Mozilla Firefox 3.5: Life In The Fast Lane
The release of Mozilla's Firefox 3.5 comes after a somewhat rocky development period. Before arriving at a final version of the open-source browser, the development team went through four betas and three release candidates before deeming the software ready for release.
"So much is happening on the Web right now, it's a great time for browsers. Firefox 3.5 brings together the most innovative Web technologies and delivers them in the most complete and powerful modern browser," said John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla, in a statement.
That development time was used to deliver what Mozilla is calling the fastest version of Firefox to date. According to Mozilla, the browser has radically improved its JavaScript performance. To achieve the updates in speed, Firefox 3.5 includes the new Trace Monkey JavaScript engine, which ups the performance of the browser.
Privacy features were also given an update in the latest edition of Mozilla's browser. Private Browsing mode -- also known as porn mode -- ensures users that nothing will be stored on a machine once that session has ended. Forget This Site, a new feature fresh to Firefox 3.5, can remove every trace of a site from the browser. Finally, Clear Recent History removes all private data or activity that has occurred in the browser in the past few hours.
Mozilla has also committed to making video easier for users to watch in the open-source Web browser. Using the Ogg Theora open format for videos, users will no longer need to download plug-ins to watch content.
Last summer Mozilla set a world record with the release of Firefox 3.0. Dubbed Download Day by Mozilla, the company set a world record on June 17 for most software downloads in a single day. According to Guinness World Records, that was the first such record set.
But the record didn't come without a few glitches. The servers housing Firefox 3.0 crashed shortly after users were able to download the software, halting the download fest.
So far the Firefox 3.5 download appears to be going along without incident.
Mike Beltzner, Mozilla's director of Firefox, Tweeted that downloads were happening and they were happening quickly.
"[O]verheard at Mozilla HQ: 'we're only doing 100/s'; I think they are daring more people to download Firefox 3.5," Beltzner Tweeted.
Just a few minutes later Beltzner Tweeted again, noting that the number of downloads that were occurring could challenge Mozilla's own record.
"[I]f we sustain this download rate, we will beat last year's Download Day record. Wasn't the plan, but Firefox 3.5 fans are awesome," Beltzner Tweeted.
Mozilla's open-source Web browser Firefox 3.5 is available for download now.