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StatCounter: Chrome leapfrogs Firefox for the first time, still trails Internet Explorer
StatCounter has just released its latest global report on web browser usage, and it's something of a doozy. According to the analytics firm, Google Chrome overtook Mozilla Firefox for the first time this month, becoming the world's second most widely used browser. During November, Chrome accounted for about 25.7 percent of the global market, up from a measly 4.66 percent in 2009, and slightly higher than the 25.2 percent that Firefox pulled down this month. It still trails Internet Explorer, however, which enjoys a healthy 40.6 percent market share globally, and a 50.7 percent share in the US. As the above graph clearly demonstrates, though, both IE and Firefox have seen notable declines in recent months, though the latter still has a slim lead over Chrome in the US market, with a 20.9 percent share, compared with Google's 17.3 percent cut. For more country-specific stats and crunchy numbers, check out the source link, below.
Amazon's Kindle Cloud Reader storms into Firefox on an HTML5 chariot
Just about three months after launching on Safari and Chrome, Amazon's Kindle Cloud Reader app has finally made its way to Firefox. With this HTML5-based app, Mozilla devotees can access Kindle books directly from their browsers for both online and offline reading, while syncing their digitized libraries, notes and bookmarks. Available for Firefox 6 and above, the Cloud Reader also offers a touch-optimized store that's integrated directly within the app, putting you within just one click of Amazon's coffers. Take it for a spin at the source link below, or float past the break for the full PR.
Firefox for Honeycomb nightly builds now available for the brave beta testing few
"Boot to Gecko" this is not, but it's still a tasty morsel for the beta testing hordes. Mozilla's mobile group, which has been hard at working translating its popular browser to Android slates, appears ready to dole out the first downloads of its UI-in-progress. The team's begun reaching out to its user community, offering up nightly builds of the tablet-based Fennec and soliciting feedback testing. If you're the type to get your hands dirty coding, you can even sign-up to help the crew debug the early stage browser and speed up its official release. Feel like taking a crack at Firefox for Honeycomb? Then hit up the source below to preview the in-development goods.
Visualized: an interactive timeline of the web
Ever wondered what the World Wide Web's illustrious history would look like if plotted in timeline form? Well, thanks to Google's "Evolution of the web," you won't have to. The delectable chart traces the evolution of HTML, the web technologies that came alongside it and the browsers that've held it all together -- all in a seriously meta HTML5 package. Ready for a trip down memory lane? Hit the source, friend, and revel at how far we've come.
Firefox for Honeycomb UI shown off, inching closer to a tablet near you
The Mozilla team has been quietly toiling to bring Firefox to a mid-sized screen near you. It's already a perpetual favorite on the desktop and has made a bit of a splash on Android phones, now the group has Honeycomb tablets squarely in its crosshairs. It's still very much in the early stages of development but a few UI decisions have been made, including the choice to adhere pretty strictly to Android 3.0's minimalist appearance. In landscape mode tabs will be represented as a persistent thumbnail bar on the left, but in portrait they'll revert to the top with a more familiar appearance. The tabbed Awesome from the mobile version also returns. Check out the gallery below, as well as the source for more detail and more mockups. %Gallery-132066%
Mozilla officially releases Firefox 6, wants to show you how it's done
You may have caught wind of one sly fox unofficially popping up over the weekend. Well, as we reported, that fox -- specifically Firefox 6 -- is now officially ready for your downloading pleasure. If you're a diehard Mozilla fan, or just an armchair browser expert, you're probably already hip to the new Firefox rapid refresh cycle that's seen three releases in the past five months. If not, the folks at Mozilla sent along a couple of nifty graphics (available after the break) to show you how the new timeline works. Alternately, if you're not interested in how your latest install made its way to your device, feel free to download the real deal at the source links below.
Firefox 6 breaks out ahead of schedule, gets official August 16th
It looks like the sly fox is ready to make its worldwide debut a few days early. In typical Mozilla fashion, a complete build of Firefox 6 is now unofficially available for your downloading pleasure, three days ahead of schedule. If you're looking for a major facelift to the desktop edition, you won't find one here -- most of the new features aren't cosmetic. Perhaps most visibly, you'll find the domain name of the page you're parked on highlighted in the address bar. On the Android side, version 6 makes much bigger promises, like a "fresh visual style in Chrome Gingerbread," enhanced image scaling, and, perhaps most importantly, it's "faster and uses less memory." We've downloaded the desktop version of the browser ourselves, and we've found the release quite snappy. If you're not afraid of a little pre-release downloading, you can catch the (desktop) fox at the source links below. And as per usual, please let us know how it's treating you.
Mozilla planning a Chrome OS-like operating system for phones and tablets
The jury is still out on whether Chromebooks will sell like hotcakes (we're guessing not), but no matter to Mozilla. The organization behind Firefox has plans to develop its own operating system for mobile devices -- a clear shot across the bow at Google's browser-based Chrome OS. In a page on Mozilla's own wiki, a handful of senior developers announced their intentions to create a "complete, standalone operating system for the open web" running HTML5 apps. The OS, codenamed "Boot to Gecko," will be designed with tablets and handsets in mind, says Mike Shaver, the foundation's VP of technical strategy. And here's the fascinating part: the OS will rely on Google's own Android drivers and kernel to boot the device. In a Google Groups discussion thread, the lead devs said they chose Android over a Linux stack since so many device makers have focused their efforts on Android, and it makes sense to "reuse its lower layers." Still, they insist that they otherwise intend to borrow from it as little as possible. Obviously, don't hold your breath for Firebooks, as the project's very much in its infancy, but in the meantime there's some mighty interesting conversation happening in that discussion thread about Mozilla's lofty end game: breaking "the stranglehold of proprietary devices over the mobile device world." [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Google says goodbye to browser toolbar, drops support for Firefox 5
Google Labs isn't the only thing winding down in Mountain View, it seems Google's Firefox toolbar is also kaput. Citing exponential growth in the browser space, the outfit declared that the Google toolbar for Firefox is no longer necessary -- modern browsers are just too darn capable. Support will continue for older versions of the browser, but Firefox 5 will have to stand on its own. Still, El Goog admits that dropping the toolbar kills more than a few features, and is offering a list of similarly featured add-ons to users via the defunct toolbar's help page. Not enough? Head on over to the announcement's comment page and join the peanut gallery, a few clever legumes seem to have uncovered a FF5 workaround. As for the rest of us, it's not like we didn't know Google had its own browser (and interests) to take care of, right?
NVIDIA 3D Vision machines get 3D YouTube video support on Firefox
NVIDIA and YouTube made a rather caveat-heavy announcement today that promises to bring stereoscopic 3D YouTube videos to NVIDIA 3D Vision PCs and notebooks, running Firefox 4. If you're rocking an NVIDIA GeForce GPU-equipped machine, sporting driver release 275 or later, a 3D Vision monitor, notebook, projector, or DLP HDTV, and Firefox 4 with streaming HTML5, you've got access to all the 3D goodness YouTube has to offer -- given you're not trying to access content via a standard YouTube channel, as the outfit's HTML5 support is still limited. And don't forget, you'll need your active shutter 3D glasses handy, too. So, if you fit all of the aforementioned criteria, check out the demo video after break (and make sure to hit the HTML5 function under options) -- otherwise, feel free to go on using the old cyan and red method for viewing YouTube in 3D. Full PR after the break.
Mozilla Firefox 4 RC for Android and Maemo now up for grabs
If you're liking what Firefox 4 for mobile already offers in its previous beta builds, then you'll certainly want to check out its release candidate that went live on Monday -- just less than six months after the browser when beta. According to Mozilla, this new build provides a better overall user experience with faster scrolling and improved Firefox Sync, along with other goodies like Awesome Screen smart shortcuts, tabbed browsing, Firefox Add-ons, and Persona themes. Sounds a lot like its desktop sibling (which has a healthy 4.9 million downloads already), doesn't it? Head over to the source page for the Android and Maemo download links, or you can have a look at Mozilla's latest video after the break if you need some convincing.
Firefox 4 to be released on March 22nd, download statisticians ready their calculators
Having kicked out a release candidate on March 9th, Mozilla now feels confident enough in version 4 of its well loved Firefox browser and has set a date for its final release: March 22nd. That's next Tuesday, if you're calendar-shy, and a download is penciled in for availability at around 7AM Pacific Time. Mind you, Mozilla believes its RC1 build, already available on Windows, Mac and Linux, will likely be the final version put up in a few days' time -- the team is just monitoring the code and performing last-minute checks to ensure there are no massive, world-ending bugs that haven't been spotted yet. So that basically means you can risk it now and get your GPU-accelerated web future started early, or you can wait until it's official on Tuesday and be part of Mozilla's next attempt at breaking the downloads record. [Thanks, Ro]
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]
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]
Mozilla bundles WebM support into nightly Firefox builds
Google's new web video standard seems to be gathering a bit of momentum, as today Firefox is following in the ultrafast steps of Chrome by offering built-in support for WebM video. Bugs are still being worked out, but the fundamentals are there, and we'll hopefully see all kinks ironed out in time for the release of Firefox 4 Beta, which is expected to land later this month. This is now the third big browser to announce compatibility, with Microsoft already promising it for IE 9, provided users download the necessary VP8 codec first. The HTML5-obsessed Apple hasn't yet decided which way it's going with the standard while Opera is presumably busy figuring out how to parody the whole thing in video form.
Mozilla shares tentative vision for Firefox 4
Our first glimpse of Firefox 4 was limited to a few tasteful mockups; this time, Mozilla's main man Mike Beltzner has revealed the company's plans for its next generation web browser in its entirety. While exact features and dates are sketchy, his presentation reveals Mozilla would like to hold the Firefox 4 beta in June, before unleashing a CSS3, partially HTML5 compliant web browser with multitouch support, background updates, geolocation, Firefox Sync (aka Mozilla Weave) and a greatly streamlined UI this holiday season. The presentation has "PLANS MIGHT CHANGE" written all over it in large red letters, so trust us when we say none of this is for sure, but we like the direction Firefox is going and we'll be happy to see more. Video presentation at our source link, full slideshow after the break.
Firefox now available for Android 2.0 and above, still at pre-alpha stage
Fennec, Mozilla's codeword for mobile Firefox builds, has just made its pre-alpha debut on Android. The tastefully named Vladimir Vukićević informs us that it's pretty much a debug release, with unoptimized memory utilization and some quirks rebooting the app when it's started and when add-ons are installed, but it is at a stage where the devs felt they could get useful feedback from a broader user base. It's not yet available on the Android Market, so you'll be needing to download it from the link below, and remember that you'll have to have an Android 2.0 or higher device, with OpenGL ES 2.0 capabilities also being recommended. If you've got all those boxes ticked, get downloading and come back to tell us how that WeaveSync is working out for you. We've got video of an older build running on a Nexus one after the break, just to whet some appetites. [Thanks, Jonathon]
Mozilla halts Firefox development for Windows Mobile, won't offer it on Windows Phone 7 without NDK
Color us resolutely unsurprised at the news that devs are starting to abandon the Windows Mobile platform in favor of, well, longer-lived opportunities. Firefox's maker, Mozilla, has come out with a statement that it's ceasing development of its WinMo builds and -- perhaps more importantly -- it's also curtailing work on a Windows Phone 7 offering until Microsoft opens its new platform up to native apps. So basically, no Native Development Kit from Microsoft equals no Firefox for Windows Phone from Mozilla. The browser maker does express hope, however, that Microsoft will make it possible to deliver the popular IE alternative in the future, pointing out that the underlying Windows CE 6 architecture suits Firefox well and the company is "well positioned to have an awesome browser on Windows Phone 7." For now, the focus in Mozilla's mobile HQ remains on bringing out a great product on the less restrictive Android and MeeGo platforms.
Firefox for Mobile makes Maemo its first home
As if you needed any more evidence of the tech supremacy of your Nokia N900 or N810, here's Firefox making its official mobile debut on the most righteous Maemo OS. Available for download right now, version 1.0 will come with a pretty sweet feature named Weave Sync, which harmonizes your bookmarks, tabs, history and passwords across devices, making for a seamless transition between your desktop computer and your mobile one. We reckon we could get used to that. Alas, Flash support is still somewhat shaky, and does not come enabled by default, though you're free to flip the switch and ride the lightning as it were. We're sure Mozilla will appreciate any crash reports you might want to throw its way as well. So come on already, download the darn thing and let us know if it improves on the already spectacular browsing experience of the N900. [Thanks, Ross M.]
Firefox 4 Windows mockup provides 5 UI hints of things to come
Want a hint as to where Firefox will go next? As a product visual designer at Mozilla, Stephen Horlander is the kind of guy who can make things happen -- so when he shares updates and mockups on Firefox 4's user interface, we tend to pay attention. He outlines five portions of a screenshot teaser that'll get a much cleaner, more streamlined facelift. Our favorite takeaway is the singular app button for menu navigation. Several variations are shown, but if you ask us, we're currently fond of the setup above. As Horlander notes, the design's in constant flux, but what we're seeing is certainly promising.
