14 DAY TRIAL // No more nightly builds to get a taste of the redesigned Firefox UI because the first beta for Firefox 4 has been released. The new look and feel mentioned in our previous article have been wrapped in a safe version of the browser, which is ready to be taken for a spin. In this still early stage of development, snags are likely to occur and plenty of add-ons have not yet been tested for compatibility issues (but you can give a hand through the add-on compatibility reporter).
Besides the new user interface, which places tabs on top by default, just like in Google Chrome (only in Windows for now), Vista and Windows 7 users can enjoy the Firefox button instead of the menu bar (this can be accessed by tapping Alt key), as in Opera, Firefox 4 Beta 1 allows you to search and switch to opened tabs straight from Smart Location Bar. A new addons manager and extension management API are present but the user interface will be modified before the final release.
A keen eye will notice that the number of buttons has been reduced by merging the reload and stop buttons into a single element and that instead of the bookmark toolbar available in the stable versions of Firefox which build features a button (you can switch to the classic view if you like).
However, the more interesting advancements are not available to the human eye. Although Firefox 4 comes with plenty of new features, some of them are disabled by default. This is the case of WebGL which is fully supported or the experimental Direct2D hardware acceleration. On the other side, crash protection when Adobe Flash, QuickTime or Microsoft Silverlight crash is up and running and CSS transitions are at the moment partially supported. In case you’re wondering about the fresh HD HTML5 WebM video, Firefox 4 offers native support for the format.
Web developers have their reasons to rejoice too, because the set of improvements on Firefox 4’s list includes a new HTML 5 parser, use of Websockets for low complexity, low latency, bidirectional communications API, support for more HTML5 controls, more responsive page rendering using lazy frame construction or changing CSS :visited Selectors to prevent websites from checking user’s navigation history. Developers can find all changes and new features here.
You can send feedback about your experience with the new Firefox release through the Feedback button in the upper far right side of the interface. This is recorded through emotional ratings accompanied by a line of text explaining what you liked/disliked.
Enjoy the pictures below and for downloading Firefox 4 Beta 1 you can access this link.
