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Firefox 2.0 RC3 Released
midkay writes "Firefox 2.0 RC3 has just been released. The release notes cover all the changes since the first release candidate, but RC3 appears to have a new Windows installer and more security in the extensions aspect, among a few other things."
That said, I wish they would take care of these problems at some point. I know on the current Firefox, you can take measures to restrict its size but I think it starts to thrash when I go to a largely intensive Flash site. I would rather it not steadily accrue memory as I use it through the day and visit sites that use Flash extensively. I know that Flash is a plug-in and this is one of the leading causes of memory problems in Firefox. But it's the only extension/plug-in I use and it's so I can see average websites, I don't do anything special or extraordinary with it. You'll probably be able to convince me that this is Flash's fault yet I don't quite see the same effects in IE. Conspiracy? Well, I'm all ears and happy if it is.
Maybe it's the fact that I have between 5 and 10 tabs open at a time. Although I'm good at closing them, sometimes the memory doesn't seem to be freed up. Maybe that's not Firefox's fault and it's these shady sites (like Slashdot) that allocate resources that can't be freed? Maybe this is an unavoidable problem and IE 7 will experience the same problems--I'm not sure but we'll see I guess. What should worry Firefox proliferation advocates is that I'm willing to try out IE 7 when Windows forces it on my machine just to see if I can use it all day without having it blow up a couple times due to memory leaks.
So this features list has some intriguing points but the one that would make me squeal like a giddy school girl would be:
- Large Amount of Memory Issues Fixed.
It's not a feature but it means the world to me.So, in the end, I hope that the development efforts of Firefox 2 are spent implementing better memory management and control instead of introducing more features. More features are probably a lot more fun to develop and I know I get this for free so I'm not in any position to bitch. But if you want to make me an I'm-going-marry-Firefox fanboy, fix the memory leaks that plague the occasional user--I'm not saying all of them, just the ones that large percentages of your users probably experience.
Does anyone else experience memory issues with Firefox? Does anybody know if development efforts for Firefox 2 have included memory management? I can't seem to find any record of that online.
My work here is dung.
...is this on Slashdot? This is almost like reporting on a nightly build. Remind me when it actually goes final.
WASTE - The Secure P2P
It's a bit obvious from the number of major additions described, but the "phishing protection" and "new Windows Installer" are just new features of 2.0, which were already in earlier release candidates. Compare the announcements of RC3 and RC2 on the developer blog.
The release notes page itself seems a bit misleading, since they specifically talk about "Firefox 2 RC3" even in places where they mean Firefox 2 - perhaps someone saved time with a search & replace.
--
So while this announcement probably means they fixed bugs and are another step closer to the final release, the major features aren't news.
Give it a few weeks, this is a release candidate and hopefully this one will be ready for release. Unlike Microsoft, the Mozilla project usually mean the release candidates can true candidates for release therefore most extension developers can work on testing their extensions against this release knowing that it's unlikely to break in the final.
Last year 1.5 had 3 release candidates and 1.5 final was identical to RC3. So hopefully this year they get it right on the third attempt too.
Anyway, give it a few weeks and your extensions will most likely be working and tested. There's no one forcing you to upgrade and the 1.5 branch will be supported for a while yet.
Some nice new features (no, I didn't RTFA):
-auto spellcheck (GREAT idea, especially for your typical slashdotter)
-session saving (although Opera beat it to the punch like, well, everything else(aww snap -1 troll))
-security updates... ?
Because what they really mean is "someone thought it would be fun to re-write the installer", despite the fact that I've never heard anyone complain about the installer breaking ever. And I live around a lot of people who complain a lot.
WASTE - The Secure P2P
It's not a bug, it's a feature :)
Blog -
Your boat has a hole in it.
Here is the link: Bill's Big List of Firefox 2.0 Compatible Extensions
It is not an alpha of Firefox 3, that has not been released yet. It's just the trunk is listed as version 3.0a1 that'll eventually be 3.0a1 but it is not there yet and won't be for a while
An MSI would be nice for deployment in large network, yes. However, deploying firefox for us
on our large network would be a piece of cake when bundled with the scripting application we
use (WinBatch). Winbatch makes deploying apps like FireFox a piece of cake.
I would love to see FF start supporting group policies. When the day comes that FF supports
MSI deployment and Group Policies, that will be the day (for me) when FF is ready to be taken
seriously for corporate deployment.
I long for the day when FF steps up to the plate are makes itself more attactive to the
corporate world. I'm not talking about just basic FF either. For me, basic FF sucks. FF only
begins to shine after you add a few extentions to is. Nothing would make me happier than if a
mandate came out that all FF extentions had to support MSI deployement and GP integration as
well.
and each tab will now have a close tab button.and each tab will now have a close tab button.
I seriously hope they have changed the preferences this time so that is easy to change back to the pre 2.0 behavior (its doable but its quite a hassle - using about::config to enter a new option that does not exist is not really that user friendly).
God, having to move your mouse to close a multitude of windows just UBER sucks.. the last beta I couldn't even change the behavior to full pre 2.0 behavior - when I had less windows than what filled the horisontal screensize, the closing button would be at the right end of the tabs, not at the right end of the entire firefox window.. talk about sucky inconsistent user interface.
-pug
I just told my Firefox 2.0rc2 to autoupgrade ; now when I ask "about Mozilla Firefox", it says "Firefox 2.0" - whereas 2.0rc2 said "2.0rc2" . So this , under the hood, is already 2.0 ; IMHO the dev team thinks that, most probably, there will not be a 2.0rc4, so they are betting on this to really be 2.0.
How about Adobe?
You do realize the Flash plugin is a 3rd-party piece of closed-source software, correct? And that the IE Flash plugin is different from the Netscape/Mozilla Flash plugin?
I've been using the release candidates for nearly a month now, starting with the first candidate of RC1 (yes, they do release release candidates of release candidates ;)). There were some things that took a bit of getting used to, but within an hour, I was loving it.
:) No more need for NTT or for manually bumping up the maxVersion of such extensions.
1/ It seems faster. It also has a MUCH better memory footprint.
2/ Session-saving and undo close tabs is now built-in. This is great, because I used to get this from an extension, and that extension was a horrible memory leaker (this might contribute to #1).
3/ New tab management. I often have lots of tabs open, and it's nice to be able to scroll the tab bar now or to get a drop-down of all the open tabs. The close button on each tab is annoying (that's what middle-click is for) and the wider minimum tab width is wasteful, but both of those settings can be changed in about:config.
4/ Speaking of about:config, there is a new hidden setting that lets you disable compatibility checking for extensions. Oftentimes, an extension marked for 1.5 will work just fine for 2.0, but the author hadn't updated the extension's manifest to say that, so FF2 would refuse that extension. Not anymore.
5/ Button to restart Firefox after installing an add-on. And the new session saving kicks in to restore all your tabs and even what you have filled into forms after the restart. Makes installing stuff much less painful.
6/ Spell check! No more copying-and-pasting into word to check for typos.
7/ Better RSS management
8/ Better password auto-fill
9/ I personally love the look of the new theme. The old tabs looked rather ugly on Windows Classic. Now combined with ClassicFox, Firefox looks stunning on Windows Classic. But that's a matter of personal taste.
Personally, I didn't care much for the other features like anti-phishing (I have it disabled 'cuz I think I can protect myself, but it's good for Joe Sixpack), live titles, or the search suggest (which I also have disabled). Anyway, at the risk of sounding like some sappy endorsement, I really love Firefox 2. Once I got used to it and tweaked the settings, I can't believe how I ever managed to get along with 1.5.
Does anyone have an extension or a way to "un-fix" the tabbed browsing changes? I actually prefer the original method of tabs getting smaller.
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
I recently enabled support for the new Firefox 2.0 auto-suggest search engine feature on all Wikimedia servers.
Wikipedia will provide suggestions to your search as you type in the search box. To enable, visit any Wiki-site (i.e. http://en.wikipedia.org/ ), and click the Engine Selector button (to the left of the search box). Click "Add Wikipedia". Afterwards, when you start typing in the search box while having Wikipedia engine selected, titles will automatically appear. Sometimes a FF restart is needed for the feature to begin to work. If you have any questions or suggestions, leave me a comment at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Yurik . At some point more relevant search will be implemented as well.