14 DAY TRIAL // Mozilla is considering an early development Build of Firefox 4.0 ahead of the Beta planned for release by the end of June 2010. In the latest Firefox Delivery Meeting, the browser maker indicated that it was hoping to produce a Developer Preview of Firefox 4.0, as the successor of Firefox 3.6 makes its way to the first major development milestone, but did not offer any specific details. Mozilla has started working on the Beta program for Firefox 4.0, and Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox, did present the overall goals of the project, revealing that version 4.0 will be fast, powerful and empowering.
Beltzner shared the early plans for Firefox 4.0 with the public earlier this week, and he did emphasize that there was nothing set in stone for v4.0. “Please understand that these plans are fluid and are likely to change. As with past releases, we use dates to set targets for milestones, and then we work together to track to those targets. We always judge each milestone release against our basic criteria of quality, performance, and usability, and we only ship when it’s ready,” he stated.
With Firefox 3.7, early adopters got to test drive multiple Develop Previews of the release, which was melted into Firefox 3.6.4. Designed to bring Out of Process Plugins to Firefox 3.6, the 3.6.4 update was supposed to be offered to this week, but yesterday, there were no less than 8 blockers preventing the finalization of the refresh. Because of the severe issues that still plague Firefox 3.6.4, its availability is likely to be pushed back, and dragging Firefox 3.5.10 with it, as the two updates are joined at the hip, somehow.
In the case it indeed opts for a pre-Beta for Firefox 4.0, the browser version’s schedule will change to a Developer Preview by the end of May 2010, most probable, with the Beta following in June, Release Candidate (RC) in October and RTM in November 2010.
Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 / Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 3 for Windows is available here.
Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 / Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 3 for Mac OS X is available here.
Firefox 3.7 Alpha 3 / Mozilla Developer Preview of Gecko 1.9.3 Alpha 3 for Linux is available here.
Firefox 3.6.3 for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6.3 for Mac OS X is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6.3 for Linux is available for download here.
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