Phoenix 0.2


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Phoenix is a redesign of the Mozilla browser component, similar to Galeon, K-Meleon and Chimera, but written using the XUL user interface language and designed to be cross-platform.

Here are a few new features in this version:

Web form auto-complete

You loved autocomplete in the addressbar and you're gonna love it in Web forms. The new feature, dubbed satchel, makes filling out Web forms a snap.

Sidebar is back

Phoenix 0.2 sees the return of the sidebar with a new, lightweight and performant implementation. The "one at a time" approach provides more space for sidebars and includes toolbar buttons (View|Toolbars|Customize...) for the three default panels.

Downloads Sidebar

The new downloads sidebar offers quick access to the status of your downloads and lets you launch them (including executables) or open the directory they're in when they finish. You can also drag files into the panel to start downloading them, a feature that will become more useful with the addition of a default downloads directory in the next milestone. Like this panel and want to turn off progress dialogs? You can do that from the Advanced preferences; otherwise, just never open the panel -- it won't get in your way :-)

Bookmarks Sidebar

If you didn't use bookmarks in the sidebar because you just couldn't see enough of them, you'll love the new panel. The panel also contains fast and easy quick search.

History Sidebar

The history window has been replaced with history in the sidebar. See the FAQ for more information.

Extension management

Phoenix doesn't include the kitchen sink and it never will. But that doesn't mean that you can't bolt the kitchen sink onto Phoenix and have it work wonderfully. Phoenix developers have implemented a new Extensions panel in preferences which will allow you selectively enable and disable specific extensions. Some popular extensions -- like mozgestures and prefsbar -- already work with Phoenix. It's easy to make other add-ons work with phoenix, and we're working with developers to expedite this.

Toolbar customization

Toolbar customization capabilities have been greatly expanded. Want the location bar on its own toolbar? Just add a toolbar and drag it over there. Now you can also decide where your personal toolbar bookmarks will go. You can also now add space and flexible space, and toolbar customization is live -- the toolbar is updated as you work. And we have added a variety of off-by-default toolbar buttons, like New Tab and New Window, and those to open sidebar panels. Please be forgiving of any bugs in toolbar customization; we had a week to do all of this :-)

Search bar

Phoenix now contains a handy search bar which lets you find in page or search Google (click the icon to toggle) quickly and easily (use Ctrl+; to focus/select it). But maybe you find it a waste of space, so customize it away.

Prefs

We are continuously working to bring back your favorite prefs without making the Preferences dialog too complicated. The proxy preferences are back, as are those for tabbed browsing, scripts, image looping and some other advanced options.

Speed

Phoenix 0.2 is actually marginally faster than 0.1. Probably nothing you'll notice, but rest assured that it certainly hasn't gotten slower.

Ctrl+Mousewheel to resize fonts

Toggle your font size more easily with this handy shortcut (we didn't just make it up; it's a standard on Windows).

Bug fixes

Read more about Phoenix here.

Downloads:

Windows

Linux

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Phoenix is pretty good. The speed is great.

I have been watching the nightly builds waiting for one that will work on my system and show the navigation bar (home, back etc. buttons)

With Phoenix 0.2 they are finally working now. No more right mouse clicks to navigate.

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I've been trying it out tonight.

I like that it makes use of msstyles for the UI elements, unlike mozilla. But,I really don't see anything that impresses me enough to switch, especially since it is much slooooower than IE.

The ie/crazybrowser solution is still much better as far as I'm concerned.

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