Mozilla Firefox 2 Alpha 1 Available

Mini-Geek writes "Code-named Bon Echo, the first Alpha of Firefox 2.0 is now officially available. You can download it at ftp.mozilla.org. From the article: 'Here are some new features in Bon Echo Alpha 1 that require feedback: Changes to tabbed browsing behavior, New data storage layer for bookmarks and history (using SQLlite), Extended search plugin format, Updates to the extension system to provide enhanced security and to allow for easier localization of extensions, Support for SVG text using svg:textPath'"

Comments

But...

[Onymous Hero]

Will it use less memory than 0.x / 1.x ??

Re:But...

[Adult film producer]

I hope so, check out Ben Maurer's latest blog entry, near the bottom he talks a bit about this. Actually, the latest entry is quite informative about the new memory mapping features in the latest kernel.

Re:But...

[hkgroove]

Yes, but you have to think in Russian for it to be efficient.

Re:But...

[Pneuma ROCKS]

That's why it's called an alpha developer build. It's barely beginning active development. You cannot expect it to be stable. You cannot even expect it to be safe. This is not a beta or release candidate. It's meant only for testers and active developers. Use with extreme caution.

SQLite

[kevin_conaway]

We all know that Firefox has had (and still has) a lot of memory issues. Will embedding a database in memory help or worsen these issues?

I haven't used SQLite, can anyone with experience using it please comment?

Re:SQLite

[G)-(ostly]

I forsee no problems. It's a surprisingly minimal addition to a software package, and the problems with Firefox's memory management are very likely in unrelated modules.

"SQL" engines tend to evoke images of hulking software packages like PostgreSQL, SQL Server, and Oracle, but those things do an awful lot more than the typical desktop app needs, and the SQLite engine is much, much simpler in order to meet that lesser demand.

Re:SQLite

[LurkerML]

http://www.sqlite.org/

The website says 250KiB fully configured. That is tolerable, i think.

Re:SQLite

[smooth wombat]

We all know that Firefox has had (and still has) a lot of memory issues.

We do? Funny, I've been running FF since the 0.8 days (Phoenix) and have never had any memory issue. In fact, I've never had any issue other than one mini-crash which forced me to use a default profile until I pulled up my old one. Further, I've installed FF on several different systems, including W98, and not one of those systems has ever had a memory issue.

Looking at the FF boards it appears the issue is not so much with FF but the multitude of extensions that people think they need to install.

Re:SQLite

[bperkins]

Mu.

The memory usage problems have been related to the image cache. (I've heard that this is often caused by an old version of the adblock extension)

Using SQLite to store profile information will probably have little impact the memory usage problems people see.

Re:SQLite

[bunratty]

All browsers have lots of memory issues. They also all have security problems, they crash under lots of different situations, have many kinds of CPU use problems, and thousands of other kinds of bugs. What else is new?

I don't think embedding a database will noticably impact memory usage. The most noticable change will be that your bookmarks, cache, and other parts of your profile will not be corrupted or lost nearly as easily. The dataloss problems SQLite will fix are much more severe than the memory problems some people expereience with Firefox. Firefox is using too much memory? Just restart. Firefox lost your bookmarks? Tough sh*t!

Re:SQLite

[smittyoneeach]

You believe falsely. (Possibly you're thinking of BerkelyDB). http//sqlite.org has full disclosure, even describing the virtual machine and opcodes that drive this little ~300kb, mostly-ANSI '92 compliant wonder.

Combine a scripting language for end-user forms, and you've got everything MS Access wishes it could be.

Get Hipp. Get SQLite.

Re:SQLite

[Jjeff1]

I have firefox 1.5.0.1 on windows xp with latest adblock and filterset G updater, nothing else.

I've noticed that web pages that refresh themselves cause a run-away memory situation. Specifically the win32 MRTG package from open innovations causes FF to use huge amounts of memory. It auto refreshes graphs I think every 10 seconds. If I leave a graph up on screen and leave for the weekend, FF will be using 1.8 GB memory when I come back on Monday. I've been unable to find out if this is a known problem or not, so I've not submitted this as a bug.

Re:SQLite

[MooUK]

Adblock itself has had, and still does have, memory leak problems. The original maintainer shows no inclination to deal with them. It's generally recommended to use Adblock Plus, which has fixed most of these problems and also has useful new features, such as whitelisting. The maintainer of Adblock Plus has also shown strong interest in debugging and fixing any problems, including memory leaks.

There's a few problems that can cause leaks in FF itself which have been fixed in the main trunk. Almost all of those fixes are supposed to be included in 2.0.

Re:SQLite

[Tezkah]

Yes, here are the instructions for using with Adblock plus.

Re:SQLite

[zerblat]

Firefox already includes a database, mork, which is used for e.g. storing history. The problem with mork is that it's a completely braindead format (it's text based, but definately not human readable), it's practically unmaintained and it's almost imposible for third party programs to read.

So, this will make all the data that Firefox stores accesable to others, and hopefully all the mork-related bugs will just disapear.

Re:SQLite

[HolyCrapSCOsux]

Why do people use adblock? Isn't that what the hosts file is for?

If you don't know what I'm talking about, the Hosts file lines in Windows\system32\Drivers\etc\
think of it as a blacklist.
Windows won't allow those sites to connect to you, thus, No ADS!
If you are thinking, golly, that's alot of typing, my hosts file is 421k. You can copy paste from others off the internet.
that's one less process, smaller footprint, and speeds up browsing somewhat, as the ad connections aren't made so the crap isn't loaded.

Getting a Firefox Alpha

[gurutc]

takes me back to the good old days when it was new, fresh, and charmingly not yet seemingly perfect, but so much the best choice!

Re:Getting a Firefox Alpha

[AKAImBatman]

(raises eyebrow) Getting an Alpha takes you back? Pff. I used to have a cron job that would download and compile Mozilla Nightlies every night on my Solaris box. It would automatically back up the current version just in case the new version didn't work in the morning. Every morning it was a new and wonderful experience to see how stable Mozilla would be today, if it would even run, and if there were any new features.

Back then we didn't have no "Alphas". We had semi-stable code snapshots called "Milestones" and we liked it that way! ;)

Re:Getting a Firefox Alpha

[bcattwoo]

Well, back in my day we would download "Hourlies" to our abacuses and sit around wondering "WTF is the Internet?!"

I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[caluml]

I've always wondered why bookmarks don't sort themselves by most often used to least recently. Maybe it will happen now. But the changes to tabbed browsing behaviour - hmm - I hope that means something like memory optimisation and not making it more like the tabs in Konqueror. Blech.

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[night_flyer]

Open Bookmarks, right click and Sort By Name

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[laa]

Personally, I dislike all kind of autosort behaviour like the office feature of showing only recently used commands. Many (most?) people remember the positions of items and choose before reading the actual bookamark. If the sorted in some random way (like most recently used) then each item has to be read -- and you can't assume that people with a collage degree are able to read :)

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[ILikeRed]

You don't need a database for sorting algorithms (think gnu sort), but what this will almost certainly do is complicate backup and transfer of bookmarks. I really can't understand what is wrong with a simple text file. Do they not see all the issues Microsoft has because of their registry format??? This is NOT a speed or sorting issue. (I could care less about the history, but don't think that will help anyone other than some possible edge cases there either.)

This will also almost certainly kill any chance of reusage of bookmark data by other programs - which could be a really inovative area if the barrier to entry is kept low. They need to read the Art of Unix Programming.

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[Anonymous Coward]

They aren't doing this just to get sorting algorithms. This actually improves things because right now there are a number of different formats that Firefox stores data in. Look at your bookmarks.html(HTML), cert8.db(Berkeley DB), formhistory.dat(mork... don't ask). Using sqlite reduces the amount of code for accessing all of these formats and provides some degree of uniformity. Getting data from sqlite is pretty easy(and much easier than the current situation) because we have dozens of language bindings and tools to do it with.

Yes I read the arguments against this is in AUP, but Firefox is an application that runs completely counter to most of what's in there. Firefox is never going to be a Unix application following the advice in AUP. It wants to be an operating sytem(or platform if you prefer), and not just an application.

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

[cduffy]

This will also almost certainly kill any chance of reusage of bookmark data by other programs

Not at all. SQLite is extremely easy to use -- it has bindings for major scripting languages, and trivial queries can be run on the command line. I use the Python bindings in a number of my minor scripts, and it has frequently resulted in a massive performance improvement (as opposed to using flatfiles and writing the data-munging and analysis code myself).

That's all?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously - that's all the new features? How does that warrant a 2.0 label and not a 1.8? Firefox has been pretty innovative or good at putting great features together that Opera and Microsoft haven't done (yet), but now it seems IE7 has caught up in so many ways, but Firefox 2.0 will be just a minor, incremental update. Hell, bigger changes have gone in the post 1.0 releases. Come on...

Re:That's all?

[Pneuma ROCKS]

It will be much more than that when Firefox 2 actually makes it out to the world. This is a very early build and according to the Roadmap, it will be released near the third quarter of 2006. I'm guessing it will actually be a little later than that. I also found this Feature Brainstorming page, which seems to be closer to what's being planned for 2.0. I see a lot of new stuff.

SVG support

[caluml]

I hope more browsers end up using SVG. There are some very nifty uses that can be made of it - an example of which is the porn database - http://pdatabase.dyndns.biz (how's it going, John? :) )

So Far So Good ....

[abhinavmodi]

Works fine on Windoze even after 2 hours .. No crashes or memory hogs. In addition, it is co-existent with Firefox.

Re:So Far So Good ....

[SimonH_1978]

In addition, it is co-existent with Firefox.


Kind of . . . it's disabled all of my extensions, even when I start FF instead of Bon Echo.

Re:Really?

[Denyer]

Yeah. This isn't a dupe, which we could probably do with a tag for on the article...

It's still just an alpha though.

what's really new?

[scarlac]

TFA doesn't say anything about new exciting features. I wonder what made them decide it to be 2.0 alpha instead of 1.6? Was it just so that they could reach the planned milestone?
I read something about they were trying to optimize the renderengine, so it could support cairo and have hardware acceleration... no promises was made, but they expected it to be in 2.0 (correct me if I'm wrong).

I guess the more comprehensive changelog (which isn't available yet) will reveal some more interesting changes - perhaps some nice performance enhancements?

Re:what's really new?

[bunratty]

New features planned for Firefox 2.

ACID 2

[Agelmar]

For those who are wondering - the 2.0 alpha build renders the ACID 2 test exactly the same as Mozilla 1.7.12. (http://www.webstandards.org/files/acid2/test.html #top)

I don't personally think that the ACID 2 test is the be-all end-all test, but I know the question will be asked, hence the post.

Re:ACID 2

[nonpareility]

Firefox 2.0 is based off the 1.8 Gecko branch, just like Firefox 1.5 was. 1.5 uses 1.8.0, 2.0 will use 1.8.0.1, 3.0 will use 1.9. There shouldn't be much difference in terms of rendering pages between 1.5 and 2.0.

Re:ACID 2

[Sycraft-fu]

I think it's probably a fairly worthless test when you get down to it, overly synthetic tests usually are. It reminds me of a test that was real popular back on the now defunct r3mix.net, a site devoted to MP3 encoding, specificly working on the LAME encoder. I can't remember the name of the test, but basically it was very loud low frequency drum-like sounds followed by high frequency clicks. Turns out, this was really problematic for MP3 encoders. Well because they had such trouble with it, it was seized upon as a good test, and work was done into improving performance on it... Except it turned out that often happened at the expense of normal music encoding. Changing it in such a way it could deal with the oddities of the synthetic test made it such that it didn't work as well for it's oringal intended purpose.

IMO, the important question for a browser is can it render the kind of HTML you are likely to find on the net well. That includes broken, incorrect HTML. This idea that "well if all broswers mandidated good HTML, sites would fix it" is bunk. People are lazy, they make mistakes, sites will have broken code. The ability to render that well is an asset, just like it's an asset to be able to render complex code that uses cutting edge HTML features.

So I don't really care how FF ends up working on the Acid test, what I care about is pages looking good when viewed with it, which they do in almost all cases.

Re:Will Firefox 2.0 support the latest standards?

[lithvanguard]

Acid2 Test? http://www.webstandards.org/action/acid2/

XForms support?

[VP]

Is there a plan to add XForms support to Firefox, or will they be waiting for XHTML 2.0?

Firefox 2

[56ker]

I just hope that the greater prevalance of Firefox leads to a greater number of sites supporting it. I've had problems with some sites telling me my version of 1.5 needs to be upgraded to an earlier version!!! The site in question was the Comedy Channels's website. To many website designers seem to still design for IE only or use version checking to serve different pages. People should stick to writing valid HTML code that works across all browsers instead of making their websites unusuable for those who don't use IE.

Version inflation

[Ulrich Hobelmann]

ok, some features most users won't even notice, and that deserves a bump to 2.0...?

Well, Slackware did it. FreeBSD did it.

Even NetBSD did it.

I'm waiting for Mac OS 11.

Worth the jump in major numbering?

[PoprocksCk]

I've been toying around with the new alpha, and it has some interesting additions. But heck, the changes made do not warrant a jump in major version numbering in my books. But I guess that's because I'm used to how version numbers are in the Free Software world, where a jump in a major version number usually means there was a rewrite, or ABI was broken in favour of some fundamental changes.

I'm definitely not seeing that here with Bon Echo.

Not that this is a bad thing -- heck, I'm as much against featuritis as the next guy. But frankly I see less change here than from 1.0 to the Deer Park alphas.

IMHO the #1 thing the guys should have focused on for the 2.0 release was to make Firefox a XULRunner application.

libstdc++

[calzplace]

Note that most FC4 machines out there will need the compat-libstdc++-33 package for the libstdc++.so.5 library. Just an FYI. :-)

FF Extensions Contest

[Kranfer]

I find it very strange that the winners of the recently posted FF Extensions contest do not work. The extensions that is. I like this alpha of FF 2 but I wish I still have the extensions / Themes I had before still working.

Portable version just posted

[Anonymous Coward]

A portable version of this build was just posted for those that want to use this with a separate profile:
http://www.cybernetnews.com/?p=417

How soon to version 3.0?

[TheSkepticalOptimist]

I mean, Mozilla used to be slow and steady, now they are firing out updates on .5 increments.

Is this good or bad? I think Firefox will end up becoming bloated and bug ridden just like IE if they keep up this kind of product update cycle. Firefox 1.5 hasn't even been out for 6 months and they are previewing version 2.0.

While I do think that some open source projects move a long at a pace that make snails impatient, I have found that this quick turnaround for FireFox versions isn't beneficial in the long run. I have found there to be more problems in each new version, and I have stopped using Thunderbird for several problems that haven't been addressed yet (such as opening up the wrong email when you click on a header).

I think Mozilla should slow down a bit, or at least go back to the .1 version increments. If they are just trying to drive up the version number to match I.E.'s 7.0, then they will find that Firefox performs about as well as I.E. 7.0, or even less so considering it took Microsoft 10 years to get there.

Re:How soon to version 3.0?

[Kjella]

So how exactly is version numbering related to the speed of development? Linux has been moving along in 0.0.1 increments for over two years now, yet most have been complaining about how much they've added to the kernel between increments. Debian's got a higher version number but I haven't seen anyone complaining about their rapid pace. Version numbering is either a) plain bookkeeping, similar to build numbers, b) some sort of interface/stability indicator or c) marketing, trying to create a perception of how fast it's evolving. I think Firefox squarely ends up on c). Announcing the first alpha 1.5 years after their last major version isn't break-neck speed to anyone except OSS geeks who're used to entire overhauls being 0.1 releases.

Re:How soon to version 3.0?

[jsoderba]

If the roadmap holds up (and it usually slips a few weeks/months), Firefox 2.0 will be released in September or so, 10 months after Firefox 1.5, I don't see how that's too quick.

Browser dreams

[MadFarmAnimalz]

I'm not all that enthusiastic about yet another iteration of Firefox... It's my primary browser and I do like it, but it will never be the browser that I would regard as the ultimate.

I envision a web browser which is the browser equivalent of Linux; a collection of simple programs performing very specific and narrowly defined tasks, all working through clean APIs or protocols. The HTML rendering being split off entirely, the javascript in its own library, image rendering separate, cookie management, security features, history management, bookmarks display, etc. Ideally, the various parts would be so simple that the barriers to development would be lowered drastically resulting in the organic rise of alternatives in the various segments; imagine having a flamewar over which js rendering plugin/library were better!

Extensions are not the solution by far. The functionality decentralization necessary to realize the vision of a browser like this far exceeds what the design idea behind extensions was.

Firefox will never be this. The only thing I've seen which might be salvaged into some sort of semblance of this vision is Kazehakaze, though that remains to be seen (I'm not sure you can even hotswap html rendering in Kazhakaze; I've never managed to keep it from crashing for long enough to test).

Screenshots

[MagPulse]

Here and here.

My favourite bug...

[GeekDork]

Bug 9458 (referrer block for links from slash), "Implement inline-block in layout" hast its 7th birthday coming up.

Re:So basically ...

[PhysicsPhil]

They're changing features that work great now (tabbed browsing) and adding a whole bunch of features that the vast majority of end users really don't care much about (new data storage layer for bookmarks and history, extended search plugin format, updates to the extension system to provide enhanced security and to allow for easier localization of extensions). How Microsoft-esque...

If by Microsoft-esque you mean that version 1 has the features to keep 99% of the user base happy, you're absolutely right.

As far as the "average user" is concerned, what features is Firefox actually missing right now? It renders webpages, keeps bookmarks, has tabs and stores webpage passwords. That's enough for the vast majority of the world's users.

But would you prefer that the development team declare victory and stop coding? The Firefox team could stop development today and Joe User would be happily surfing with Firefox version 1 for many years to come. Any new developments are going to be for that last 1% category, because everyone else is happy.

Gecko version

[jonasj]

1.5 uses 1.8.0, 2.0 will use 1.8.0.1, 3.0 will use 1.9

Almost:

1.5 uses 1.8.0, 1.5.0.1 uses 1.8.0.1, 1.5.0.2 will use 1.8.0.2, etc.

2.0 will use 1.8.1.

3.0 will use 1.9.

Re:Will Firefox 2.0 support the latest standards?

[jsoderba]

It will not. 2.0 is about non-rendering features.

Because of the huge changes going on in the Gecko rendering engine the Gecko team needs more time to work on it. 3.0 with the new Cairo-based Gecko 1.9 is scheduled for Q1 2007. See the Mozilla Wiki for more information.

Design for FF, typically works in IE

[beemishboy]

Most web people I know design for Firefox and then check IE for any weirdness. That seems to be much better than the reverse. The only exception would probably be certain CSS tags that IE has yet to support.

Re:OT: Your sig

[Ginger Unicorn]

Type the left hand side of my equation into google.

then email google and tell them their calculator thingy doesnt work.

only someone else who owns a delorean may criticise my signature. :p

For those who want multiple versions of Firefox

[zero0w]

If you want to try out the latest 2.0 alpha version of Firefox without affecting your current 1.x installation, that they can run along each other, then you can check out this homepage for further detail (I have tried it, the tricks works for Linux version as well):

Running multiple Firefox versions concurrently
http://www.jeroencoumans.nl/journal/multiple-firef ox-versions

Re:What is Bon Echo & FF2 Alpha does not updat

[jhermans]

BonEcho is the codename for Firefox 2, just like DeerPark was for Firefox 1.5. They're not using the name Firefox, otherwise people will claim various bugs and half-implemented features for Firefox, ignoring that it is an ALPHA release.

Database vs Mork

[Richard_J_N]

I am delighted to see this. Some of the mozilla stuff still uses Mork, which is truly and utterly horrid. I recommend reading this delightful code by Jamie Zawinski, which has a brilliant rant about it: