Mozilla is currently working on four different versions of its open source browser, albeit the focus of the development process falls on a single one, the next major iteration of Firefox. A preview version of Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 is currently available for download. Early adopters can grab the bits from Mozilla’s FTP servers. However, it is important to note that the current release of Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 is not the fully fledged Alpha 3 development milestone, but just a nightly Build instead. It is highly probable that Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 will be delivered by the end of this week, although Mozilla has confirmed nothing officially in this regard.

Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 will in fact be the third Alpha of the Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3. Already available for download, the release brings to the table design elements from the Firefox 4.0 graphical user interface overhaul. Mozilla has been hard at work laboring on a complete GUI revamp for version 4.0 of the open source browser.

Earlier this week, I told you that the redesign for the Toolbar buttons for Firefox 4.0 had been completed. Testers that will grab the nightly release will notice that the redesigned elements have been introduced in the browser’s new UI, with more to follow. The next generation of Firefox will feature a drastically redesigned UI, which will incorporate various new elements inspired by the Ribbon/Fluent approach of Microsoft’s GUIs for Office, Paint, etc.

In addition to the preview for Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 / Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 3, Mozilla has also made available for download a range of Candidate Builds that will end up as updates for existing releases of Firefox.

On March 11th, Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox, revealed that, “We are now code frozen on Firefox 3.6.2 / 3.5.9 / 3.0.19 (which align to Gecko 1.9.2.2 / 1.9.1.9 / 1.9.0.19 respectively). This means that patches (except for test and ‘not part of the build’ changes) are no longer allowed on those trees – all patches marked with the relevant approvals have either landed or had those approvals revoked.”

“The branch driving team recognizes that there is still a large list of approval1.9.2.2 nominations – we will continue to work through that list, moving nominations to approval1.9.2.3 if they are likely to be taken, or indicating where they are not likely to be taken. We appreciate your patience in this matter; over 100 bugs were taken for 1.9.2.2, and we had to close down on the release in order to limit risk,” he added.

In this context, testers can also download Candidates for Firefox 3.6.2, Firefox 3.5.9 and Firefox 3.0.19.

Firefox 3.7 Alpha 2/ Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 2 for Windows is available here.
Firefox 3.7 Alpha 2/ Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 2 for Mac OS X is available here.
Firefox 3.7 Alpha 2/ Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 2 for Linux is available here.

Firefox 3.6 Final for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6 Final for Mac OS X is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6 Final for Linux is available for download here.