Mozilla Firefox 3.0 RC1


Recommended Posts

I just upgraded from Beta 5 to RC1.

The UI has been updated. The bookmarks manager was updated to the Vista UI look. It wasn't there in B5... was it?

I don't know because I used my old skin in 3.0b5

When I upgraded to 3.0 RC1 I was forced to use the default skin (due to compatibility issues) which did look different to me.

Same here. I ran it in sandboxie and the bulk of my extensions didn't work.

Other than that, looked good.

Seems good, but it's unusable for me until all my extensions get updated.
I just upgraded from Beta 5 to RC1.

The UI has been updated. The bookmarks manager was updated to the Vista UI look. It wasn't there in B5... was it?

No it definately wasn't! :) I was using Beta 5 with the default skin for about a month and it was a horrible interface for the library, very un-userfriendly and dull. I LOVE what they have done in RC1. I'm sure it was supposed to be called 'Places' though wasn't it? and not 'Library'??

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok, I gave in, despite none of the extensions I love being compatible with RC1 - Stylish, Basics, Glasser (officially) - I went and updated and you know what...? I LOVE it!

Having made the transition from Beta 5, there are many changes I love; from the small changes (like putting a door on the small 'Home' icon) to the big changes (like the green text in the AwesomeBar becoming blue, tags shown in the AwesomeBar aswell as the star and the 'Library' getting a WHOLE new UI overhaul - icons, black bar, etc).

This is an amazing browser, MUCH better than Firefox 2.0 and the biggest number of features and UI changes in a Firefox version update.

I think the UI for Windows Vista fits perfectly, however, one change they should have made is to automatically hide the menubar - would look so much better - and have the 'small' 'Back and 'Forward' buttons as default ;))

One thing no one seems to mention is that they are going to have a brand new application icon for Firefox when it is final. I cannot wait to see what it looks like and hope they release it soon, if not then at least pictures of it! :p

I have one problem with RC1 though. The Neowin banner at the top of the forum does not seem to be loading :/ it could be my Internet connection, but that is strange as it loaded when using Firefox 3 Beta 5. It also says 'Done' in the statusbar... :unsure: screenshot attached)

----------------

Now playing on iTunes: "Weird Al" Yankovic - Trash Day

via FoxyTunes

post-194916-1211001895_thumb.jpg

Edited by cJr.

pet-peeve

Most won't give a rats ass about the Mac users experience, but I'm just saying that Mozilla really worry me sometimes. For all the mac user out there, if you open a new tab...notice how the close button (the X) is on the RIGHT side of the tab as opposed the left? :p

Oops? :p

No it definately wasn't! :) I was using Beta 5 with the dafult skin for about a month and it was a horrible interface for the library, very un-userfriendly and dull. I LOVE what they have done in RC1. I'm sure it was supposed to be called 'Places' though wasn't it? and not 'Library'??

...

The backend is called Places, the front end remains fairly unchanged.

and how might that be accomplished

Control + Scroll wheel, or View > Zoom. It now zooms the whole page, including images and flash, instead of just text like it used to in Firefox 2.

It's a bit different than Image Zoom which lets you zoom a single image.

Control + Scroll wheel, or View > Zoom. It now zooms the whole page, including images and flash, instead of just text like it used to in Firefox 2.

It's a bit different than Image Zoom which lets you zoom a single image.

Uh that's been there for ever. Thats also zooming the entire page. With the image zoom extension you could right click a woman with some nice titties and choose zoom in. That would just zoom in the picture.

Uh that's been there for ever. Thats also zooming the entire page. With the image zoom extension you could right click a woman with some nice titties and choose zoom in. That would just zoom in the picture.

Hasn't been there forever, unless you're talking "forever" in Firefox 3. I just use the Fire Gestures mapping for increasing/decreasing image size (as well as a different mapping for increasing/decreasing overall page size).

I think someone asked earlier about whether the inactive state of Firefox 3 works properly (chrome goes lighter) in OS X and it does indeed with RC1.

Uh that's been there for ever. Thats also zooming the entire page. With the image zoom extension you could right click a woman with some nice titties and choose zoom in. That would just zoom in the picture.

Hehehe!

Well if you want to use that extension, try installing Nightly Tester Tools then you should be able to press Force Install.

It should then work (don't know for sure, but all the extensions I used in FF2, apart from the themes & cutemenus were ALL successfully adapted automatically to FF3 using Nightly Tester Tools.

In v2 there was no 'zoom' for images, only text, in v3 they added zooming for whole page - even images

Anyway does anyone know if this rc1 called version 3.0pre? or RC1? Are the nightly updates good enough?

It's called version 3.0 in the build string:

Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.5; en-GB; rv:1.9) Gecko/2008051202 Firefox/3.0 ID:2008051202

Is the different system themes in effect? If so, can I use the vista icon set with XP? It'd look killer with Royale Vista 2.

They've been in effect since the past few betas actually, and at least Vista's theme saw a further update in RC1. :)

I'm starting to be quite satisfied with it now, although I'd prefer to not have the back/fwd buttons look like that in small icons mode, I don't think they fit in. :(

But otherwise I like it, and the Places library ("manage bookmarks") use the Windows Vista Media Player look now too in Vista. (new in RC1)

I don't know how to use the Vista icons in XP or vice versa, but I think I've heard about it and that there is a way (unless someone replied here already and I missed it)

They've been in effect since the past few betas actually, and at least Vista's theme saw a further update in RC1. :)

I'm starting to be quite satisfied with it now, although I'd prefer to not have the back/fwd buttons look like that in small icons mode, I don't think they fit in. :(

But otherwise I like it, and the Places library ("manage bookmarks") use the Windows Vista Media Player look now too in Vista. (new in RC1)

I don't know how to use the Vista icons in XP or vice versa, but I think I've heard about it and that there is a way (unless someone replied here already and I missed it)

It's possible, as I posted in this thread.

Force Firefox extensions to work in the latest version

When Firefox updates to a new version, some extensions are disabled. However, you can easily edit the extensions to make Firefox re-enable them -- no particular expertise required.

Problem

Extension authors sometimes abandon their creations, and when Firefox enters a new version, it will refuse to use extensions that are not tagged as compatible.

Solution

Basically, the extension installer is just a zip archive. The installation information file inside contains a "maxversion" note to Firefox letting it know what versions the extension is appropriate for. Just change this value and you're good to go!

Warning! The extension may not be installable for a reason. If you break Firefox, close it and start it in safe mode, then remove the extension.

Instructions:

1. Save the install file to the desktop. (Right-click, "Save Link As...")

2. Rename the file's extension from .xpi to .zip. (In Windows, go to a folder window and click Tools -> Folder Options, then unhide extensions.)

3. Open the file. (WinZip or some other archive program.)

4. Extract the install.rdf file to the desktop. (Drag it.)

5. Open the file in a plain-text editor (Notepad, vi, Gedit, etc.)

6. Find a block that starts with <em:targetApplication>. If there is more than one, choose the one that contains the string {ec8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384}, the ID of Firefox.

7. Find the line that starts with <em:maxVersion>. You will see a value that looks something like 1.5.0.* -- a version number.

8. Change that value to the current version of Firefox. (so input - 3.0.0.*)

9. Pack everything back up! Save the install.rdf file, pull it back into the archive, rewriting the old version. Rename the extension's file extension from .zip back to .xpi.

10. Install the edited extension in Firefox by dragging it onto a Firefox window. Complete the installation by restarting Firefox.

:)

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • Waymo recalls self-driving software after cars enter closed freeway work zones by Paul Hill Waymo, the self-driving car maker owned by Alphabet – the parent company of Google –, has recalled some of its fifth-generation Automated Driving Systems (ADS). It did so after some of its cars drove through closed construction zones. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the affected vehicles were capable of driving through a closed freeway construction zone and continuing to drive at speed. The listing on the NHTSA website says that Waymo is currently developing a solution to fix this issue, but in the meantime, freeway driving is being restricted. Waymo will update its ADS software so that vehicles can detect when they can avoid entering construction zones. According to the Safety Recall Report, on April 20, 2026, Waymo’s Field Safety Committee began meetings reviewing an event from April 11, 2026, and five events from April 19, 2026, where Waymo’s autonomous vehicles didn’t recognize and drove past ramp closure signs into the pre-planned freeway construction zones. This took place in Phoenix, Arizona. Separately, on May 18, 2026, seven Waymo vehicles entered freeway lanes with active construction in the San Francisco Bay Area by driving between cones that were placed to show the lane was closed. On the back of both of these events, Waymo restricted freeway driving until it could address the issue. In June, Waymo’s Safety Board reviewed the issue and additional information related to ADS performances around construction zones; then, as a result, it decided to conduct a recall. This development is not good for Waymo as it adds to a growing list of technical hiccups its cars have experienced. Ultimately, it will lead to more scrutiny from lawmakers around the world who will be more cautious about letting autonomous vehicles on their roads without tighter regulation. For readers in areas where Waymo operates, does this news make you more wary about stepping into one of these vehicles?
    • I'm still on Windows 10 22H2 because I didn't want to deal with all the issues in Windows 11, so I waited almost a week before installing the latest Patch Tuesday update (KB5094127), I went ahead and did it, and it was a huge mistake—ever since then, my File Explorer has seen a performance drop of about 30% when transferring large files... Once again, Microsoft has outdone itself! This update cannot be uninstalled, either through the Control Panel (via Settings) or by accessing Advanced Startup Options. The only possible alternative would be to use system restore points, but I’d have to reinstall all app and driver updates (and there’s no guarantee it would work). Or there’s the “nuclear option” of a in-place repair without losing files or apps, but even then, all my customizations would be lost! Microsoft just can’t help but mess everything up! Way to go, Microsoft! But I still don’t want your c****y Windows 11!
    • Microsoft: Windows 11 could finally solve a major issue across AMD, Nvidia, and Intel GPUs by Sayan Sen While Microsoft has been trying to improve it, Windows 11 is definitely not flawless, as even today some issues are taking a year to publicly acknowledge. However, one area of trouble that may finally see much better results soon is graphics driver crashes. Work on graphics driver timeouts, also called Timeout and Detection Recovery (TDR), is not new as the latest WDDM 3.2 also has specific improvements regarding it. Windows Display Driver Model (WDDM) version 3.2 is supported on Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2. However, with the upcoming version 26H2, TDR crash diagnosis could go to the next level as Microsoft is introducing a new DirectX 12 API feature called "DirectX Dump Files". Similar to how system memory dump files work when a system crashes or freezes or encounters any such major issue, DirectX Dump Files (DDF) will essentially record a snapshot of the GPU execution right at the moment a graphics-related crash or hang or freeze occurs, so that developers can better understand and diagnoze these TDR and timeout detection errors. The dump will be available as a .dxdmp file for analysis and it will be a comprehensive dump file generated with detailed insights about the hardware, drivers, Windows, as well as the affected application. This should be another welcome change in this department. Earlier at GDC 2026, when the technology was first debuted, Microsoft had shared more details regarding it. The company had explained how DDF is designed to gather data from every layer of the graphics stack into a single file, eliminating the need for developers to manually correlate logs from multiple tools. As mentioned above, the dump can contain a lot of useful details like GPU hardware state information such as register values, shader program counters, page fault virtual addresses, shader memory data, and command buffers. Alongside that, it also captures DirectX runtime and kernel information, including D3D objects, pipeline state objects, device error data, adapter details, and CPU call stacks. Microsoft says the feature has been built around two primary use cases: retail device removals and local device removals. The former allows developers to collect crash information from end users' systems in the field, while the latter helps QA teams and developers investigate issues on test machines. Developers will also be able to include up to 2 MB of custom application data through new D3D12 APIs, providing additional context for troubleshooting. In addition, Microsoft is introducing three dump collection modes ranging from zero-overhead capture, which has no runtime performance impact on supported hardware, to higher-detail modes that collect more vendor-specific debugging data. On compatible Tier 2 hardware, zero-overhead dumps will be enabled by default, meaning developers may begin receiving useful crash diagnostics without making any code changes. The table below explains the three tiers: Tier Description NO_OVERHEAD Enables crash capture with no runtime cost and is suitable for broad deployment MEDIUM_OVERHEAD Provides a balance, capturing additional diagnostic data with moderate impact HIGH_OVERHEAD Collects the most detailed GPU and driver state available, enabling deeper investigation at the cost of higher runtime overhead In terms of availability, the company expects broader release to be around the fall of 2026, which should be right around the time when Windows 11 version 26H2 lands. Right now, DirectX Dump Files are available as a preview and currently, only AMD has the compatible AgilitySDK Developer Preview driver version 26.10.07.02. You can find the official announcement post here on Microsoft's website.
    • And with SO much better perf than the laggy mess that is Files.
  • Recent Achievements

    • One Month Later
      Sharbel earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • First Post
      BizSAR earned a badge
      First Post
    • Week One Done
      Jordan Smith earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Reacting Well
      BizSAR earned a badge
      Reacting Well
    • First Post
      AndreaB earned a badge
      First Post
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      598
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      190
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      79
    4. 4
      Michael Scrip
      76
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      70
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!