14 DAY TRIAL // A new development milestone of Firefox 3.6 is now available for download as the open source browser makes its way toward the Release Candidate Build, expected to drop later this month. Yesterday, you were able to read right here on Softpedia that the third revision to the Firefox 3.6 Beta was in the final stages of cooking, and that the release was just around the corner. Well, baking time was done soon after, and Firefox 3.6 Beta 3 is currently up for grabs for all early adopters looking to see what the next version of the browser has to offer.
“This update contains over 80 fixes from the last Firefox 3.6 beta, containing many improvements for web developers, Add-on developers, and users. More than half of the thousands of Firefox Add-ons have now been upgraded by their authors to be compatible with Firefox 3.6 Beta. If your favorite Add-on isn’t yet compatible, you can also download and install the Add-on Compatibility Reporter – your favorite Add-on author will appreciate it,” revealed Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox at Mozilla.
Mozilla revealed early on, after the public availability of the first fully-fledged Beta for Firefox 3.6, that it was considering serving minor updates to the Beta development milestones, labeled as revisions. In this regard, the company showed little consistency, and in fact offered the post-Beta versions also as full Betas.
The next step in the evolution of Firefox 3.6 is RC. However, Mozilla still has to deal with a number of blockers that, while still in place, generate a no-go situation for the Release Candidate. Firefox 3.6 RC was planned to hit the download tubes by the end of November 2009, however, given sufficient show-stopping bugs and insufficient fixes, the next Build might just slip into December. Mozilla said that it planned to release the final version of Firefox 3.6 in December.
Beltzner noted that “the Beta of Firefox 3.6 / Gecko 1.9.2 introduces several new features for users to evaluate:
•(New in this update) A change to how third-party software integrates with Firefox to increase stability. •(New in this update) The ability to run scripts asynchronously to speed up page load times. •A mechanism to prevent incompatible software from crashing Firefox. •Users can now change their browser’s appearance with a single click, with built in support for Personas. •Firefox 3.6 will alert users about out of date plugins to keep them safe. •Open, native video can now be displayed full screen, and supports poster frames. •Support for the WOFF font format. •Improved JavaScript performance, overall browser responsiveness and startup time. •Support for new CSS, DOM and HTML5 web technologies.”
Firefox 3.6 Beta 3 is available for download here.