Good news for Firefox fans! We today recommend you two new ways for your Aero Glass Firefox. Let's right now see respective effects and functions.

The first one is called All-Glass Firefox, which the specific visual effects quite match its name. There is really an all-scale Aero Glass place. All-Glass Firefox is a nice add-on made by Ambroos and is especially for Windows Vista and Windows 7 users. Almost every piece of the Firefox interface is getting Aero transparency effects. After the installation, restart the Firefox, you will see a shiny new transparency effects jumping into your sight. If you are running the latest beta of Firefox, you will experience even an additional fancy text effects. See what I've tried.

Read the rest of this entry »

Firefox yesterday made a discussion to change Shiretoko into Firefox 3.5 due to a total increasing volume of work. The proposal has been argued in Firefox internal meeting.

As the version 3.5 released from 3.1, new features are consequently being focused. Shiretoko presently supports video tag and TraceMonkey. Some significant improvements over users' data privacy are being added and also, the alternation in web layout and rendering platform is under operation.

Besides, under this proposal:
* Shiretoko would be released as Firefox 3.5,
* the upcoming third beta release would still carry the 3.1b3 version numbering,
* the following fourth beta will be numbered Firefox 3.5b4,
* "Minefield" builds from the trunk mozilla-central repository will be renumbered to 3.6a1pre until further notice - we will need to consider and decide on a version number for that release at a future date,
* The Gecko version numbering will not change; remain 1.9.1 on the mozilla-1.9.1 branch and 1.9.2 on the mozilla-central repository for the foreseeable future.

Moreover, in version 3.5, systems like addons.mozilla.org, bugzilla.mozilla.org, tinderbox.mozilla.org, crash-stats.mozilla.com, are made to operate under the smallest disruption.

Probably some of you might have heard about Betta Fighters (Betta splendens), this brightly coloured but aggressive little fish also called "Siamese Fighting Fish" was originally found in south-east Asia, nowadays it is a popular ornamental aquarium fish well known for its pugnacious nature. They are named as "fighters" because males will fight each other. In the Thai culture, staged matches between these aquatic fighters are very common.

This curious and particular fish, its name and behaviour inspired me to write about another kind of "beta" contenders. In this review I will analyse what novelties Mozilla Firefox 3.1 and Internet Explorer 8, both in their Beta testing version, bring.

Notice
Before going any further I have to tell you that if after reading this article you decide to try any of this beta version browsers, you must have in mind that they are available just for testing purposes and it is highly recommendable that you use them carefully, besides many plugins may not work properly or not work at all, as well as they are prone to partial and general crashes.

Warnings done! Let's see what's going on

Firefox - The Red Beta Fighter
I will begin with Mozilla Firefox because it is my favourite. Mozilla added significant features in its version beta 2 of Firefox 3.1, including stability improvements in the performance and changes in the interface. It seems that the plan is that Firefox 3.1 is going to go from Beta 3 straight to the Release Candidate, the arrival to this stage will marks the proximity to finalization. Feature additions to Firefox 3.1 will stop with Beta 2. One interesting improvement allows tabs change from one window to another and the dropping of a tab out of the window (to the desktop) will create a new one.

Another remarkable novelty seems to be its new "private browsing" mode available the Tools menu. In order to activate it, before starting a private browsing session, you will have the choice of saving and close all of your current windows and tabs. Once you started a private browsing mode session, the browser won't log your activities or leave any traces on your computer, apart from the files you download or new bookmarks. To end the private browsing mode, you just un-check Private Browsing in the menu. You have to know that private browsing does not mean that surfing goes under an anonymous way. Read the rest of this entry »

The following article about First Look At Firefox's Private Browsing Mode is from our content partner Ghacks.
The latest nightly build of Firefox 3.1 included a first version of the long awaited private browsing feature. Private Browsing is basically browsing the Internet in a sandbox that does not write any data of that session on the computer's hard drive. Unlike Google Chrome's Incognito Mode Firefox will close all tabs that have been opened before starting the Private Browsing mode and restore them once the Private Browsing session is closed again. Google Chrome on the other hand is opening a new browser window keeping the previously opened tabs which makes it possible to switch between normal and private sessions.

It is important to note that private browsing is only helpful to avoid records of browsing sessions on the computer used. It does not hide the user from the Internet Provider or websites that they visit.

Private Browsing can be enabled in the Firefox Tool menu. It will display a popup that contains information that private browsing mode will be started and all currently open tabs will be saved to be reopened after the private browsing session ends.

Firefox will not record browsing history, search history, download history, web form history, cookies and temporary Internet files. Bookmarks as well as downloads on the other hand will be retained in private browsing mode.

Firefox will add the (private browsing) string to the title which is a indicator for anyone that Private Browsing is enabled. Private Browsing can be disabled from the Tools menu again by selecting the same menu entry that activated it.

Users who regularly clear data when closing Firefox might wonder why they should be using the Private Browsing mode at all. The main difference between clearing data when closing the browser and using the Private Browsing mode is that the Private Browsing mode will never store data on the hard drive. This might however happen when cleaning Firefox data by closing the browser. First, data could be recovered and second it will still be there if Firefox closes unexpectedly.

Mozilla released Firefox 3.1 beta 1 on Tuesday. This version is the third development milestone and first beta release of Firefox 3.1, the upcoming version of this popular open source web browser. It is intended for web developers and members of testing community for early evaluation and feedback.

The beta version includes Mozilla's new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine, which boosts rendering speeds up to 40 times over those of Firefox 3.0 and makes it faster than Google Chrome's V8 engine, but Mozilla did not enable its new engine in beta 1. It's still switched off by default. However, you can enable TraceMonkey by yourselves with typing "about:config" in the address bar, entering "javascript.options.jit.content" in the filter field, and then setting it to "True" by double-clicking the item. Firefox 3.1 must be restarted for the change to take effect. Read the rest of this entry »

Microsoft released Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 version on 28th Aug. For the faithful supporter of IE, it is an exciting good news. According to Microsoft's development plan of IE, this version is the last beta one. And the final version will be available at the end of this year. As early as July 28, Mozilla released Firefox Shiretoko Alpha 1 which is the next version of Firefox. IE8 Beta 2 vs. Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1, both are the major upgrade of the product, but which will run faster? Some comparative test data will tell you the result.

New Features of IE8 Beta 2
The new version gives us both practical and convenient features, so first let's check out the new features IE8 Beta 2 brings to us.


Accelerators
Accelerators let you complete your everyday browsing activities more quickly and even discover new services. Start mapping, translating, emailing, and more in just a few mouse clicks.


InPrivate Browsing
Keep Internet Explorer 8 from adding any sites you visit to Browsing History with InPrivate Browsing. Now you can shop for that special gift with confidence knowing your family won't accidentally find out.


SmartScreen Filter
New security features help to protect you against deceptive and malicious websites which can compromise your data, privacy, and identity.

More features, you can visit HERE for details.

Comparative Test - Which Runs Faster
The following comparative test is based on i-Bench 5.0 which is a discontinued browser test suite. i-Bench tests include HTML (Hypertext Markup Language), XML (eXtensible Markup Language), Flash and Shockwave animation, Java and JavaScript processing, and various types of streaming and embedded audio and video.

Note:The above data is the result which tests under the identical environment, and only supplies the reference. The different computer disposition can have the different test result.

From the comparative test, we know that IE8 Beta 2 improved in each aspect compared with the IE7. But it's pretty clear from the test that IE8 Beta 2 has a long way to go if it is to catch up with Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1 in terms of JavaScript performance. Maybe the final version of IE8 can do better, much better.