Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1 is available for download since July 28, 2008 under the codename Shiretoko, and now Mozilla is gearing up for the release of the first Beta of Firefox 3.0's successor. According to Mozilla's initial plans, Firefox 3.1 Beta 1 is scheduled to drop by the end of August; however, nothing is set in stone. From the pre-release version of the Gecko 1.9.1 platform, namely Shiretoko Alpha 1, Mozilla needs to go to Alpha 2 stage, before jumping to Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1. Still, the proposed deadline for the Code Freeze of Firefox 3.1 Beta 1, a critical phase on the road to availability, is August 19, 2008. But at this point in time it is possible that Mozilla will not make August 19 for Code Freeze.

"We've discussed this a bit already, but I think it makes sense to nail down a date for the Beta 1 freeze date. Beta 1 is a feature freeze, so if you have a feature you are working on, it's time to start wrapping it up. After discussing dates with quite a few people and hearing people ask for more time, August 19th seems appropriate. That's a Tuesday, and we can take a look in that day's Firefox 3.1 meeting to see where things stand," revealed Damon Sicore, Director of Platform Engineering at Mozilla.

Axel Hecht, a member of Mozilla Europe's board of directors pointed out that the evolution of Firefox 3.1 has not advanced to a point where Beta 1 could be dealt with at the pace proposed by Sicore, especially with key developers not available. Hecht pointed out that Firefox 3.1 Beta 1 could slip past the August 19 Code Freeze date, but failed to reveal whether this scenario would influence the availability of the fully fledged Beta. Mozilla is currently hammering away at Shiretoko Alpha 2 with no release date set as of yet.

"There's still about 20 blockers for 3.1/1.9.1. We need to hit that list pretty hard over the next two weeks. Since blocking+ really means blocking, those items need to be cleared before final. For the 3.0 betas, we had blockers that lasted past and into betas, so I think it still makes sense to continue doing the same--not all blockers will be resolved before beta. There's about 89 or so blocking noms for 1.9.1. We [have to] hammer through those," Sicore added.

According to Mozilla, Beta 1 of Firefox 3.1 is designed as a feature complete release, or at least as a Build with all the items of the final feature-set implemented. Because of the existent blockers, some of the features lined up for Firefox 3.1 might get cut off, in order to ensure that the successor of Firefox 3.0 will be available in late 2008, or early 2009.

Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1 for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1 for Linux is available for download here.
Firefox 3.1 Alpha 1 for Mac OS X is available for download here.