IMHO quite importantly, this version also includes a list of Microsoft fonts that don't render well with DirectWrite, and will switch back to GDI font rendering for those.
On my machine, this fixes the "fuzzy fonts" issue that existed since Firefox 4 if you enabled hardware acceleration.
It's awesome, but it's still not nearly as frictionless as Chrome. My understanding of Chromes upgrader - as a user who only occasionally uses the browser since firefox is still my main - is that the browser auto-upgrades the first time you load it after the new version comes out. Now, I thought this was how the new Firefox worked, but since I did it manually today even after rebooting once for a plugin issue (Netflix doesn't fullscreen properly after you load it a few times - apparently it's an issue with the firefox plug-in container and/or silverlight), now I'm not so sure.
Either way, Chrome installs cleanly without the user even having to know it happened. Firefox, OTOH, causes the UAC in Win7 to halt everything for the upgrade. It's not as transparent as maybe it could be.
Firefox does update automatically. By default it checks for updates every 8 hours, downloads the update in the background, and installs it the next time you start Firefox. If you haven't restarted Firefox for 24 hours after an update is downloaded, it'll prompt you to restart. If any of your add-ons will be disabled by the update, Firefox will list those add-ons and ask whether to upgrade or not.
We're working on refining all of this; here are some of the things that may change in the default update behavior in future versions: https://wiki.mozilla.org/Silent_Update
Thanks for the clarification. I did think the Firefox update was automatic, but I think I confused myself by doing it manually today.
My main point was really meant to be the UAC, since it was a bit jarring to see today (First upgrade on Win7; just bought this computer a month ago). I'm glad to see that this is being looked into.
On the bright side, I had absolutely no issues with add-on compatibility this time around. In the old days, I would wait a while - sometimes literally months - before upgrading, because of issues with add-ons I considered "important". I actually ended up backing up my profile before any upgrades, and often had to roll back the version. I didn't even think of that today, I just clicked apply and everything worked. It's a serious improvement.
It's not quite as efficient as the "Courgette" algorithm used by Chrome, but it's much smaller than downloading a full installer. Hopefully we can use Courgette if the patent issues* are resolved.
That's not working for me. Help->About offers an update, downloads it, installs it, then informs me that the update it's just installed (6.02) is old, and I should go to the website to download v7.
This one drove me nuts. Many developers were achieving the same result in firefox 3.6 and earlier using an XUL hack - but in FF4, the ability to do that XUL hack was removed for (valid) security reasons - but without addressing the text-overflow: ellipsis issue for which they'd had an open bug tracker entry for about 5 years. There were many complaints about this months before FF4 was released but they went ahead anyway.
> FF7's been running for about 12 hours on my win7 box and is using over a gig of ram just like normal...
Are you looking at resident set size (aka real memory), versus virtual set size (aka virtual memory)?
The memory VMs in both Windows and Linux kernels will happily let an app malloc all they want until they hit the userspace address limit, with no affect on performance. It's only when those apps use the memory that there's a perf hit.
Open about:memory and see where the memory is going. And if you think the use is excessive, please file a bug including the about:memory data and any details you know that would aid in reproducing the problem.
Is this memory that is needed for some other application you are running? Is your system running low on virtual memory? If not, what is the problem with FF using it? From what I've seen (at least with FF6), when system memory gets low FF will start to release memory back.
I'd rather have FF use the memory for cache to speed up performance than to have it sit unused.
I was just about to update my installation, but it told me that my Roboform extension isn't compatible with v7.
If they allow the application to update when it wants, they're going to quickly render me unable to use Firefox, since I won't be able to log into secure web sites.
Did you receive the update automatically, or did you download and install it manually? If you are using automatic updates, Firefox should ask before updating if any of your add-ons will be disabled.
My experience is that if I click "Check for updates" and an update happens to be available, then there's no way to prevent that update from being installed, even if it causes add-ons to be disabled.
Yep. You only have to download the update if you don't want to wait the up to 8 hours before your browser pings the update server and discovers there's an update.
I came here to see if anyone had anything to say about this. Hadn't heard rumblings about sunsetting GWT, but the conspiracy portion of my brain wondered if Google not trying too hard to keep the plugin up to date was a subtle push for GWT dev's to move to Chrome. :)
Well, the main evidence for me can be found in the leaked "Dart/Dash" memo, where GWT is referenced a few times:
"The JSPrime effort was begun to unify and be a (single!) successor to GWT and Closure/JSCompiler"
"What is the future of the JSCompiler and GWT?
JSCompiler and GWT were already on a merger path. This effort gives us a direction for that unification around the Dash language. We will actively support teams for a long time on the current generation of JSCompiler and GWT and provide fantastic co-existence and migration tools to Dash."
(My emphasis added. I read that as "maintenance mode".)
(Edit: thanks for the heads-up on the FF6 version of the plugin - but I guess I have now missed the two-week window where both FF6 and the compatible version of the plugin where available to download!)
This is one example of a devastatingly common category of assumptions. Never assume that the set of people who care about something is the same as the set of people who know how to fix it. Similarly, distrust statements of the form, "Anyone who is/does/has X already knows about Y."
I myself have been bitten by this assumption when I discovered a new subject for study (e.g. math, entity formation, physics, a new programming language, etc.), but found most of the web pages related to the subject assumed that all those interested in the subject were already fully knowledgeable about it.
I don't want to install FF7 to test this, but how can a user switch from a http to https version of a site? Can a user still type the URL prefix to override what is hidden?
After Firefox 4 came out I had to install so many extensions to make it feel like 3.6 that it became unstable and incredibly slow. Because Firefox apparently tries to be more like Chrome I decided to switch to the original and I haven't looked back yet. I only fire up Firefox when Chromes built-in developer tools lack functionality compared to Firebug, which is rarely the case. The way Firefox decided to take makes me really sad, as I was a big Firefox supporter, until they screwed me over with the new UI. I hope this is not too off topic, but I never got the chance to comment on the changes.
Huh? The only way it's like Chrome is how you can move the tabs above the other controls on top. 3.6 feels very slow now, I can't use it and have never felt that I wanted to.
I actually still run 3.6 since I like the UI on it better. The speed of the browser means very little to me, I'd rather have the familiar UI. If you liked FF 3.6, why not stick with it?
And FF 7 (which I've been using for about 5 months now) is not even noticeably faster than 3.6 on my usage pattern. In fact it seems to spend more time with an unresponsive UI than 3.6.
What fundamental new is for new UI comparing with 3.6? I use Firefox for some way, only for firebug mostly. I think its just evolution of person, now I use what is most serves my needs.
Tab Groups are cool, but I don't think anyone uses them. If you're on Windows 7 it hides the menu bar for more vertical space. It has support for lightweight extensions (called "JetPacks" internally) which don't require a restart to install or uninstall. There's no statusbar, like Chrome, URLs pop up when you hover over a hyperlink.
The main advantage over Chrome is that it doesn't freeze up when it's loading a new tab.
I use Tab Groups mainly for task related stuff, as well as using a tab group to allow for a read later style of interface. But no, it's not a major thing for me, I've used Chrome for the past few months and not missed Tab groups.
Tab groups would've been much better if they showed all the tabs across all windows (like Expose on Mac does for windows). Unfortunately it's just a gimmick in its current implementation.
Firefox also hides the menubar on linux, although it can also be disabled. It is also posiblse to enable an 'extension bar', which takes the place of the status bar for extension icons.
Arguably, having the menu visible is not the default setup, is it? The default fold-out "Firefox" menu simply doesn't have that issue and is not transparent.
I agree it's a problem in Thunderbird, which has a menu by default.
I think that if you try to tweak Firefox 4+ to look like 3.6 you're going to run into suboptimalities. It evolved. I think that if you get used to the changes, they're actually changes for the better (new menu giving more vertical room, tabs-on-top, etc).
Great! Love the new canvas renderer. Anyone know when they're planning to add generational GC or other improvements to the GC? It's making some HTML5 games choppy as far as I can tell.
Incremental GC is mostly done, so it might make it to trunk soon (so maybe in FF10 - 4 months from now). Generational GC and other improvements are also in the works but will take longer.
why is the channels[1] page never up-to-date? the 'download beta' link still sends 7.0 - if they don't want to confuse people, they should try to be more consisten across their site (which is in general not very well thought-out in my opinion)
"Code is not always released to users on the same day as the branch migration. The release to users may be a few days later, to allow for manual testing and sign-off."
I think this is confusing. Either you synch the switch (i.e. when you release the "release" version to users you release the "beta" too), or it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
99% of the add-ons that are hosted on http://addons.mozilla.org are compatible and had been automatically updated to be compatible. Can you list which ones you use that are not?
This may be because roboform proper isn't hosted on addons.mozilla.org, so they can't vouch for it or bump the version for you. The Roboform Lite that is on addons.mozilla.org is properly marked.
I've had these as well. Firefox 6 on win7-32, with latest Adblock-Plus, Firebug(usually disabled), Flashblock, Greasemonkey, Noscript(in allow-everything mode), Foxit plugin, latest Flash, no antivirus, no other media plugins.
It looks like some of the old configurations on the update server have not been updated to reflect the latest release; some details at http://bugzil.la/689004
Looking at the features, it looks like they're fashioning the UI after Chrome's. The reload/stop button and tabs on top are new, and what is an "Awesome Bar" but an omnibar?
* Drastically improved memory handling for certain use cases
* Added a new rendering backend to speed up Canvas operations on Windows systems
* Bookmark and password changes now sync almost instantly when using Firefox Sync
* The 'http:// URL prefix is now hidden by default
* Added support for text-overflow: ellipsis
* Added support for the Web Timing specification
* Enhanced support for MathML
* The WebSocket protocol has been updated from version 7 to version 8
* Added an opt-in system for users to send performance data back to Mozilla to improve future versions of Firefox
* Fixed several stability issues
* Fixed several security issues
http://blog.mozilla.com/blog/2011/09/27/mozilla-firefox-sign...
--
Android highlights:
* Android-style Copy & Paste
* Ability to quit
* Use Firefox in your language
* WebSocket API
http://blog.mozilla.com/blog/2011/09/27/firefox-for-android-...
[Edit] Updated the list of highlights