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Firefox 4 beta 5 for mobile released, available on Android, N900, your computer
Tired of using the default browser on your smart phone to browse Engadget? Got a thing for Firefox? Great, 'cause Mozilla just pushed out the fifth beta of Firefox 4 for mobile. You might be familiar with the on-the-go version of Mozilla's creation, but if not, here's your chance to grab the latest (and probably) the most stable build to date. In addition to the Android and Maemo version, the company has released a Fennec build for use on Windows, OS X and Linux. We tinkered with the OS X build of the browser on our Macbook Pro and although pages appear to render quickly, we can't quite figure out how to navigate backwards. You can pinch-to-zoom with the trackpad and scroll with the d-pad, but once you've loaded a page, it seems you need to be on a mobile device do any further navigation. Of course, as you'll see in the gallery below, the beta comes packed with the usual -- preferences, downloads, add-ons, bookmarks and Firefox Sync. If you want to give the software a whirl, hit the source link to grab the build of your choice.%Gallery-117565%
Google's paying $20,000 to hack Chrome -- any takers?
So far, Chrome is the only browser of the big four -- Safari, Firefox, and Internet Explorer being the other three -- to escape the Pwn2Own hacking competition unscathed the past two years. (Sorry Opera aficionados, looks like there's not enough of you to merit a place in the contest... yet.) Evidently, its past success has Google confident enough to pony up a cool $20,000 and a CR-48 laptop to anyone able to find a bug in its code and execute a clean sandbox escape on day one of Pwn2Own 2011. Should that prove too daunting a task, contest organizer TippingPoint will match El Goog's $10,000 prize (still $20,000 total) for anyone who can exploit Chrome and exit the sandbox through non-Google code on days two and three of the event. For those interested in competing, Pwn2Own takes place March 9th through 11th in Vancouver at the CanSecWest conference. The gauntlet has been thrown -- your move, hackers.
Microsoft releases H.264 plug-in for Google Chrome, vows to support WebM video in IE9
Hard to believe that the infamous "fragmentation" term is now being bandied about in the web browser world, but sure enough, it's Microsoft using the term today to describe the brave new realm we're living in. If you'll recall, Google defended its decision to not include H.264 support natively in Chrome, but maintained that WebM plug-ins were coming to Safari and Internet Explorer 9. Today, Microsoft's kinda-sorta returning the favor. Following the outfit's release of a Firefox add-on to bring full H.264 support to Windows machines, the outfit is releasing a plug-in for Chrome (only the Windows version for now) that provides support for H.264. Furthermore, it's committed to supporting third-party WebM video plug-ins; to quote, users "will be able to play WebM video in IE9." It's fairly obvious that Microsoft's taking this golden opportunity to push its browser as one that supports everything (rather than just its own preferred format), but regardless of the motives, we're just happy to see differences put aside and compatibility finding priority.
Chrome and Firefox adding new opt-out features to prevent third-party advertisers from tracking you
Ever been freaked out by an online ad that seemed to know you that little bit too well? It's the result of good old advertisers tracking your net-navigating habits and delivering targeted commercials to your eyeballs, but it can be prevented. Both Google and Mozilla have stepped up (or perhaps been pushed by the FTC) to try and tackle this issue of pernicious tracking cookies, but they've gone about it in different ways. The Chrome solution is a Keep My Opt-Outs browser extension that remembers the sites you don't want personalized information from, while Firefox will start beaming out a Do Not Track HTTP header that should be respected by advertisers and result in you receiving generic, repetitive ads. The important commonality between the two is that they don't rely on you preparing a cookie file with all your anti-advertiser bile contained within it (which was the FTC's original, somewhat impractical idea). Google intends to open-source its extension and bring it to other browsers as well, though obviously it's taking care of Chrome first, which can benefit from the add-on right now.
Firefox beats Internet Explorer in Europe, according to at least one Statcounter
Measuring browser use is an inexact science, we all know that, but at least one traffic monitor is reporting that Firefox has managed to beat out Internet Explorer as the most popular browser in the fine continent that is Europe. StatCounter reports that during the month of December, FF afficionados accounted for 38.11 percent of all analyzed traffic, a few precious digits ahead of IE's 37.52 percent. This marks the first time Microsoft's browser has lost the crown in a major territory, though apparently the handover of the number one spot has been thanks to the third player in this contest, Google's Chrome. StatCounter says it was Chrome's consumption of IE's market share that has led to the current situation, whereas Firefox's big achievement is to merely maintain its position. Guess that EU-imposed browser ballot screen is having the desire effect after all, eh? [Thanks, Nickolas]
Beta Beat: Kylo Browser featuring 10-foot interface
Kylo is a free browser you use from your couch that embraces the 10-foot UI philosophy. The idea is that buttons, menus and text are larger than when viewed at your desk. This aids in usability when sitting farther away from the display, as would be the case in a living room environment. It is powered by Mozilla -- which may or may not be a feature depending on your opinion -- and is easy to navigate with little visual clutter. In addition to standard Web browsing, Kylo offers a host of online video options, including YouTube, Netflix and many network offerings. The most notable source that appears to be absent is Hulu; if you browse the Kylo forums you'll find there are workarounds to this, but your mileage may vary. The experience is definitely more pleasurable than using Firefox in full-screen mode. The only issue I really have with Kylo is that, even though it is free, there is an occasional advertisement for its companion product, the Loop. The ads don't seem to be too intrusive, but that could change in the future. If you've got a Mac that you hook up to your TV for online video duty or just general Web surfing from the couch, then Kylo seems to be a real winner. Do you have any other suggestions for couch computing? We'd love to hear from you in the comments about how you're getting the most out of the 10-foot experience with your Mac.
Mozilla evangelist asks Apple, Google and Microsoft to stop installing unwanted plug-ins
Asa Dotzler has been promoting Mozilla Firefox for more than six years, and he's not happy about other software vendors installing unwanted plug-ins in his browser. Among the vendors getting under Dotzler's skin are Apple, Google and Microsoft, each of whom also happen to produce a competing web browser. Apple, Google and Microsoft are by no means the only companies that install plug-ins to Firefox, but most companies at least ask the user before doing so. Dotzler is concerned about plug-ins like the iTunes Application Detector or Google Update being installed silently in the background without even a prompt. In Dotzler's view, this behavior is akin to installing a Trojan horse. Although the Firefox evangelist is not accusing Apple and the others of installing anything malicious, just the act of pushing unknown software is troubling. Since plug-ins and extensions are typically the leading cause of browser instability and crashes, even seemingly benign additions can cause user frustration. While silent plug-ins are doubtlessly annoying, the fact that it can happen is troubling. Instead of accusing other software companies of being evil, perhaps the Firefox developers need to change the code to prevent this from happening in the first place. If Apple or Google can install a plug-in without asking, what's to prevent a hacker from doing the same and grabbing your private data? Do Safari or Chrome allow silent plug-in installations? If not, then perhaps it's time to move on from Firefox. [Via MacStories]
Firefox 4 for mobile goes beta on Android and Maemo
After a healthy alpha (and pre-alpha) period, Mozilla is taking the mobile version of Firefox 4 to beta on Android and Maemo this week, promising improvements in stability, performance, and functionality. Actually, this represents a shift in branding for Maemo, where Firefox 1.1 has already been gold for some time -- but odds are good you're going to want to upgrade in any event, since this new version nets you the so-called Layers framework that aims to improve scrolling and zooming responsiveness. As you might expect, you get built-in Firefox Sync -- basically making this a superset of Firefox Home -- and support for HTML5. Makes that ol' N900 look a little shinier, doesn't it? Follow the break for Mozilla's announcement video.
Six Android browsers enter the ring, only one reigns supreme
Choice is a good thing, and Android users certainly have a lot of choices. Default launcher or Launcher Pro? Fancy animated live wallpaper or static picture of adorable puppies? Stock browser or alternative? It's that last question that has plagued so many, and to offer some guidance PC World pitted six of the Market's top choices against each other. The 2.1 and 2.2 stock browsers entered, along with Skyfire 2.0, Opera Mini, Dolphin HD, and Mozilla Fennec (the pre-beta release of what could bring Firefox to your phone). The winner? Well, you can see the ultimate speed results above, with SkyFire surprisingly trumping Opera Mini, though that one seemingly has 'em beat when it comes to repeat-visits. However, the full story when it comes to things like page rendering and Flash compatibility is naturally a good bit more complex. For those details you'll need to click on through. [Thanks, Tim]
PreFox is the webOS browser Mozilla won't make (but they will make Firefox Home for Symbian)
Despite its fairly magnificent set of developer tools, webOS still gets the short end of the third-party app stick more often than not for the simple reason that there aren't many devices in the field, relatively speaking -- and considering how late Mozilla is in the mobile browser game, they've got bigger fish to fry. Of course, the code underpinning Firefox is open source, so it comes as little surprise that it's been repackaged into a Pre-friendly form with the aptly-named PreFox. The app's developer warns that this is more of a proof of concept than anything else, but we're sure it could get whipped into shape with enough time and effort. Separately, judging from a request for developers, Mozilla proper has started planning for a Symbian build of Firefox Home, its companion app to Firefox that makes transferring bookmarks and open tabs a breeze between your desktop and your phone. Seems like another case of attacking the low-hanging fruit -- Symbian's just about everywhere, and we're sure Mozilla would like to make its presence known.
Mozilla's Seabird phone concept teaches us how to dream
Look up, peasant, from your soot-stained hands. Drop that shovel into the furrowed ground and gaze upon the magic* that Mozilla has wrought. Concept designer Billy May, working through Mozilla's "Open Web Concept Phone" project, has gathered community feedback and followed up on some rather mundane visions for the mobile future with this little beauty, the Mozilla Seabird. The completely fictional device has a disturbing initial resemblance to a BlackBerry Storm, but as the video unfolds the functionality is really what sells this thing. The big innovation is the use of dual pico projectors on the side of the handset, which can provide different functionality based on the phone's orientation: flat on a table they pump out the two halves of a QWERTY keyboard, up on a dock they offer the dual purpose of a large viewing screen above and a seamless projected keyboard below. Other features, like the pop-out wireless pointer / Bluetooth headset are slightly less realistic but no less charming. Now, before you get too excited, you should know that Mozilla has no plans to build this or any phone, they're just messing around with some fancy 3D software and the bright imagination of their community of users. Still, for the two minutes and thirty seven seconds that the video after the break unfolds, allow yourself to think: "What if?" *Actually, it's just a 3D render.
Boxee's new browser is built on Webkit and HTML5 ready
Expect to see some changes to Boxee when its $199 D-Link-built Box ships in November, as Lead Apps Developer / Community evangelist Rob Spectre tells NewTeeVee that among them will be a new Webkit based browser. The current Mozilla based browser is clearly useful for some quick & unblocked Hulu viewing, but still doesn't render many sites properly. According to Spectre, HTML5 "absolutely should be the future for the browsers you use on your TV," with competition from Google TV we can see why he'd say that, and it should be ready to stream video from even more sites that don't build Boxee apps. The desktop versions of the software will get the new browser in version 1.0 after the Boxee Box is released, so make sure your comparison charts are appropriately updated.
Firefox 4 Beta 5 brings GPU acceleration for Windows
Browser betas, like puberty, can be a confusing time. Sure, we're eager to be getting new functionality, but all the crashes and compatibility breaks and unrequited crushes can be a bit tough to handle. Now Mozilla is giving us something big for all our blood, sweat and acne: Firefox 4 Beta 5 has Direct2D hardware acceleration on by default. We tested it out real quick, and it seemed to speed up most HTML5 tasks considerably while inexplicably slowing a couple down, but we're sure all will be ironed out in time for the final version of Firefox 4 to go head to head with Microsoft's own upcoming hardware accelerated contender, IE9. Unfortunately, the speedups only apply to Windows for now, Mac and Linux are being left out in the GPU-less cold, but we suppose they should be used to that by now. Other perks in the update include HSTS, a successor to HTTPS in secure surfing, and HTML5 Audio, which allows for all sorts of audio processing and analysis at the browser level. You can check out a quick demo of hardware acceleration after the break.
PPC Macs 'likely' to be unsupported by Firefox 4
While it may not come as much of a surprise, it's still going to aggravate owners of aging PPC Macs that the upcoming Firefox 4 browser is probably going to drop support for the older architecture. Mozilla program manager Mike Beltzner noted that the next version of the open-source browser, currently in beta, is not working on PowerPC machines now and the update will not be automatically offered to them. Computerworld points to two separate technologies in FF4 that are standing in the way of a PPC build: the OOPP isolated plugin system, which prevents browser extensions from gumming up the works; and the JIT (just in time) compiler for the new JaegerMonkey JavaScript engine, which sounds like a drunken simian but is actually supposed to speed up JavaScript compilation manyfold. Neither have a functional equivalent on the PowerPC. It's not clear if the Camino browser, which does work on both Mac processor platforms and is based on the Mozilla Gecko rendering engine, will be able to update to the Gecko 2.0 platform that powers Firefox 4. In the same message thread, Beltzner allowed that developers could certainly work on a PPC version that left out the two problematic components, but that it most likely would not be allowed to carry the Firefox brand (which has happened before with custom optimized builds for specific architectures). He also pointed out that there aren't development resources within Mozilla to extend support for OOPP and the JIT compiler to PPC, and that outside help has not been forthcoming. [via Download Squad]
Royalty-free H.264 is a big win for HTML5, big loss for Flash
Update: Mozilla responds, saying that by 2014 (when the original fee-free license for H.264 would have expired) chances are the codec won't be relevant anymore. So far, one of the main arguments against widespread implementation of HTML5 video has been the uncertain licensing future of the H.264 standard. Proponents of Flash video and organizations committed to license-free software, like the Mozilla foundation, said that while H.264 was currently royalty-free (and would remain so until 2015), there was no guarantee that MPEG LA wouldn't start charging licensing fees later on. In that event, if HTML5 had supplanted Flash as the de facto standard for video on the web, it would have meant that organizations and possibly even end users would have found themselves saddled with onerous fees after 2015. That theoretical stumbling block has disappeared. MPEG LA has announced that H.264 will be royalty-free forever so long as video encoded with the standard is free to end users. This means sites like YouTube and vimeo will never be charged licensing fees to serve video on the web; presumably, it also means that Apple will continue to pay licensing fees to sell videos in the iTunes Store. Mozilla's Firefox browser doesn't currently support HTML5 video (via H.264, that is -Ed); the uncertainty of H.264's licensing future meant Mozilla wanted to stick with Ogg Theora, a video codec Mozilla believed would be unencumbered by patenting issues. With MPEG LA's announcement that H.264 will be royalty-free in perpetuity, it's likely only a matter of time before Firefox joins browsers like Safari, Chrome, and Internet Explorer 9 in fully supporting HTML5. This is good news for almost everyone except Adobe. Adobe's main argument against moving away from the current Flash-dominated web video landscape to one with a truly open standard like HTML5 is now invalid. While Flash may continue to hold onto its grip on interactive web content, MPEG LA's announcement likely points to an end to Flash's dominance in video. This is also the last nail in the coffin for any possibility of Flash running in iOS -- with possibly the biggest obstacle to widespread implementation of HTML5 video now gone, there's zero incentive for Apple to hitch its wagon to Flash. [Via Macworld]
Firefox Tab Candy groups your tabs, but that's just for starters (video)
Although Firefox already has a strong selection of tab management helpers like TooManyTabs, which gives you extra rows and memory-preserving options, or Tree Style Tab, which shifts things to a tree-based vertical menu, Mozilla has rolled up its scaly sleeves and decided to rethink the whole thing. Tab Candy starts off much like Safari's TabExposé, by showing you all the tabs you currently have open in thumbnail form, but from there it allows you to organize them into separate groups (with sub-groups promised for the future), which then act in very much the same way as opening a new Firefox window. Yes, it's folders within the browser, and it's all based on good old fashioned HTML, CSS and JavaScript, so no pesky additional downloads will be required once this Alpha-stage code gets added to Firefox's official release. If you want to give it an early spin, hit the source link below, but don't neglect the video after the break to see what else Mozilla is thinking of cooking up with Tab Candy.
Firefox Home available for iOS
Firefox Home is now available for iOS. Although not a full-featured web browser in its own right, the app is probably as close as we're going to get to running Firefox on an iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad. Firefox Home is a strange app, so first let's look at what it is. According to the description at Mozilla's page, "Firefox Home provides access to your Firefox desktop history, bookmarks and open tabs on your iPhone." So virtually all Firefox data on your Mac or PC transfers to the cloud and gets synced to Firefox Home... at least after you download and install the Firefox Sync add-on, restart Firefox, set up a Firefox Sync account, then enter your Firefox Sync username, password, and secret phrase into Firefox Home on your iPhone/iPod touch. It's not terribly complicated, but anyone used to the one-click simplicity of syncing Safari on the Mac with Safari in iOS may well wonder whether all of this will be worth the bother. That's a good question once you look at what Firefox Home isn't. Click the "Read More" link to find out.
Firefox Home for iPhone bows in the App Store
Alright, we know that playing with the Firefox 4 beta has been a full-time job for you Mozilla fanboys and girls out there, but let's try something fresh on for size, shall we? Firefox Home has finally been whisked into the App Store on news that Apple gave it the green light, meaning you can now sync your bookmarks and open tabs between your desktop and your phone. Some of us can go a few minutes without browsing the web in the off chance we're away from our PCs... aw, who are we kidding? No we can't -- and neither can you, so you may as well grab it if you're using Firefox and an iPhone.
Firefox 4 Beta 1 now available for download
Whoa, Nelly! Is that a Firefox 4 download button we're looking at? Why yes... yes it is! We can't think of a much better way to wrap up one's workday than by finding out that Mozilla's own Firefox browser has finally made the official leap to 4.0, with Beta 1 going live for the adoring public today. It's ready to be sucked down and installed for those with Windows, Linux and OS X-based machines, and the changelog itself is far too lengthy for this space (though it's linked below for your perusal). You'll obviously notice an overhauled look hitting you front and center, with a new add-on manager, support for the new WebM format, improved privacy settings and crash protection headlining the "big chart o' features." Give 'er a download and toss your thoughts on the new build down in comments below, cool? P.S. - Be warned that this may very well not work with your stable of add-ons right away, so we'd keep that stable 3.x.x build installed as a backup!
Firefox 1.1 hits Maemo in final form, featuring Add-ons, Save to PDF and more
Two months after an impressive beta, Mozilla's finalized its first full mobile browser for Maemo -- beating iPhone, Android and most assuredly Windows Mobile versions to the punch. Though it doesn't seem to have gained any new features in the interim, what it does bring to the table is sweet indeed: portrait browsing, auto-updating add-ons and the ability to magically convert webpages to PDF right on your phone. If you have a Nokia N900 or N810, do your device a favor and download it right now; if not, you'll find a handy guide to your burning jealousy at our more coverage link.
