Firefox Beta 4 (Win)

[night_stalker_z]

The icons are quite inconsistant right now but it feels faster and uses less resources. The Linux one seems to have had the best improvements to the UI.

[y2kboy23]

I'm running Beta 4 on OSX and I must say, it runs much faster that v2.0 did and uses far less ram too. The new default theme also blends in better with the overall Mac theme. Not sure how stable it is yet but I'll play around with it for the next few days.

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

I'm using the following theme under OS X instead of the default:

Discussion about the theme: Mozillazine forums

Homepage and installation/download: www.takebacktheweb.org

[1Frothy]

Those back and forward buttons are terrible. Mozilla can't be seriously considering those as standard buttons. :|

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Apparently there will be a beta 5 before Firefox 3 reaches RC status.

At today?s Firefox 3 / Gecko 1.9 meeting the development team decided that a fifth beta milestone would be required based on the number of blockers remaining. This additional beta will ensure that changes which may affect website compatibility and changes which affect the user experience will get exposure to a wider audience for feedback and regression testing.

[Neo Razgriz]

Minefield/Firefox 3.0 beta 5 pre disabled the only two addons I really wanted - NoScript and AdBlock. I'm thinking of downgrading to beta 4 pre again.

[AngryTomato]

Minefield/Firefox 3.0 beta 5 pre disabled the only two addons I really wanted - NoScript and AdBlock. I'm thinking of downgrading to beta 4 pre again.

Type about:config in the adress bar, right click-> New-> Boolean-> type "extensions.checkCompatibility", set it on false and you're done.

This will disable the extensions compatibility check meaning you're able to install all firefox extensions doesn't matter whether they work or not.

Most addons designed for an earlier beta version of Fx 3 are compatible with beta 4/5pre too, for example Adblock.

[random_n]

I still think Firefox's theme reached it's height of design with the Qute theme, though Pinstripe was still okay. Keyhole, despite customizations for each system, seems to look more out of place than any of the preceeding styles.

But oh! That GrApple theme linked above blends in so nicely! Maybe it looks exactly like Safari, but I wouldn't call that such a bad thing. :)

[Purple Haze]

I hate keyhole designs on anything - all it does it waste space. Thankfully, themes will always be available.

[Neo Razgriz]

Actually, it was Adblock Plus. That and NoScript were two extensions I installed to make Minefield the fastest it could be. My connection is ADSL2+ by the way.

EDIT: Thanks for the tip AngryTomato. NoScript and Adblock Plus now both work with Minefield3.0b5pre.

Is there anything else I can do to improve speed?

Edited March 5, 2008 by Neo Razgriz

[lexor]

Hey guys, does anyone know if the new betas/nightlies expand browser.tabs.selectOwnerOnClose functionality? You know the old behavior of when you close a tab focus goes left or right, in Fx3beta3 (and before I think) it can now go to the parent tab, but only if you left-clicked some link that opened the new tab. Meaning if you middle-click (or do anything else other than left-click) to open a link in a new tab, the behavior doesn't work... which seems like a face slap to me, it's like they were sitting in a meeting and someone said, "Hey let's code in the functionality, but not let them use it 80% of the time".

[night_stalker_z]

Hey guys, does anyone know if the new betas/nightlies expand browser.tabs.selectOwnerOnClose functionality? You know the old behavior of when you close a tab focus goes left or right, in Fx3beta3 (and before I think) it can now go to the parent tab, but only if you left-clicked some link that opened the new tab. Meaning if you middle-click (or do anything else other than left-click) to open a link in a new tab, the behavior doesn't work... which seems like a face slap to me, it's like they were sitting in a meeting and someone said, "Hey let's code in the functionality, but not let them use it 80% of the time".

I think it only works for popup windows.

[Jon 5]

http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.or...releases/3.0b4/

It hasn't been posted to their website yet but the release was pushed to mirrors.

http://wiki.mozilla.org/Releases/Firefox_3.0b4

So it appears that will be the final version beta 4.

[lexor]

what's the general procedure with Fx beta updates, do I uninstall the old beta or just install on top?

[gigapixels Veteran]

I just installed over the other one.

The thing you want to watch out for however is your profile... If you're not already running a pre-beta 4 build, I would recommend running the profilemanager option at your first startup and creating a new profile, just so there are no conflicts with old settings.

[shakey_snake]

I just installed over the other one.

The thing you want to watch out for however is your profile... If you're not already running a pre-beta 4 build, I would recommend running the profilemanager option at your first startup and creating a new profile, just so there are no conflicts with old settings.

the profile should be easily migrated, you just won't ba able to go back to fx2 with that profile if there's something you can't stand.

In order to have the two work side by side, you can follow these steps:

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=613873

[Jon 5]

I installed beta 4 over my Firefox 2 version and it went fine. Brought my profile in and all my extensions.

[frission]

http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.or...releases/3.0b4/

It hasn't been posted to their website yet but the release was pushed to mirrors.

http://wiki.mozilla.org/Releases/Firefox_3.0b4

So it appears that will be the final version beta 4.

Thanks for the tip, just replace b3, with b4, and it downloaded fine:

http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firef...〈=en-US

[andrew_f]

Seems to run a lot nicer than Fx 2 on Mac :) One think I hoped they'd integrate is the feature Safari has where you can take sites from your bookmark bar and drag them onto the desktop and it'll delete them with a puff of smoke.

[Crazysah]

I also just installed. Seems to be running fine. I like it.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

Seems to run a lot nicer than Fx 2 on Mac :) One think I hoped they'd integrate is the feature Safari has where you can take sites from your bookmark bar and drag them onto the desktop and it'll delete them with a puff of smoke.

Yeah, Gecko 1.9 (the rendering engine) now uses Quartz as the drawing API, Gecko 1.8 (Firefox 2) still used QuickDraw (Apple have been updating Quartz but not QuickDraw, so Quartz is now a fair bit faster)

So the new Gecko has a better rendering system (anti-aliasing and opacity among other things), and is now faster because of it.

[the_wacka]

Just wondering if people can access MSN.com fine with Firefox 3 Beta 4? It seems to crash on me every time I try to access it.

Would anyone know why that is?

Many thanks! :)

Update: I tried Safe Mode and still crashes... :blink:

Edited March 11, 2008 by the_wacka

[Rigby]

Just wondering if people can access MSN.com fine with Firefox 3 Beta 4? It seems to crash on me every time I try to access it.

Would anyone know why that is?

Many thanks! :)

Works fine here. Maybe you have an incompatible plugin or something?

Edited March 11, 2008 by TRC

[the_wacka]

Works fine here. Maybe you have an incompatible plugin or something?

You're a legend. It turned out to be the Silverlight plug-in...thanks so much!

[Rigby]

You're a legend. It turned out to be the Silverlight plug-in...thanks so much!

Glad I could help. :)