14 DAY TRIAL // The wait for Firefox 4 is now a little shorter with the release of the third beta of the upcoming web browser. Firefox 4 Beta 3 doesn’t come with much in terms of visual changes, but has some big new features under the hood, notably support for multi-touch in Windows 7 and faster JavaScript rendering, under some circumstances.
“The latest update of Firefox 4 Beta is now available for download and testing in more than 30 languages, adding 10 new languages,” Mike Beltzner, Mozilla’s Director of Firefox, writes.
“This update includes multi-touch support for Windows 7 and new JavaScript values to experience faster and smoother graphics. We also have vital feedback from our testers that we will incorporate into future updates,” he explains.
Multi-touch
Multi-touch support is only available under Windows 7 so far, but it enables users to interact with websites in a more natural way, providing they’re using a touch-enabled device. Touch interfaces are becoming increasingly popular, so far mostly on mobile devices, but recently on larger devices such as tablets, as well.
With a number of Windows 7-based tablets coming, users should appreciate a browser that natively supports multi-touch. The problem with this is that most websites aren’t optimized for multi-touch so even if you have a touch display and Firefox 4, most of the content on the web won't be able to leverage the capabilities.
Hopefully, now that Firefox supports the feature and is providing the necessary tools for web developers to use the capabilities of the device, more websites will implement touch-friendly interfaces.
Multi-touch in Firefox 4
Improved JavaScript performance
“Changes to the C++ representation of JavaScript enable Firefox to execute heavy, numeric code more efficiently. This sort of code is used to produce smooth, streamlined graphics in modern Web applications,” Beltzner writes.
Basically, the change should speed up websites which leverage HTML5 features like Canvas for graphics, but also other computation-heavy JavaScript sites.
The new JavaScript value representation is the result of work done on the JaegerMonkey experimental engine. The project is used to try different approaches in speeding up JavaScript and is separate from the engine used in Firefox 4. The developers borrowed some ideas from WebKit and the LuaJIT and expanded on them, especially for the 64-bit version.
500,000 people use Firefox 4 already
Other than these two big features, Firefox 4 Beta 3 comes with a lot of bug fixes and improvements, based on feedback. The inclusion of the Feedback add-on, based on Test Pilot technology, has proven very successful.
Mozilla says that the 500,000 or so Firefox 4 Beta users send about 3,500 feedback reports each day using the add-on. A couple of more betas are planned before moving to the release candidate phase. The pans is to release Firefox 4 final this year.
Firefox 4 Beta 3 for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 4 Beta 3 for Linux is available for download here.
Firefox 4 Beta 3 for Mac is available for download here.