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Mozilla Rallies Fans with Firefox 4 Plans
In
an attempt to spark some momentum for Mozilla's open-source Web
browser, Firefox team leader Mike Beltzner delivered a Web video presentation
Monday night outlining the product's plans for the near future. 0diggsdigg
Beltzner
outlined goals and dates for changes to Firefox's internals and user
interface, with the caveat that they were subject to change. Firefox
growth has recently stalled in the face of competition from Google's
Chrome, and enthusiasm has been growing around other recent efforts such
as Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview and Norway's Opera
10.5. Apple, too, has made waves lately with its Safari browser, a
version of which is included in its hot CE devices, the iPhone and iPad.
Beltzner
listed the three main goals of the plan, to make Firefox: fast, as in
super-duper fast; powerful, enabling new open, standard Web technologies
(HTML5 and beyond); and empowering, putting users in full control of
their browser, data, and Web experience.
Beltzner noted that
Firefox 3.7 would be ditched in favor of an update to 3.6, called 3.6.4.
Both use plug-ins to run in separate processes (called "Lorentz") for
improved stability and security. He said unequivocally that the target
was to ship version 4 by the end of the year. A beta is planned to hit
by the end of June, and the final release should ship sometime from next
October to November.
Since the arrival of Chrome just over a
year ago, Firefox's market share has stalled at just under 25 percent,
and this has to concern Mozilla, whose browser had enjoyed seemingly
unbridled growth over most of its five years of existence. But when
questioned about this increasing pressure from competitors, Beltzer
unambiguously stated, "We are in it to win it." But he went on, "It's no
longer the case where it's all easy wins. There's hard work to be done
here."
Improving Firefox's speed was foremost among Beltzner's
goals. The fact that Chrome, Opera, Safari, and Internet Explorer 9
Platform Preview score higher than Firefox on the widely used SunSpider
javascript Benchmark has to be a motivator for this objective. The
browser's next javascript engine, dubbed JägerMonkey, is the first line
of attack on this front. Firefox has also long trailed these competitors
in the time it takes to open the browser app. Beltzner noted that not
only does he want Firefox to run faster, but that the interface should
be simplified so that it would "seem" faster. But this means taking
interface elements away, which could provoke a user backlash.
And
speed hasn't been the only setback for Firefox: the recent fracas over
web video started by Apple has also put Mozilla's browser in a lonely
position. Apple's Steve Jobs denounced Flash as the standard for Web
video, saying that Apple products like the iPad and iPhone would instead
favor HTML 5 video. Though Firefox has been an early supporter of HTML 5
video, too, it's gone with the less-polished and less-popular Ogg
Theora format, where Apple, Microsoft, and Chrome have settled on
support for the licensed H.264 video format, which enjoys widespread use
on the Internet.
Mozilla considers Ogg completely license-free,
though there have been doubts raised about its vulnerability to patent
claims. While a truly free and open video format would be ideal, the
backing by the three software powerhouses Apple, Google, and Microsoft
point to HTML 5 video settling on H.264. If that's the case, Firefox
will be the only big browser whose implementation won't play most HTML 5
videos.
Beltzner's last point about empowering the user has led
to some user interface objectives. Tab treatment figures heavily in
this, with "application tabs" similar to those we saw in Chrome OS, and
tab "candy" among the ideas. The actual design prototype resembles Opera
10.5's look, with no toolbars or menus cluttering the browser window,
and a very top Firefox button that resembles Opera's "O" button. A
"switch to Tabs" feature, too, will help users navigate more quickly by
dropping down other tabs in the address bar.
Syncing, better
privacy controls that allow users to easily decide what they want to
share with sites, and geolocation features are also on the table for
Firefox 4. Like Opera's Link and Google's Sync, Mozilla's Weave Sync
lets you synchronize bookmarks, history, saved passwords, open tabs to a
server and all your devices. The new JetPack plugin system and a new
extension manager will limit extensions' ability to affect the entire
browser and make programming compatibly easier. Better on-page search
with highlighting is also in development.
Under the covers, some
new capabilities for developers to take advantage of will appear in the
next Firefox. Support for 64-bit platforms will bring Firefox in line
with Internet Explorer and Safari. And work is being done on speeding up
graphics display using hardware acceleration (a big push for IE9) using
WebGL. Developers get some new tools, as well: Firebug compatibility, a
remote javascript debugger, web console, web inspector, a new profile
manager, and possibly a timer API and memory diagnostic tools.
The
presentation emphasized that plans might change, so we shouldn't take
any of this as written in stone. For a complete look at the plan, you
can view the video presentation and its accompanying slideshow on Beltzner's blog. You
can also leave feedback on the project by leaving a comment in his
Firefox 4 Rypple
account.