Firefox 2.0 released
From what I understand there isn’t much difference at all between Firefox 2rc3 and Firefox 2 final. There are noted changes since the 1.5 version including aesthetics (cleaner look overall), better built in RSS support and control, bugfixes as usual and other features listed such as:
- Built in Phishing Protection
- Search suggestions now appear with search history in the search box for Google, Yahoo! and Answers.com
- Changes to tabbed browsing behavior
- Ability to re-open accidentally closed tabs
- Better support for previewing and subscribing to web feeds
- Inline spell checking in text boxes
- Search plugin manager for removing and re-ordering search engines
- New microsummaries feature for bookmarks
- Automatic restoration of your browsing session if there is a crash
- New combined and improved Add-Ons manager for extensions and themes
- New Windows installer based on Nullsoft Scriptable Install System
- Support for JavaScript 1.7
- Support for client-side session and persistent storage
- Extended search plugin format
- Updates to the extension system to provide enhanced security and to allow for easier localization of extensions
- Support for SVG text using svg:textPath
I have tried it out on a couple of boxes and it does seem very nice. I am missing support for one of my favorite extensions though – tabbrowser preferences. Hopefully there will be a build for 2.0 soon. It would have been an even better idea to just build that component into the browser itself, it seems so functional and fundamental. As of October 24, 2006 – a new tabbrowser preferences was built: v. 1.3 which now works with Firefox 2.0. Thanks!