Firefox for Mobile Gets New Channels and Branding

Non-profit organization Mozilla is working hard on the delivery of new flavors of the Firefox for mobile application they released on Android and Maemo a while ago, and has just announced a series of changes in the development phases through which the browser would get.

According to the company, the same as with the desktop flavor of Firefox, the mobile application would adopt a rapid release system, which should result in a faster delivery of new features to end-users.

Some of these changes in building the browser would involve the addition of a new channel for the development process, Aurora, which adds to the already existing three channels, Mark Finkle explains in a recent blog post.

“I mentioned that Firefox for Mobile (codenamed Fennec) has adopted the same rapid release system as used for development of desktop Firefox,” he explains.

“The new system creates four (4) channels, each with possible releases: Nightly, Aurora, Beta and Final.”

The most interesting change in the development process would be the fact that users can install all four channels on their devices at the same time.

There would be no sharing of files or data between these channels, as they would be completely isolated one from another.

At the same time, he notes that the mobile browser has adopted a new branding along with the aforementioned channel changes.

“Fennec has adopted new branding for releases. First up is the Nightly channel. As with desktop Firefox, the Nightly channel is our bleeding edge and the new branding has landed there first,” Mark Finkle continues.

“If you install or update and existing nightly release of Fennec, you’ll see the new logos and naming. Don’t be alarmed – it’s the same Fennec you know and love, just with a new name and logo.”

These changes, consistent with the modifications that the desktop flavor of Firefox is suffering, would affect the next channel soon, namely Aurora.

“Firefox for Mobile beta branding will deviate slightly from desktop Firefox. The logos and title will contain “Beta” text to avoid confusion when both final releases and beta releases are installed on the same device,” the blog post continues.