Mozilla Pitches Firefox 3.1 Alpha For July Release

An anonymous reader writes "Just a week after Mozilla shipped Firefox 3.0, the open-source developer has proposed ship dates for the next version that, if approved, would produce an alpha release next month and a final no later than early 2009. According to a draft schedule discussed at a recent meeting, Mozilla wants to have the first Firefox 3.1 developer preview ready by July, then move to a beta by August. The schedule slates final code delivery in the last quarter of this year or the first quarter of 2009. A month ago, when Mozilla first started discussing Firefox 3.1 internally, Mike Schroepfer, the company's vice president of engineering, said the upgrade's target ship date was the end of 2008. If Mozilla holds to that plan, Firefox 3.1 would be its first fast-track update. Firefox 3.0, for instance, launched approximately 20 months after its predecessor, Firefox 2.0."

Comments

Re:There is no such thing as a quick Firefox relea

[trawg]

I'm passing up the opportunity to moderate you as 'troll' despite your obvious troll post on the basis that maybe, just maybe, you have some evidence to back up those statements. I'm not sure what bugs you're talking about but I use Firefox all day long every single day and very rarely have any problems.

I also use an application (MediaCoder) that I believe uses the XUL parts of Firefox seemingly without any problems (other than annoying load times for what should really be a simple control panel thing).

Re:End users don't want constant change

[Anonymous Coward]

People getting bent out of shape about the address bar is simply absurd. While I admit, the option to turn it off should appear somewhere, if only in about:config, the development team isn't ignoring it's users. I have a feeling far more people LIKE the new address bar than dislike it. I certainly find it very useful at times. I also happen to find the new user interface to be well thought out and designed.

The "it's only one option in the config dialog" argument is wearing a bit thin. It also demonstrates a lack of understanding on what testing is required for even simple options. Perhaps terms like "decision coverage" and "condition/decision coverage" are meaningless to you, but they are quite important to software testers. Also important is the psychological concept of the paradox of choice in which many people will not make a choice if presented with too many options. I really am quite sick of hearing, "But it's just one little check box in the option dialog." Take a second and think about how many features that has been said about. Then take a second to consider how much your really now about good user interface design and how much research is done in the area of human/computer interaction.

The changes presented in Firefox 3.0 are actually quite minor when compared to other UI modifications such as Office 2007 or KDE 4. Such drastic language on your part is quite uncalled for. The changes presented in Firefox's front end are, in fact, not for the sake of change but rather for the sake of improvement. I hope comments like yours don't encourage the developers to stagnate on a single UI design because every time they work to improve it, a vocal minority of rigid people can't pull a stick out of their ass.

Re:Acid 3

[mdew]

80/100 on the current nightly builds, http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/7533/acid3trunkok0.jpg