New Firefox For Android Beta Released

Mozilla has announced the availability of a new beta version of Firefox for Android. The release notes list many of the new features and fixes, which include Flash support, improvements to panning and zooming, plugins loading only on touch, and a new "Awesome Screen." They point out that many Android phones are supported, and that a beta version for tablets will be coming soon. Mozilla is asking for help "testing everything from the faster startup and response times to compatibility for specific websites and graphics performance." Here's the download page.

Comments

Didn't you get the memo? Maemo is dead.

[OliWarner]

As much as I hate to say it (as a N900 pre-orderer), the N900 is dead. The community is split between fourteen different forks and forks of forks and most of its users seem to have moved on to more popular devices (Android and iOS - I doubt too many bought another Nokia/WP7 after what Nokia did with the N900).

Anyway all these together make for a rather unwelcoming development platform. You can't blame people for dropping it.

What's special about this version?

[shutdown -p now]

They release new Android betas pretty often - there have been half a dozen last year, for example. What makes this version so special that it warrants a /. front page story?

Re:What's special about this version?

[markdavis]

>"What makes this version so special that it warrants a /. front page story?"

Because it is the first Firefox for Android that uses the Android user interface, instead of a totally foreign one. It is a pretty big milestone.

If they can improve the speed to match (or at least approach) the native Android browser AND support Adblock, I will absolutely use it for 100% of my mobile phone and tablet browsing, like I already do for all my desktops.

Re:What's special about this version?

[evilviper]

Firefox on android has always been a dog slow, steaming pile of crap. I just downloaded the Beta, and it seems this new version FINALLY isn't... It starts up pretty quick (the old one takes forever) have gotten rid of the nightmare UI elements like scrolling off the left & right sides of the web page to see controls and tabs.

Plus, Flash support is a big deal, that it should have had from the start.

I've kept Firefox around as a last resort, because web pages that won't work on any other Android browser, even with the user agent switched to desktop, usually DO work with Firefox, but otherwise, refuse to use it. The latest beta sure cranks down the pain level by leaps and bounds. Unfortunately, almost no ad-ons work for it right now, so I can't test much, and it looks like It's still a long way from something I'd use as my primary mobile browser, but it seems to be a hell of an improvement.

Re:Don't forget about mobile AdBlock Plus

[MachDelta]

If your Android is rooted, try AdFree. It's a blacklist for your hosts file to block ad servers from almost any app, not just the browser.

Re:Let me know when Android devices equal the N900

[evilviper]

* Root-out of the box
* Hardware QWERTY
* Removable SD storage
* Large internal storage
* Works with T-Mobile 3G/4G bands (if not just the latter)
* FM+RDS Transmitter
* USB Host
* Onboard Wifi that can be repurposed for carrier-hostile tether
* Debian-based userland
* Relatively curve-free body (unlike most everything HTC).

Devices aren't rooted out-of-the-box, but it's trivial to root any Android device. USB cable to the PC (Linux/Windows/Mac) and run a shell script to invoke ADB and transfer the SU APK. Really, really simple.

Hardware QWERTY is very easy to come by with Android.

Just about all new Android phones have removable microSD.

Size of internal storage varies from phone to phone. If you're willing to spend good money, you can get at least 64GB. Personally, I'm perfectly happy with very limited internal storage, and relying on said swappable microSD cards.

I'm sure you can find plenty that'll work on T-Mobile's network. Personally I'd strongly recomend looking at Sprint first, though...

FM Transmitter seems like a ridiculously silly requirement to me, (long-live bluetooth) but I imagine you can find an Android phone that has it.

Any high-end Android phone will support acting as a USB Host... And if it doesn't, you just need to root it and install the appropriate app.

Once you've rooted the phone, you can install a plethora of Wifi Tethering apps. There's at least one that claims to work without root, but I can't vouch for it... YMMV.

Lots of people install a Debian userland on their Androids... It only gets ugly if you want to run X11 apps (NX Client, for me), and I'm hopeful that the new X server will get up to snuff soon.
 

STILL no text reflow on zoom? What the heck?

[TheEyes]

Seriously, the stock browser has been able to reflow text on zoom practically forever; why doesn't Firefox Mobile?

This is the killer feature for me; with my poor vision I always have to zoom in pretty far to see anything on those tiny screens, and being forced to pan left and right to see every line is a huge pain. I like FF for its bookmark/password sync functionality, but when it comes to actually reading anything it's almost easier to copy the bookmark out of Firefox into the stock browser and go from there.

Re:No Adblock :(

[Calos]

(well, that, and no Google-overlord spying as with the stock and Chrome Android browsers)

Out of curiosity, has anyone seen any evidence to back this up, or is it just speculation?

Not saying I don't understand the cause for concern, but, given the number of people suspicious of anything Google, you'd think someone would have some evidence were it a problem.