14 DAY TRIAL // The latest beta version of Mozilla's extremely popular browser Firefox 3.6 Beta 4 was recently pushed to testers and eager users worldwide. It's mostly a bug fixing release, unsurprising at this stage in the development process when the focus is on rounding out the rough edges. Still, there are a couple of new features geared more at developers, but which will potentially improve the user experience significantly, like the brand new support for the HTML 5 File API.
Mozilla says a total of 100 bugs have been fixed from the previous beta version and it looks like Firefox 3.6 is now very close to a final state. Firefox 3.6 Beta 4 should be the final beta release, and a release candidate version and also the final build are expected to come by the year's end. The new release focuses on add-on compatibility as 3.6 is considered a major release so add-ons have to be upgraded to support it.
There was talk of labeling 3.6 as a minor update, which would have meant developers wouldn't have had to update their add-ons, but it looks like those plans were dropped after several developers complained it would create confusion about the versioning system. Still, Mozilla claims that about 70 percent of the add-ons available in the online gallery have now been updated, and it is urging users to help the developers by installing the latest Add-on Compatibility Reporter to test the ones which haven't been updated yet.
There is one big new feature in Beta 4, support for local files through the HTML 5 API, which opens the door to several possibilities for web developers. With more and more services moving to the cloud, there has been a lot of work to ensure that these apps can compete with native applications in terms of performance, by improving JavaScript engine speed, but also in terms of capabilities. Mozilla lists several use-cases for the feature, for example by showing thumbnails of images selected by a user before they are uploaded to the cloud.
Firefox 3.6 Beta 4 for Windows is available for download here. Firefox 3.6 Beta 4 for Mac OS X is available for download here. Firefox 3.6 Beta 4 for Linux is available for download here.