Firefox 3.1 Beta 3 Coming on March 10

[The Canadian]

Yesterday Mozilla updated its release schedule to include Firefox 3.1 Beta 3, set to go live on March 10th at 2pm PST. Whether or not it actually lands in the hands of public end-users is another question.

Believe it or not, Firefox 3.1 hasn't seen a major upgrade since June 2008, however hopeful users seeking new features and improvements of the Internet browser can expect to see Beta 3 to go live on March 10. This is, of course, will only happen if the current version actually went into code freeze last night, and Mozilla kicks off the QA testing later today as originally scheduled.

So what's taking the new beta so long? According to this blog post by Mozilla's vice president of engineering Mike Shaver, the "upvar" patch and a handful of other JavaScript patches have held up its release. "That patch is getting close, but the continuing and great work on fixing other final-release blockers means that we're accumulating a lot of changes on the 1.9.1 stream that would benefit from wider feedback from our beta testers," he wrote in the post last week. "To that end, we're going to wrap up beta 3 in the next week regardless of upvar status."

Last week, Shaver also mentioned that the team decided to release a fourth beta, scheduled to hit the public six weeks after Beta 3's release. This fourth beta will serve as testing grounds for Mozilla's new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine, video, Places and "other eagerly-awaited improvements as well as feedback from Beta 3." This announcement also confirmed Shaver's statement from weeks ago, saying that bugs in the TraceMonkey engine were slowing things down, and that the developers were considering a fourth beta.

But as of Monday night, Mozilla had not completely resolved the TraceMonkey issue, thus consumers will see Beta 4 addressing those issues when released in April. Progress of Firefox 3.1 has been fragmented since its original 2008 launch date, held back by various bugs and the development of TraceMonkey. Just this year alone, Beta 3 experienced two major setbacks, first in mid-January and then again a week later. However, several Firefox developers felt that Beta 3's development process was taking too long, especially in light of TraceMonkey.

"Without Tracemonkey, we probably could have shipped 3.1 (final) by now (or, if not now, within the next month), since other areas would have been under more pressure to finish sooner," said David Baron back on February, "and since some of the things we've been adding to the blocker list lately (in Layout, anyway) feel a lot more like 3.1.0.2 blockers than 3.1 blockers."

Hopefully Mozilla will stay true to the schedule and release Beta 3 on March 10. However, more delays will only keep Firefox from gaining ground once Microsoft releases Internet Explorer later this month; Apple's Safari 4 went into public beta last week.

Source: tom's hardware

[Quillz]

IE8 is actually already finalized on Win7 Build 7048, so the RTM could likely be just days away. But I do think that 3.1 will go final before Safari 4.

[mancode20]

Any idea on what new features/improvements we can expect with beta 3? Thanks for the news!

[Lord Ba'al]

If they continue like this, then Opera 10 final will come out before FF 3.1 final :p

[Sub_Zero_Alchemist]

IE8 is actually already finalized on Win7 Build 7048, so the RTM could likely be just days away. But I do think that 3.1 will go final before Safari 4.

Not at this rate, i think safari 4 will have another beta before going final and SF 4 willl be released before Firefox 3.5 goes final. the third beta has been pushed back to March 12. and Firefox will now go from 3.1 to 3.5. beta 3 will still use the 3.1 number. and they will be a beta 4. Here's the Status on all this.

If they continue like this, then Opera 10 final will come out before FF 3.1 final :p

I wouldn't be surprised by it, see my above post.

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

A first test build of Firefox 3.1 beta 3 is now available:

http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/fir...didates/build1/

Also, according to the notes from the last Firefox status meeting will be released as version 3.5 rather than 3.1 'to indicate increased scope'.

[thealexweb]

A first test build of Firefox 3.1 beta 3 is now available:

http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/fir...didates/build1/

Also, according to the notes from the last Firefox status meeting will be released as version 3.5 rather than 3.1 'to indicate increased scope'.

Thanks, and it's about time.

[phot0nic]

So, anything new other than bug fixes?

[+John. Subscriber¹]

So, anything new other than bug fixes?

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox3.1/Features

[thealexweb]

https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox3.1/Features

That page hasn't been updated for a while.

[Jayayess1190]

So, anything new other than bug fixes?

Changes to tab behavior coming

[boogerjones]

Also, according to the notes from the last Firefox status meeting will be released as version 3.5 rather than 3.1 'to indicate increased scope'.

No, the notes clearly indicate that they are just considering it at this point. No confirmation anywhere.

[RageOfFury]

No, the notes clearly indicate that they are just considering it at this point. No confirmation anywhere.

Are you...perhaps...blind?

https://www.neowin.net/news/software/09/03/...-is-actually-35

[The Canadian]

Oh, since it's on neowin then it's canon...unless it's on the OFFICIAL Mozilla site then it's all speculation!

[mancode20]

I tried out the new tab add-on, and it seems to have some promise. Problem is, it doesn't appear to play nice with other extensions, such as the always needed TabMixPlus, and one of my favorites, Fast Dial. It would be pretty cool if there's a way to get them all working together. Anyone know of a way? Perhaps an updated TabMixPlus that plays well with this new tab add-on.

Let me know! In the meantime, I'm going to mess around with it in hopes of figuring something out.

[fix-this!]

so when is the final going to be out?

[The Canadian]

Build 2 was released 2 days ago:

http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/fir...d2/win32/en-US/

[mancode20]

The build 2 that u mentioned, does it work with the most commonly used extensions? Such as TabMixPlus and Fast Dial. There's no point in downloading that if Beta 3 is coming out on March 12th, right? Does it have the new tab behavior built in?

[thealexweb]

so when is the final going to be out?

There's still Beta 4 and a couple of RCs to come.

[The Canadian]

The build 2 that u mentioned, does it work with the most commonly used extensions? Such as TabMixPlus and Fast Dial. There's no point in downloading that if Beta 3 is coming out on March 12th, right? Does it have the new tab behavior built in?

I don't know, I tend use IE more than I fo Fx; and anyways a Extensions compatibility checker will popup if the extension does not work...and I don't know how to check if the new tab stuff is in it or not...you may have to look at the stuff in about:config.

[BinaryFragger]

The build 2 that u mentioned, does it work with the most commonly used extensions? Such as TabMixPlus and Fast Dial. There's no point in downloading that if Beta 3 is coming out on March 12th, right? Does it have the new tab behavior built in?

Fast Dial is compatible, and they'res a Tab Mix Plus development build that's also compatible.

The Nightly Tester Tools extension can make most extensions work with beta 3.

[mancode20]

Thanks for posting that, Binary! It seems TabMixPlus auto-updated to the newest version. Now I'm just trying to decide if it's worth it to update to 3.1 beta 3 pre-release, or just wait til beta 3 is officially released? That's supposedly gonna be on March 12th. Might just wait if there's no big reason for me to update.

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

The releases of Beta 3 are just nightly releases. It has not been officially released as Firefox 3.X Beta 3 yet.

https://developer.mozilla.org/devnews/index...ome-firefox-35/

The much awaited launch of Fx3.1 Beta 3 is now in the hands of QA for testing. We are working hard to target ship by 3/12 now, pending any blockers found. BetaTesters, we'd love your extra help on these beta 3 candidates! Please download a beta 3 candidate and give it a testrun. All bugs found should be investigated for dupes first, and then filed under bugzilla. Note that these are not official, until QA has signed off on them, and the announcement is made on Mozilla Developer News.

http://quality.mozilla.org/events/2009/jan...31-beta-3-ships

[mancode20]

What was the point in posting that when I just said above that it's coming out March 12th? You made it seem like you were correcting someone. We already knew that.

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

What was the point in posting that when I just said above that it's coming out March 12th? You made it seem like you were correcting someone. We already knew that.

I did not mean to. I would not however bet any money on it being out on March 12th. It has been delayed so many times there is no tellin when it will be out. They even had to rename their numbering release scheme due to the delays. On the site that I quoted, it said it would be out late Feb, then it was delayed until March 2nd, and then it was posted that it would be out March 17th. Now it is March 12th. Maybe someone should start a poll and give out a prize to whoever guesses the correct release date of Firefox 3.5 Beta 3. :)