New FireFox Beta 2 (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

Firefox has recently released a BETA of its new version 2.

I have only been using it for a few hours, and I love it!

In addition to added phishing protection, there are some cool
changes that I am noticing.

Firstly, the tabbed browsing has been upgraded to include little
"x" buttons to quickly close a tab (instead of right clicking).

Also VERY neat here is a spelling tool that automatically checks
spelling as you type messages in forums and blogs. For example,
a few spelling mistakes I made in this post were immediately
underlined for correction.

It *seems* that most of my extensions are working with this
beta version, though a few will not, including my browser theme.

Fortunately, the HTF Toolbar works fine with this version.

You can check out and download the new version of Firefox
by clicking HERE

Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

 

[Stephen Orr]

I downloaded it last week, after I had ditched my original firefox in favor of IE7beta.

So far, for me, it's working fine. No complaints.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

If you click a tab with the middle mouse button or scroll wheel they'll close as well.

 

[DaveF]

I found an extension for that. Also, if you click the tab currently in use, it toggles back to the previously viewed tab. Does the new beta incorporate that behavior?

What other sorts of fixes / features have been added? I've grown to depend on Firefox over the past year, and look forward to continued improvements.

 

[Michael_K_Sr]

The Safari browser on the Mac has had this for years, so it's nice to see it incorporated into Firefox 2. On Safari, the close tab "X" appears on each tab no matter how many tabs you have open. In Firefox 2, it appears that if a lot of tabs are open in a window, only the active one will have the "X" showing. One nice feature I like about this new version is the ability to quickly re-open a recently closed tab from the History menu. One thing that I'd like to see added is being able to access your full browsing history under the History menu instead of having to do it from the history sidebar. Still, there are a few bugs to be worked out. Sometimes I'll try opening a new tab and nothing happens. Excellent job for an initial beta though.

 

[RoryR]

Its better, but it kills my machine. It uses way too much memory and its overpowers my CPU with over 10 tabs.

I prefer Opera myself.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

I am loving this Beta. A big improvement over the last version, and
another reason to avoid IE 7 altogether.

 

[Greg*go]

Firefox 2 Beta 2 has just been released. So if you've been using Beta1, it's time to upgrade.

I haven't downloaded any of the new betas yet, I'm a little apprehensive about losing any of the tré cool setup I have going on in the 1.5 version. And I know some of my favorite extensions that I use aren't ready for it yet.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

I forgot to mention...

I removed Beta 1 weeks ago after Firefox kept crashing on my
laptop and desktop.

Interestingly, I was able to install 1.5 back over the Beta and
all my extensions, bookmarks and settings were still intact.

May skip Beta 2 and wait for final release. I did like the built-in
spelling feature, though. Great for forums like this.

 

[Carlo_M]

Thanks for the heads up on Beta 2. Working like a champ right now on my Macbook Pro. Quite a few nifty and subtle improvements.

 

[DaveF]

Even more exciting to me was discovering FireFox Portable: A self-contained installation that doesn't touch the Windows Registry, enabling me to install it at work

I've not tried FFB2; I'll wait until it's a stable release. And I was disappointed to hear that the revamping the bookmark system is being postponed. The bookmark system is one of a few remaining major weaknesses in FF, compared to IE6.

 

[Greg*go]

I think the new bookmark system "places" was in an alpha version, but it was still way too buggy so they postponed it to FF3. Maybe I'm just a very simple internet browser, but I don't get the complexities of bookmarking at all.

I use a Bookmark toolbar, and every single one of the links I use is on there. What else is there to bookmarking besides putting a link on the toolbar and clicking on it when it is needed?

I have a couple RSS feeds in my links as well, and they seem to work well too. Although I must admit, it took a bit of tinkering to make the RSS feeds appear with specific icons instead of the stupid RSS icon.

 

[Greg*go]

Drum Roll please...

Firefox 2.0 RC1 is now available.

This is supposed to be a feature complete version, the only thing left is supposed to be minor bugs and ones that haven't yet been identified. It's also more stable that the alphas and the betas. If you have a beta, I suggest upgrading. And if you've been on the fence about it, nows a good time to try it out.

I used to always test the pre-1.0 versions, but now I'm waiting on more of my extensions to become 2.0 compliant. It's so annoying when you spend a hours configuring a program to make it look just the way you want it to, then they upgrade, and half of your stuff doesn't work.

For anyone trying this version, is it true that undo-close tab is now a feature? How about duplicate tab?

 

[Christ Reynolds]

i love all the portableapps! audacity is GREAT, but gimp is probably my favorite. saved me from using mspaint when i'm forced to use a windows machine, and i have no rights to install anything. i also love portable firefox and abiword.

CJ

 

[DaveF]

I must confess to being sucked in to Portable Sudoku :b. I tried Portable GIMP, but the interface was so atrocious that I dumped it. I need to try Portable OpenOffice to see if it includes the drawing program and how it compares to Visio. I'm still looking for a decent technical drawing tool for Windows.

 

[Michael_K_Sr]

RC2 is out

 

[Ray Chuang]

I'll patiently wait for the final release, which should be by the end of this month at latest.

 

[Clinton McClure]

The HTF toolbar works on my desktop with FF2.0 but will not work with it on my laptop. I get a message that the toolbar is not compatible with the version of FF and the toolbar is disabled.

Any guesses?