that was supposed to be a reply to a comment above. Disregard.
  • Raiku, on 06/13/2008, -0/+2Someone help! Firefox reveals unnecessary history that I do not want anyone to see.... when someone types in the word "RED"... a certain website pops up... anyway to hide it?
    • indisguise, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3mouse over the entry and hit the delete key
    • bewareofcabbage, on 06/13/2008, -0/+2Clear your history - click Tools, Clear Private Data.
  • spudsstuff, on 06/13/2008, -0/+0Tick tock, count down to download day!
  • aidwiz, on 06/13/2008, -0/+3fantastic guide on firefox 3. must read for those who don't know the new features yet.
  • Steinr, on 06/13/2008, -5/+1Will there be a new Logo in version 3?
    http://digg.com/software/NEW_Firefox_Logo_15
  • NecroDigg, on 06/13/2008, -4/+2What's the point of firefox3? Opera 9.5 has been released
  • cubicrystal, on 06/13/2008, -3/+2Golden Calf much?

    It's a browser, people. Not the alpha and omega.
  • betona, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1Question: are there big changes that developers need to be aware of to properly render their pages in FF3 vs. code that was written to work with FF2/IE6/IE7 ?

    (I haven't paid much attention to FF3 until this week since it's finally coming out on Tuesday)
  • TheRealMisterd, on 06/13/2008, -1/+1Still no official MSI package from Mozilla.
    Supposedly that feature has been dropped.

    => Corps will NEVER want FF without an MSI.
    => And Frontmotion (http://www.frontmotion.com/) != Mozilla (It's a trust issue)

    Why MSI?
    -it's a corp standard.(STD switches, behavior, customizable without repackaging the original MSI)
    -It is designed from the ground up to run UNATTENDED regardless if it's an upgrade or a new install.

    BTW: GPOs are nice to have but not critical.
  • OaklandNative, on 06/13/2008, -0/+1I'm loving RC3 for the most part but for some reason, the flash plug-in won't install properly. I get the missing plug-in pop up, click install, FF restarts and the missing plug in pop up comes again. Cycle repeats.
  • ninjasquirrel, on 06/13/2008, -0/+2Another thing I've noticed is that Firefox 3 appears to be aware of anti-virus software... rather than just hanging up at the end of downloads while the AV software was checking them, it displays something like "Checking for viruses" before completing the download.
  • sunb, on 06/14/2008, -0/+0It's amazing, really helpful, it tells me what the awesome firefox3 is!
  • al0k, on 06/16/2008, -0/+1ya.. ff3 will be a revolution.. hope IE dies out totally :D
  • conshus, on 06/16/2008, -0/+0I have a secret bookmark of my fav. porn. Now firefox 3 is revealing it all through the browser. Is there not an option to filter out a bookmark file? wtf? totally ruins it for me, how do I revert back to ff 2?
  • davidv00, on 06/22/2008, -0/+0Very nice article
  •  

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