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Or just get Text Link for Firefox and you can just double click on the URL to load it. :)

A ghastly article that is shoddy on details. It barely mentioned it was a proxy (as I was also wondering if this was a simulation). The article describes that the toolbar will display your new IP, but the screenshots do not show it.

Also, in regards to the extension:

1. The "China Channel" is a horrid name
2. w00t, just what every browser needs, yet another screen-real-estate-sucking toolbar
3. To get the same experience, why not use one of the many proxy switching extensions. Then go find a list of Chinese proxies so you can cycle through them.

I do, however, respect the point of showing the rest of the world how the web "feels" inside of China.

On a related note, does anyone have a list of proxies organized by country? As a web developer, I would love to test various web sites that geo-code the IP and dynamically display different content.

A ghastly article that is shoddy on details. It barely mentioned it was a proxy (as I was also wondering if this was a simulation). The article describes that the toolbar will display your new IP, but the screenshots do not show it.

Also, in regards to the extension:

1. The "China Channel" is a horrid name
2. w00t, just what every browser needs, yet another screen-real-estate-sucking toolbar
3. To get the same experience, why not use one of the many proxy switching extensions. Then go find a list of Chinese proxies so you can cycle through them.

I do, however, respect the point of showing the rest of the world how the web "feels" inside of China.

On a related note, does anyone have a list of proxies organized by country? As a web developer, I would love to test various web sites that geo-code the IP and dynamically display different content.

Hi Jeff, it's me again :)

First, let me repeat: Minefield is firefox without the official branding.
You can download the source code for Firefox-3.0.3, compile it as described earlier and it will identify as Minefield-3.0.3. All versions of Firefox exist as feature identical Minefield equivalent, but not vice versa. Pre release binaries of firefox are always compiled without the official branding flag.
The reason is purely political/marketing: The Mozilla guys don't want the Firefox trade mark to be damaged by reports on pre release software. You can even check out the current working tree, compile it with official branding flag enabled and it will identify itself as firefox. You're just not allowed to distribute the resulting binary.

Happily looking forward to continue this discussion ;)

Hi Jeff, it's me again :)

First, let me repeat: Minefield is firefox without the official branding.
You can download the source code for Firefox-3.0.3, compile it as described earlier and it will identify as Minefield-3.0.3. All versions of Firefox exist as feature identical Minefield equivalent, but not vice versa. Pre release binaries of firefox are always compiled without the official branding flag.
The reason is purely political/marketing: The Mozilla guys don't want the Firefox trade mark to be damaged by reports on pre release software. You can even check out the current working tree, compile it with official branding flag enabled and it will identify itself as firefox. You're just not allowed to distribute the resulting binary.

Happily looking forward to continue this discussion ;)

Not exactly. Minefield is firefox without the official branding, nothing else.

If you don't believe me, go and download the official beta code from here, compile it without --enable-official-branding, start the browser and realize that is identifies itself as Minefield version 3.1b1. Note, I'm posting from exactly such a build. And note. this also works for any rescent officially released version.

In my original post I was implicitly referring to the 3.1 series with tracemonkey in general. Tracemonkey is included since 3.1b1. There just is no need to use nightly builds.

In summary I rather would say: Minefield is, by definition, as stable as firefox.

v8-richards failure was fixed recently: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=456384

Thanks for the heads up! I expected you guys would only want bare, basic code examples to demonstrate bugs, but BZ has set me straight. Someone's already filed a report using my example code, however.

Cheers!

I think the hype is that in the latest nightly builds, apparently you are not using, the JIT has been turned on by default.

The new Firefox Windows installer - for a custom install location - put the Firefox files into the top level of my d:\Program Files directory. I did not want this, so I uninstalled it from the Windows Control Panel Uninstall applet. It did not uninstall so I logged in as adminstrator and then ran the uninstall. THe unintall took a long time with lots of disk activity. At the end of it, about 2/3 of the folders in Program Files had been deleted. I lost dozens of applications, many of them requiring serial numbers to reinstall, and all the associated configuration, etc. Included in the carnage were two other Mozilla installations and my Thunderbird 0.4 installation, and Winzip which of course I needed to unzip replacements. Don't use nightly builds unless you actually understand the possible consequences. And for FSM's sake don't suggest it to others!

These benchmark results are a bit debatable - I've seen different suites electing different "winners" and, while SunSpider seems to be the best, it's a long way from a robust benchmark like SPEC* or DaCapo.

In any event, even if SFX is leading the pack right now, that's because it's the most mature competitor, and its advantage won't last too long. I predict (and I write this logged with my account, not AC, so I would be forever glorified when this becomes true in 12 months max) that both V8 and TraceMonkey will take the lead, leaving SFX in a safe third place permanently.

The reason is very simple. All these new JS VMs are JIT compilers, producing native code. But SFX is a context threaded JIT. Context threading is just a step beyond traditional direct-threaded interpreters: functions are 'compiled' into streams of CALLs into routines that implement each bytecode operation, but there is limited inlining (simple operations and branches), with a focus on reducing branch misprediction.

OTOH, both V8 and TraceMonkey are "real compilers" that emit real native code (not CALL streams) for entire functions (or even larger chunks of code, with inlining). This is necessary to enable traditional optimizations like register allocation, instruction scheduling, constant folding, loop unrolling etc. Some of these optimizations can be performed on a high-level intermediate code representation (HIR), but that's typically not worth the effort without real compilation. E.g., loop unrolling will just waste memory an i-cache efficiency if performed by a threaded interpreter/JIT... as the real benefit of unrolling is giving the compiler a much larger basic block to perform other opts like extra folding and bounds-check elimination, or real low-level tricks like exploring using SIMD registers and operations / Instruction-Level Parallelism / prefetching / branch predication etc.

The only reason why V8 and TraceMonkey don't completely 0wn the benchmarks today, is that these JITs are still in their infancy. They have implemented the foundations (like V8's hidden classes or TM's tracing), but they still miss to implement dozens of important optimizations (including very easy ones - they just didn't have the time yet). Check some comments about V8's limitations. TM's developers have also commented on many limitations, quote (Andreas Gal: "If it talks to the DOM during the benchmark, we currently donâ(TM)t compile across such calls (we plan to for Beta2 though)". This and several other improvements are planned for future builds of Firefox 3.1. Notice that items like special support for DOM interactions and event handlers should be critical to some benchmarks - and of course to real-world RIA apps. I'm sure the V8 hackers are also working around the clock to fill in their own gaps. When both VMs are reasonably mature, SFX will have a VERY hard time competing (unless of course, they abandon the context threading model and mutate into a real compiler). Other optimizations, like JITted regex, can be implemented in all VMs and will eventually be ubiquitous.

Minefield. Not a beta. A nightly build.

Firefox Betas.

The link in the summary goes to Minefield. Not the beta. Minefield is, by definition, not stable.

Actually, ARM is getting first-class support (check out the source).

32-bit PowerPC will also get quality support, as both Adobe and Mozilla need it for legacy MacOS products. (64-bit PowerPC isn't as high a priority but contributions here would definitely be welcomed.)

Sun is, in fact, pitching in on Sparc.

I don't see any indication of active work on MIPS or Coldfire, but it would be welcome if anyone wants to undertake it. The code generator is pretty well insulated; adding new architectures is not trivial but is a reasonably isolated task.

Actually, ARM is getting first-class support (check out the source).

32-bit PowerPC will also get quality support, as both Adobe and Mozilla need it for legacy MacOS products. (64-bit PowerPC isn't as high a priority but contributions here would definitely be welcomed.)

Sun is, in fact, pitching in on Sparc.

I don't see any indication of active work on MIPS or Coldfire, but it would be welcome if anyone wants to undertake it. The code generator is pretty well insulated; adding new architectures is not trivial but is a reasonably isolated task.

They will replace the current FFox with what is in Minefield - when it is ready.

https://wiki.mozilla.org/ReleaseRoadmap

Minefield is just the code-name for the trunk. You see, during development new stuff is submitted to the main branch - the trunk. This is where big changes like a new javascript engine or big changes to the html rendering engine happens.

You can download Minefield today to take a look at what is currently on the main trunk. But this code is often under heavy development and has not gone through all the testing/fixing that an official release gets. That's why they call it Minefield, it can and will blow up now and then.

When the current trunk has all the features one wants for the next version of FFox, they do a branch. They then do stability / security fixes etc on this branch (but no big new features). From his branch you then get the FFox betas/release-candidates and then eventually the shiny new FFox 4 (or 3.5 or whatever they'll call it).

But has the JIT code been implemented for PPC?

No. They seem to be planning to have PPC support eventually, but work is in very early stages.

I've already seen a ton of posts thinking that this browser is somehow distinct from Firefox. It isn't. Minefield is the application name for any version of Firefox currently under development (just like Shredder is for Thunderbird). These names have been specifically chosen to sound scary, as these builds have gotten virtually no testing, and using them is not recommended for the general public. They are not in any way considered stable, and might (as the old joke goes) set your computer on fire or eat babies. It was a really bad idea of the submitter to promote using just any old nightly build - at least without explaining what nightly builds are. (They're basically automated builds created daily; testing them is highly welcome (which is why they're made available), but expect to find bugs (and please report those bugs!) - they are most definitely not vetted for general use.)

If you do want to experience the recent developments and see what Firefox 3.1 will be like when it's released, Beta 1 was recently released, and has at least gotten a nominal amount of testing to ensure that the risk of fires and devoured babies is small.

you may like this firefox addon: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1672

Are there any restrictions on what is prefetched?

Yes, only http URLs can be prefetched (https:// URLs are never prefetched for security reasons). ... In addition to this restriction, URLs with a query string are not prefetched...

Banks should only allow money transfers through https, and these URLs are not prefetched.

Online polls will presumably use a query string or POST data, and so will not or can not be prefetched.

DDOSing an image through prefetch could be done by just embedding the image, so that point is moot.

Use Opera. One of its really great features is the ability to browse the web with image loading turned off, either completely, or just by allowing already-cached images to be displayed.

Or use Firefox + imgLikeOpera addon

Opera also has the images control down on the right hand end of the status bar. It also has the option of selecting 'cached images' option. Very useful.

No Script is a pain. I don't think it is a good recomendation. One that hasn't been mentioned here is flash block, since alot of bandwidth heavy sites pimp flash items it'll replace each with button to click. Also remember to install the filterset updater firefox extension along with adblock plus.

Flash blocker linkage: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/433

Both Opera and Firefox allow you to type about:config and get into the the low-level settings of the browser, many of which will take effect straight away. (an awesome feature, every application should have this). I suggest manually adjusting your browser memory and disk caches to the largest ammount you can get away with. turn of everything with 'prefetch' in the name.

{stuff to look for in Firefox 'about:config'
browser.cache.disk.capacity 128000 or 256000, bigger numbers work ok but too big may cause issues.
Check that the following is set to true:
browser.cache.disk enable = true,
browser.cache.disk_cache_ssl = true (but this not secure)
network.http.use-cache = true
Set value to false:
network.prefetch-next = false
network.http.keep-alive = false (may save you just a little traffic) also: network.http.proxy.keep-alive = false Or else just use the below settings (firefox's default is 6)
network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server = 2 }

So sure, you can block all kinds of stuff from downloading and cache/proxy tricks, but there is one overlooked trick, and that's hitting the stop button as soon as you have what you want to see on the page. It should stop anything more downloading.

From https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Link_prefetching_FAQ:

It is important that websites adopt tag based prefetching instead of trying to roll-in silent downloading using various JS/DOM hacks. The tag gives the browser the ability to know what sites are up to, and we can use this information to better prioritize document prefetching. The user preference to disable tag prefetching may simply encourage websites to stick with JS/DOM hacks, and that would not be good for users. This is one reason why prefetching is enabled by default.

Maybe you still disagree, but I think that is a well thought-out argument for having it enabled by default.

And if you are not a Firefox user. Become one.

Some extra things you can do on top of most other things
1) http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm will block out many things without even trying to fetch them.
2) Use privoxy or junkbuster
3) https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1672 ImgLikeOpera This extension is very useful for non broadband users
4) If you have more then 1 PC, install a proxy server. Or perhaps using your providers proxy server won't count for as much (a long shot, but worth ti check out)
5) Use a webinterface for your mail without too many adds, like Gmail.
6) Read /. with the "Low Bandwith", simple design and such set
7) Use Lynx, links or w3m to browse most sites and only use firefox for those that actually need it.

Do use all of the things, not just one or two. Only when they conflict yiu need to choose.

I have a couple of suggestions for Firefox...

Don't load images: Preferences -> Content and uncheck "Load images automatically".

Block other media you don't want: FlashBlock, AdBlock, QuickJava (for Java and JavaScript)

You could also try fiddling with the browser.cache.check_doc_frequency in your about:config. I haven't tried it, but setting it to 2 might yield good results.

I have a couple of suggestions for Firefox...

Don't load images: Preferences -> Content and uncheck "Load images automatically".

Block other media you don't want: FlashBlock, AdBlock, QuickJava (for Java and JavaScript)

You could also try fiddling with the browser.cache.check_doc_frequency in your about:config. I haven't tried it, but setting it to 2 might yield good results.

If you build a web app, it might not be able to take advantage of the phone's hardware, like the GPS. I originally built a web app but bit the bullet and wrote a native iPhone app for this very reason.

Fair point in general, but for the specific case of geolocation, some upcoming standards will allow pages to access that information if the user allows it.

https://developer.mozilla.org/En/Using_geolocation

Apparently you can't make heads-or-tails of terminology either. You're thinking strict code execution, while I'm thinking conceptual division. In this case, I thought it was pretty obvious that I was referring to a CMS; I'll be sure to spell things out clearly next time.

And- just for the record, neat trick indeed. JavaScript can be and is executed server-side as well as client-side. The Dojo release build system works like that. See http://www.mozilla.org/rhino/

This would make a kinda useful bug report, you know. ;)

I can't answer the "what gives" question yet, but I filed a bug at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=460964 if you want to keep track of the progress on figuring out what is giving.

Old Location Bar actually monkeys with the way the algorithm works to make it more like FF2 behavior. It's not completely successful, but good enough for me to go ahead using FF3. Before I found it most of my FF installs were stuck at the latest FF2. The retarded thing is you have to either register for an account or install it from the developers website because the Mozilla guys are so attached to the Awfulbar that they have it stuck at experimental even though it came out in June!

There is a development build scoring 97/100 using patches that are now available on Bugzilla; AFAIK the 3 remaining problems are for missing SVG font support. See this comment for more information.

There is a development build scoring 97/100 using patches that are now available on Bugzilla; AFAIK the 3 remaining problems are for missing SVG font support. See this comment for more information.

It's not a Slashdot reference, it's a South Park reference.

It's not a South Park reference, it's a Mozilla reference:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=434180

My long-developed XUL application is completely screwed, the functionality in Fenek is at 30% maybe. For example, main menu doesn't work, image onclick event can't popup menu (or popup menu doesn't work at all?), all comboboxes are missing (but textboxes are there), mouse scroll button in tree doesn't work (cause it zoom the whole page), and now it completely crashed. While considering my last bugreport with MINIMAL TEST CASE was submited and completely ignored for 5 months, I think it's time to move on.

ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mobile/
posted using fennec on aspire one running ubuntu
untar and click on fennec :)

it's a little strange scrolling is done by click and drag but its working wit fine on here

While this is true,by putting the browser out for desktops it gives users a chance to "try before they buy" and decide if Fennec is right for them. It also gives them a chance to report problem areas in the controls as well as ask for features. Besides there isn't anything wrong with having a lightweight browser for your desktop. For those that are curious I just download the Fennec for Windows and it is as simple as unzip and use.

Oh and for those that hate to RTFA(this is slashdot,after all) the link for the Windows version is here Linux here and Mac here.

While this is true,by putting the browser out for desktops it gives users a chance to "try before they buy" and decide if Fennec is right for them. It also gives them a chance to report problem areas in the controls as well as ask for features. Besides there isn't anything wrong with having a lightweight browser for your desktop. For those that are curious I just download the Fennec for Windows and it is as simple as unzip and use.

Oh and for those that hate to RTFA(this is slashdot,after all) the link for the Windows version is here Linux here and Mac here.

While this is true,by putting the browser out for desktops it gives users a chance to "try before they buy" and decide if Fennec is right for them. It also gives them a chance to report problem areas in the controls as well as ask for features. Besides there isn't anything wrong with having a lightweight browser for your desktop. For those that are curious I just download the Fennec for Windows and it is as simple as unzip and use.

Oh and for those that hate to RTFA(this is slashdot,after all) the link for the Windows version is here Linux here and Mac here.

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/fennec/1.0a1/releasenotes/

Going to the official Firefox site and searching for "fennec" matched nothing. Yea! With it being so easy to get, I'll be trying it "real soon now".

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/FennecVision

Here's the actual FTP links http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.win32.zip http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.mac.dmg http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.linux-i686.tar.bz2

Going to the official Firefox site and searching for "fennec" matched nothing. Yea! With it being so easy to get, I'll be trying it "real soon now".

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/FennecVision

Here's the actual FTP links http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.win32.zip http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.mac.dmg http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.linux-i686.tar.bz2

Going to the official Firefox site and searching for "fennec" matched nothing. Yea! With it being so easy to get, I'll be trying it "real soon now".

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/FennecVision

Here's the actual FTP links http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.win32.zip http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.mac.dmg http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.linux-i686.tar.bz2

Going to the official Firefox site and searching for "fennec" matched nothing. Yea! With it being so easy to get, I'll be trying it "real soon now".

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/FennecVision

Here's the actual FTP links http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.win32.zip http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.mac.dmg http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/mobile/fennec-1.0a1.en-US.linux-i686.tar.bz2

After some poking around and a bit of google-fu I found this: ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mobile/ which has all the builds. There's also instructions in installing it on a Nokia N810 here.

After some poking around and a bit of google-fu I found this: ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mobile/ which has all the builds. There's also instructions in installing it on a Nokia N810 here.

Going to the official Firefox site and searching for "fennec" matched nothing. Yea! With it being so easy to get, I'll be trying it "real soon now".

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mobile/FennecVision

I would say that Google's Cache is a singleton, but--thanks to an extension in Firefox called "Resurrect Pages" https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2570 --there appears to be several websites that cache older versions of websites, although The Internet Archive seems to be the only place to save multiple versions of the same page and not just keep the latest version. (There are probably other extensions that do similar, but I've not cared to search for any others).

I would have mentioned Flight Aware http://flightaware.com/ as a web singleton, but there is another site, Flight View, http://flightview.com/ that does the same thing (let you track airline flights and their ETA, and even their position on a map!)

I haven't found a site similar to RepairPal http://repairpal.com/ where you can find approximate car repair costs.

There is also a Web Developer plug-in available at the FireFox Add-ons site.

Get firefox
http://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/firefox/

Block ads.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1136

Block cookies.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5207

Tip: If you want to enable cookies on a current site, click the CS Lite icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Block javascript.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/722

Tip: If you want to enable javascript, click the NoScript icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Can anyone else suggest a much better way to protect privacy? I want a simple no-nonsense list to give to my friends who aren't nerdy enough to know that one plus one can equal ten.

Get firefox
http://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/firefox/

Block ads.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1136

Block cookies.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5207

Tip: If you want to enable cookies on a current site, click the CS Lite icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Block javascript.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/722

Tip: If you want to enable javascript, click the NoScript icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Can anyone else suggest a much better way to protect privacy? I want a simple no-nonsense list to give to my friends who aren't nerdy enough to know that one plus one can equal ten.

Get firefox
http://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/firefox/

Block ads.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1136

Block cookies.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5207

Tip: If you want to enable cookies on a current site, click the CS Lite icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Block javascript.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/722

Tip: If you want to enable javascript, click the NoScript icon at bottom and click "Temporarily allow Slashdot.org"

Can anyone else suggest a much better way to protect privacy? I want a simple no-nonsense list to give to my friends who aren't nerdy enough to know that one plus one can equal ten.