Firefox 3 Released

[Lashiec]

Default skin ugly? Icons might not be all that pretty, but I like how simple & clean it is, how little "real estate" is wasted on useless graphics.

-f0dder (June 18, 2008, 06:44 AM)

You can make a nice skin, with pretty icons, while keeping it simple and clean. And wasting less space in the process, that big-assed back button is getting on my nerves. "Our usability tests show that 50% of the people miss the back button, so we made it BIGGER". So, Mozilla, can you explain why the Linux skin keeps the default size, and no keyhole design, hmm?

I think they made a bad choice with the integration path, because I feel the skins are not integrated at all, and wasted tons of time with them (and money, with the IconFactory contract), while a simple tour of the addons page shows themes that fit much better with Vista and Mac OS X. The Linux skin, while I think it's the better by a long shot (when it comes to integration and default looks), it's clearly Gnome-based, and of no much use for KDE-based distros. Anyway, all distros customize Firefox looks, so... And for XP, I think I found a quite decent theme, so let's move on :-)

As for speed, seems like FF3 install by default turns off HTTP pipelining even if it was enabled in FF2 - turning it back on helps increase page load speed.

Aha, thanks for the tip.

maybe we should post firefox 3 reviews we find:
http://cybernetnews....es-firefox-3-review/ - they like it a lot

-mouser (June 18, 2008, 09:28 AM)

Some of the commenters, though, prefer trolling

Does anybody know the technical details behind the automatic check for malware and phishing sites? In Firefox 2, you could opt for an automatically downloaded database, or Google assistance, but I ignore how it works now. Also, I have some connection problems with Windows Live Mail that make the page revert to the basic view (I bet it's a Microsoft problem), and the function to show the cookies of the site you're in has a few display issues.

Apart from that, seems like a solid improvement, Yahoo! Mail works significantly faster (except when scrolling the list of mails, but I don't think it's a problem with Firefox), GMail significantly slower at first (w-e-i-r-d), and the rest seems OK (except for a minor issue in Firefox own addons page). I specially like the new scrolling tab bar, which makes much easier to move between lots of tabs (while in Firefox 2 it was nearly impossible), and the new bookmark system, nicely implemented (someone has to clone this :-P). And like João, I don't like the new way to manage outdated certificates.

Also, CAKE, everybody likes cake. From the comments:

Mozilla should send the world's biggest cake to the IE team when they finally release IE8 (they've got a year to prepare, so should be plenty of time).

They could even give the cake some varying levels of opacity, although the IE team might not be able to see it properly then.

[Josh]

Exactly, that's what i'm looking for. Ok, i'll wait, then

-jgpaiva (June 17, 2008, 01:42 PM)

http://mozilla.dorando.at/

This link contains a working keyconfig for FF3. You can change everything with this

[Edvard]

I like it. 
Flashblock and DownThemAll are all I need for extensions.

Don't forget, if you downloaded it during Download Day, to pick up your certificate!

[Edvard]

The Linux skin, while I think it's the better by a long shot (when it comes to integration and default looks), it's clearly Gnome-based, and of no much use for KDE-based distros.

Yes, VERY gnome-based. I agree, they should have done a KDE skin, or at least made a default theme that's as neutral as possible across all platforms.
I'd actually like to have the "keyhole" buttons in my Linux FF3, but I can't find a skin for it.
Any suggestions?

[cmpm]

You can change the buttons without having to use a new theme.

http://codefisher.org/toolbar_button/

[ssoundman]

How can HTTP pipelining be turned on? I missed seeing those instructions.

I'm having no trouble with the version of TabMixPlus mentioned above. Thanks for pointing it out, Marc. 

[cmpm]

a theme page that may not be known to some
works with FF3

http://edhumester.googlepages.com/home

[f0dder]

type "about:config" in the location bar, then enter "network.http" in the search bar, and find pipelining - dunno if a restart is necessary.

[Ehtyar]

maybe we should post firefox 3 reviews we find:
http://cybernetnews....es-firefox-3-review/ - they like it a lot

-mouser (June 18, 2008, 09:28 AM)

And all the FF 3-only addons. I've found LocationBar^2 and Sage-Too.

Ehtyar.

[CGA]

About:config->extensions.checkCompatibility=false

-CGA (June 17, 2008, 05:05 PM)

Too dangerous for me, would be easy to accidentally forget about it and end up downloading an old extension that really messed with your browser, then as soon as you turn it off all the old addons stop working. But nice note though, I'll confess i didn't know about it
Ehtyar.

-Ehtyar (June 17, 2008, 05:12 PM)

You get a nice warning about the disabled check every time you install extensions, and there is always the uninstall button. Anyways, to each his own.

[MrCrispy]

I am very happy with this release. I love the AwesomeBar and there are little touches everywhere which I like.
I also installed the Nasa Night Launch theme (http://forums.mozill...ewtopic.php?t=547498) which is just fabulous. All my extensions also work. I've uninstalled FF2 at work and home and this is the true test of whether FF3 is good enough to use.

[ssoundman]

type "about:config" in the location bar, then enter "network.http" in the search bar, and find pipelining - dunno if a restart is necessary.

-f0dder (June 18, 2008, 03:33 PM)

Thanks, it worked! I restarted Firefox though, so I can't say if it worked without doing that.

[Fedorov]

The Nightly Tester Tools http://www.oxymoroni.../web/firefox/nightly
Allow you to force compatibility of any add-ons that are not working. I've been using ALL of my FF2 add-ons for the last 6 months on FF3 alpha/beta versions

I think there are only 2 out of my 13 add-ons that has not had a new FF3 version released.
If anyone needs help in bumping up the version number inside an older add-on then just shout.

[Lashiec]

And all the FF 3-only addons. I've found LocationBar^2 and Sage-Too.

-Ehtyar (June 18, 2008, 04:02 PM)

Locationbar² (also mentioned by Eóin in the second page) is a curious case, as at first it was discussed to merge it in the main Firefox build, when version 3 was in the planning stages. As you may see, they decided against it, which is understandable as for most users it would be a bit confusing.

Now the history repeats itself with Ctrl-Tab, which is proposed for inclusion in Firefox 3.1. It's also for Firefox 3.x only :)

[cmpm]

I fixed Minimize To Tray with help.
Changed the 2 to a 4 in the install.rdf.
And it works fine. Here it is with .zip that you need to change to .xpi after downloading it.
Cause I can't upload an xpi file.
Download it to your desktop and drag and drop it in FF3.
After you change the extension to .xpi.

[patteo]

Downloaded it yesterday and modified the Powermarks.xpi (so that the maxversion is 3.0) so that the Powermarks icons will show up in Firefox 3.

However, on clicking the icon, Powermarks does not run.

Does anyone have a workaround ?

Powermarks is a very competent Bookmarks manager and has been mentioned several times in this forum such as

Multi-browser Bookmark Synchronization Tool and Other Multi-Browser Ideas? - DonationCoder.com
"Powermarks is the best! (http://www.kaylon.com/power.html) it not only synchronises your bookmarks, crossbrowser, also lets you instant searches them, extract tags from them so they're grouped, backup/store them online so you can use them between multiple pcs."
https://www.donation...dex.php?topic=7926.0

[MrCrispy]

So why does every Firefox release cycle have to go through this mess with incompatible extensions? IE and Opera addons don't suffer this fate. There are 2 things going on as far as I can tell -

1. the internal Mozilla api's are updated quite often, and are not backwards compatible. So extension author's have to update.
2. FF will check the version number.

That's why you can sometimes trick Ff by updating the version, or disabling the check, but if #1 is in effect that doesn't work.

Both of these are bad design practices. Extensions should never have to keep updating, especially between minor revs, like on each beta and rc. This is where the open source mentality hurts FF - there's little effort on the part of Mozilla to make sure extensions work, since anyone can go fix them if they want to. At least that's what I feel.

[Fred Nerd]

Thanks Lashiec for the cake link....
Very funny

   
    If you look at the T in "the", it's written the same way. It's a cursive T, not a 7, unless it's supposed to read "Love, 7he IE 7eam"


Great, they can't even write a standards-compliant cake.

It will be interesting to to see the new IE

As for themes, I'm learning to live with this.....
I would hate to have to skin, it means things look different when you have to fix friend's computers.

But it really has impressed me, I can open heaps of tabs, and they all open quickly (not load, just open) and don't bog down the system.

And remember about:mozilla
The book of mozilla now says:

Mammon slept. And the beast reborn spread over the earth and its numbers
grew legion. And they proclaimed the times and sacrificed crops unto the
fire, with the cunning of foxes. And they built a new world in their own
image as promised by the
sacred words, and spoke
 of the beast with their children. Mammon awoke, and lo! it was
naught but a follower.



from The Book of Mozilla, 11:9
(10th Edition)

Fits in with the cake

[justice]

Extensions should never have to keep updating, especially between minor revs, like on each beta and rc.

-MrCrispy (June 18, 2008, 10:16 PM)

If this is the case then maybe they should look at javascript and test for functionality / api calls instead of version numbers?

[f0dder]

Both of these are bad design practices. Extensions should never have to keep updating, especially between minor revs, like on each beta and rc. This is where the open source mentality hurts FF - there's little effort on the part of Mozilla to make sure extensions work, since anyone can go fix them if they want to. At least that's what I feel.

-MrCrispy (June 18, 2008, 10:16 PM)

I think it's fine to make breaking API changes in major revisions. Otherwise, you either need to keep old cruddy compatibility code around indefinitely, or lock yourself to a possibly ill-designed API.

[Edvard]

OK, I found how to get the keyhole nav buttons in Linux...

http://ubuntuforums....=5219481#post5219481

I'll be testing it tonight and report back how it works.

[icekin]

After an entire day of performance tweaking, I can finally report my results on FF3.

On the bright side, the Mozilla team has certainly made progress with FF3. Memory usage is not exactly lower, but rather more efficient. In other words, unused memory is quickly returned back to the OS, while FF2 would still 'hold it' for longer, causing the leak. However, the actual usage of memory per page opened is still high, but not prohibitively so. To be fair, with the exception of probably Dillo and Lynx, all decent graphical web browsers do utilize a considerable amount of physical memory. The other main advantage of FF is obviously the plethora of plugins, themes and add-ons available, something any other browser, including IE lacks.

On the "need to be improved" section, I will comment with comparison to Opera, which I consider to be closest competitior to FF. With speed tweaks, the loading time is nearly the same on both browsers. However, Opera wins because its more responsive as a software program. For this test, I tried opening a variety of sites, including Java script heavy ones and those that have poorly written HTML. FF can still be made to 'hang' when trying to render a page. By 'hang', I mean that it stops responding to mouse clicks and I can't even CTRL + TAB to switch to another tab. This is a problem that Opera, and even K-Meleon do not suffer from. Even when unable to render a page, the software program should ideally remain responsive to external commands. This one problem results in FF having an overall sluggish feel on windows. Surprisingly, I do not suffer this problem with FF on Linux, but I did not have any extensions installed on that machine, so perhaps its not the best comparison.

Hence, at the end, my conclusion for now remains the same as it was with FF2 and Opera 9.2 : FF is a slow moving ocean liner packed with hundreds of features and an onboard swimming pool while Opera is a speedy boat with minimum features that can possibly satisfy mainstream users, but not more. Now, if Opera went open source or made it easier to write third party plugins, they can steal more of FF's thunder. But, that seems unlikely at present since Opera is a profit oriented company while Mozilla is a non-profit entity.

And IE is probably the Titanic...

[cmpm]

FasterFox for FF3.
Same deal.
Change the last 3 letters of the file from zip to xpi.

It is Faster with it.

[Ehtyar]

For this test, I tried opening a variety of sites, including Java script heavy ones and those that have poorly written HTML. FF can still be made to 'hang' when trying to render a page. By 'hang', I mean that it stops responding to mouse clicks and I can't even CTRL + TAB to switch to another tab. This is a problem that Opera, and even K-Meleon do not suffer from.

-icekin (June 19, 2008, 11:59 AM)

While i appreciate any independent testing on this website, it seems more and more people are posting their "results" with absolutely no details/supporting evidence whatsoever. For example, what sites were the browsers tested on? was the cache empty? were the browsers using pipelining? what addons/widgets were installed? was any 3rd party software present that may have interfered? etc etc.

Ehtyar.

[f0dder]

FF3/win32, running on XP64 Pro, with the following addons:

- Adblock Plus 0.7.5.4
- Dansk ordbog 1.6.13
- Download Statusbar 0.9.6.3
- Extension List Dumper 1.14.1
- Firebug 1.05 (Disabled, Incompatible)
- FlashGot 1.0.3
- It's All Text! 0.8.5
- Mouseless Browsing 0.4.3 (Disabled, Incompatible)
- NoScript 1.6.9.3
- ScrapBook 1.3.3.6
- Screen grab! 0.95
- Tab Control 0.4.1
- Tamper Data 10.0.4
- Text Link 2.0.2008052801

Seems to start slightly faster, leaks a LOT less memory, opening "a zillion tabs" (ie., 10+ forum notify emails when I get home from work) doesn't cause new-tab-open-slowdown anymore, and even facebook doesn't lag like a slug when it's been open for 6+ hours. The AwesomeBar is nice, although I'd wish it had ALT+n shortcuts like FARR.

Sites load as fast as ever, no change there really - after re-enabling pipelining, anyway.

So far, I'm pretty satisfied with FF3, it seems to have fixed the problems that annoyed me most with FF2 (even though startup time could be reduced even a bit more ).