Anyone excited about firefox 3.1?

[billgoldberg]

I sure am. This copy/paste should tell you why.


The Mozilla Foundation has released a first beta version of Firefox 3.1. This new version of the open source web browser shows some fundamental changes, including the new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine, which adds just in time compilation and speeds up JavaScript execution when using web applications.

TraceMonkey was not included in alpha versions of Firefox 3.1, but was available in nightly builds but now, it has been integrated into the FireFox 3.1 release. That said, it is still disabled by default. In order to enable it, you have to set the javascript.options.jit.content variable in about:config to true, and restart the browser. The developers Andreas Gal and Michael Franz give details of TraceMonkey in their blog.

Firefox 3.1 Beta 1 also contains the previously announced Geolocation support. The HTML5 video and audio elements are also enabled with Firefox currently supporting Ogg Theora and Ogg Vorbis formats. Mozilla's developers aim to make it just as easy to publish a video or an audio file as an image.

Further details about the new features in Firefox 3 Beta 1, such as support for @font-face, XHR extensions, a new tab switcher with previews and improved support for web standards in the Gecko rendering engine, are given in an overview for web developers. The release notes provide a more general introduction to Firefox 3.1 Beta 1 while the developer site for Firefox 3.1 details what features are planned for the final release which have not made it to the beta 1 release.


Firefox 3.1 + Ubiquity will be browsing heaven.

--

PS: would a mod fix the spelling error in the title please?

[smartboyathome]

I am excited, but mostly because I am going to try to create animated SVGs using Javascript when I get time. :p

I think I will go download the beta now. ;)

[Grant A.]

Anyone exited about firefox 3.1?


I will probably exit out of the window every now and then :)

[billgoldberg]

I will probably exit out of the window every now and then :)

see PS on OP

[billgoldberg]

I am excited, but mostly because I am going to try to create animated SVGs using Javascript when I get time. :p

I think I will go download the beta now. ;)

I'll install it tomorrow. I just hope it runs as good as the firefox 3.0 betas did.

[Dr Small]

I thought this was already released... Oh wait. That may have been Firefox 3.0.1 :-k

[Grant A.]

I thought this was already released... Oh wait. That may have been Firefox 3.0.1 :-k

That was exactly what I was thinking at first.

[LaRoza]

The exit has exitted.

[OutOfReach]

Meh, I've tried the beta (or alpha, I forget). I didn't notice anything faster or improved and the tab switcher seemed clunky to me and too unnecessary (something simpler like Opera's tab switcher would be better). But that's just a beta (or alpha, can't remember) so we'll have to see in the final version.

[zmjjmz]

OT: Don't people realize they can edit the title themselves?

Anyways, it's a pure matter of want for me.
I really can't wait.

[LaRoza]

OT: Don't people realize they can edit the title themselves?

No, they can't on the index.

[Sealbhach]

LaRoza, you look somehow different. :confused:

I thought that thread was marked [SOLVED].:confused:


.

[gaspard.leon]

I am excited, but I'm not that impressed with the performance of the beta I tried, seems the same as FF 3.0.3 ... hopefully it will see some boosts in the SQLite performance department before launch... although I'm not expecting anything...

We'll see if tracemonkey makes much difference, as it's the DOM manipulation that is the slow part, usually not the pure javascript... but we shall see, I'm always happy to use new software :D

Looking forward to OGG making it into the default build... I just hope the new theora (thusnelda) version with better quality video is released soon.
( http://web.mit.edu/xiphmont/Public/theora/demo.html )

[bruce89]

I'm surprised it's not called Firefox 10.0.

[wolfen69]

how will 3.1 improve the quality of my life?

[kevin11951]

I'm surprised it's not called Firefox 10.0.

:confused:

[cardinals_fan]

Now that I'm using Vimperator full time, Firefox improvements are rather important to me. TraceMonkey should be great if it's even half of the hype.

[bikeboy]

I'm liking it so far. Tried out the <video> feature and it was sensational, plus will get better. Die Flash die!.

Am yet to try a Tracemonkey build because there's none for 64-bit with it turned on. New tab switching features are welcome, particularly clone and the ctrl+tab behaviour going back and forth rather than cycling through sequentially.

[Polygon]

:confused:

he is commenting on the controversial way firefox releases are numbered. I dont think its that bad.

[FuturePilot]

Anyone excited about firefox 3.1?
Yes, me :)

[bruce89]

he is commenting on the controversial way firefox releases are numbered. I dont think its that bad.

Yes, I think the last few should have been 1.1, 1.2 and 1.5. 2.0 and 3.0 would suggest rewrites.

[Polygon]

not really. open office 3.0 wasn't a complete rewrite

[mrgnash]

Excited about using it? Not really... I've been using it for months via the nightlies :P I am excited about what it might mean for the future of the web though. With Chrome, Safari, and Firefox all running high-performance Javascript engines, and HTML5 allowing for the embedding of ogg/theora stuff, hopefully we will see Flash become increasingly obsolete.

[hessiess]

As long as Vimperator still works with it, I dont rilly care.

[andrewabc]

he is commenting on the controversial way firefox releases are numbered. I dont think its that bad.

I didn't know there was a controversy. The only problem I had was when they used 4 digits which was pointless because you'd never use all 4 digits.
Their numbering system is no worse than any other software.

[jespdj]

The TraceMonkey stuff sounds like the most interesting feature for me, it means that JavaScript will run much faster in the browser.

The HTML5 multimedia stuff is nice, but not that interesting, because 99,99% of the current websites will not use it, because it would mean the website would only work in the very newest browsers that support that stuff.

[ghindo]

I'm looking forward to free, open video on the web, and Firefox 3.1 is one of the first steps towards that.

[mrgnash]

As long as Vimperator still works with it, I dont rilly care.

I can confirm that it does.


The HTML5 multimedia stuff is nice, but not that interesting, because 99,99% of the current websites will not use it, because it would mean the website would only work in the very newest browsers that support that stuff.

That's not necessarily true. HTML5 stuff degrades well, so if a user with an obsolete browser runs into a page with HTML5 content, then they will still get something. This stands in direct contrast to what happens when a user runs across Flash content without a plugin.

[joninkrakow]

[QUOTE=OutOfReach;6015196... the tab switcher seemed clunky to me and too unnecessary (something simpler like Opera's tab switcher would be better). [/QUOTE]

I would prefer something like Omniweb's, or the Tree-style Tabs extension--or better yet, combine the two.

-Jon