FireMozFeeds

In this issue…

• Our First Issue
• Fennec M4 Available for Testing
• New Fennec Working UI Designs
• New Mobile Networking Profiling Tool
• Aza Raskin’s Mobile Concept Video
• Embedding

Our First Issue

Welcome to the first issue of about:mobile.  This newsletter will cover what’s going on in the Mozilla Mobile community on a monthly basis.  Please send your comments and suggestions to about-mobile@mozilla.com.  You can follow this newsletter from the Mozilla Developer News weblog or via our email list.  You can always unsubscribe from the mailing list with the link at the bottom of the mail.

Fennec M4 Available for Testing

The M4 Milestone release of Fennec is available for testing for the N800 and N810.  The main feature of this release is that it features really good scrolling and panning, largely written by Stuart Parmenter and Gavin Sharp.  Please note that this is still a very early milestone release, and as such this build has many features that are either incomplete or unstable.  Please see the instructions on how to install this Fennec milestone release on the N800-series tablets and Mark’s post on the release.  If you follow the instructions you will also get milestone updates as they become available.  The M5 milestone should be out a few weeks from now.

If you want to get involved remember that you can join the Mozilla mobile community on the mozilla.dev.platforms.mobile newsgroup or join via IRC on #mobile on irc.mozilla.org.

New Fennec Working UI Designs

Madhava Enros has updated the working UI designs for Fennec.   The current designs aim to minimize required typing, make it easy to do quick searches, and also to maximize the amount of screen space dedicated to web content.  Primary browser controls and tab thumbnails are placed out of the way, just beyond a page’s edges, but can be dragged quickly into view when needed.  Please see his updated mockups in the mobile section of the wiki to get the full story.

New Mobile Networking Profiling Tool

Pat McManus is working on measuring network performance for mobile.  As part of this he has created a network emulation tool that lets Fennec on Linux run as if it were connected to the Internet through a variety of different wireless networks.  He’s created configurations for GPRS, 3G, bluetooth and others. Feedback on the tool and especially any pages that interact poorly with any of the provided profiles would be much appreciated. Details on how to get the tool and use it are included in the newsgroup announcement.

Aza Raskin’s Mobile Concept Video

Mozilla Labs’ Aza Raskin has put up a video and blog post outlining some of the ideas he has for navigation on mobile touch devices.  Designed around single finger manipulation, Aza explores some ideas about how people might navigate from tab to tab or from browser to bookmarks.  A focus on visual momentum and realistic physics round out the demo.  To learn more see Aza’s post which includes a great screencast.

Embedding

Pelle Johnsen and Dave Camp have been hard at work on Mozilla’s new Embedding API.  It’s still very very early but Pelle has posted instructions on how to build the embedding APIs for some of our supported platforms.  Right now we have working support for Qt on Windows, a separate native win32 version, GTK+ on Linux and Tristan Van Berkom has been working on support for GTK+ on Windows.  In addition, Pelle posted early doxygen docs that outline the common parts of the API.

If you want to join up with the rest of the embedding community join us on #embedding on irc.mozilla.org or the mozilla.dev.embedding newsgroup.

In this issue…

• Extend Firefox 3: There’s Still Time!
• Status of AMO Editor Reviews
• Dangers of Using eval() on Downloaded JavaScript
• Add-on Statistics Since Firefox 3’s Release
• AMO 3.4.3 and 3.4.4 Pushed Live
• 1.9 SDK Now Available
• Firefox 3 for Theme Developers
• New CSS Features in Firefox 3.1
• New Documentation

Extend Firefox 3: There’s Still Time!
There’s still time to submit your new or updated extension to the Extend Firefox 3 contest ending on July 4. You can read the official rules and contest information at extendfirefox.com.

Status of AMO Editor Reviews
The AMO editors have been hard at work, reviewing 255 add-on updates and submissions in the 2 weeks before Firefox 3’s launch, and 238 updates/submissions between launch day (Tuesday) and Sunday. Please be patient as our editors work through this backlog. Thanks to all of the AMO editors for their hard work. You can read more about review and submission statistics at Justin Scott’s blog.

Dangers of Using eval() on Downloaded JavaScript
Many add-ons don’t make it past the review phase because a reviewer finds the add-on using eval() on downloaded JavaScript or JSON. A new MDC article talks about the dangers and how to avoid them.

Add-on Statistics Since Firefox 3’s Release
Over 16 million new add-ons have been downloaded from AMO (addons.mozilla.org) since Firefox 3 was released last Tuesday (June 17). You can read about add-on stats since the release of Firefox 3 at Justin Scott’s blog.

AMO 3.4.3 and 3.4.4 Pushed Live
addons.mozilla.org was updated recently with a number of bugfixes and new features, including a new theme browser, advanced search, and a beta of the new Developer Tools. You can read more about the new features on Basil Hashem’s blog and more about the Developer Tools beta on Justin Scott’s blog.

1.9 SDK Now Available
If you are building binary components for your add-on then the 1.9 SDK is the official way to build. It’s available for download in Linux, Windows and Mac flavours.

Firefox 3 for Theme Developers
Gavin Sharp has put together some of the highlights of new features in Firefox 3 for theme developers to use. Take a look and see how you an make your themes that much better.

New CSS Features in Firefox 3.1
The current development builds of Firefox 3.1 have more of the CSS 3 selectors implemented including nth-child, first-of-type and default. David Baron discusses the selectors and other new CSS features landing in Firefox 3.1 builds.

New Documentation
Some tricks with laying out XUL boxes are explained. A list of the parts of XUL that are now deprecated and replaced by better objects is now available. A new code snippet section on creating background processes using setTimeout and threads has been added.

Subscribe
Haven’t subscribed to the about:addons newsletter? Sign up here!.

Hi

Another Pack For Persian Supporters :D

Hop you enjoy it.

 

 

read more

From Digg.com, read about how Firefox was on the Colbert Report.  I did not see the actuall footage, but from what I have seen on that show, WOW, what an extremely excellent hypage for the new F3!

read more

Wondering what to do until we hear back from Guinness?  How about taking a moment to celebrate all the hardwork that went into Download Day and the launch of Firefox 3.  Check out Mozilla Party Central for a party near you or to host your own.

With the same enthusiasm that went into spreading the word about Download Day, the Firefox community has been planning parties with gusto!  There are over 700 parties planned worldwide. Here are some of the highlights:

• Catch a viewing of Kung Fu Panda with its director Michael Osborne in Palo Alto this Saturday.
• Fancy that Firefox 3 robot?  Come build one in Dolores Park in San Francisco on Sunday.
• The MVGeeks are planning a huge party in the Maldives on June 26th (editor’s note: the Firefox will need appropriate tropical attire stat!)
• Community members in Bucharest will be toasting Firefox 3 and the Mozilla 10-year anniversary!
• Bob Chao of MozTW will be hosting a Firefox 3 party for the Taiwan community on July 19th!

This is just a sampling…and please be reassured that it’s not too late to plan one!

Thanks to OLPC for throwing a Firefox 3 party on launch day!

Hi Guys,

   I've featured Firefox 3 on my blog. I've tried to people to download Firefox too. Hehe..The URL is this http://reubenteo.blogspot.com

Cheers,

Reuben

Last.fm users can meet here to discuss techniques to spread firefox through the last.fm user network. Major goals include brainstorming, organization and group development on last.fm.

We’re getting close to handing over our download logs to our judges for our Guinness World Record attempt.  We’re very lucky and honored to have Paul Vixie of the Internet Systems Consortium and Corey Shields of Indiana University.

Here is a little background on them both:

Paul Vixie has been contributing to Internet protocols and UNIX systems as a protocol designer and software architect since 1980, and was a cofounder of ISC in 1994. Early in his career, he developed and introduced SENDS, proxynet, rtty, cron and other lesser-known tools. Paul is considered the primary modern author and technical architect of BIND8, the most commonly used DNS server on the Internet.

Corey Shields is the Lead Systems Analyst for the High Performance Systems group in University Information Technology Services at Indiana University. Corey has had a long history as an open source software user,  advocate, and contributor.  He has made contributions to many open source projects including Mozilla and the Gentoo Linux distribution, and spent a couple of years managing the Open Source Lab  (OSL) at Oregon State University.

Currently, Corey is working with a team of administrators on the BigRed supercomputer at Indiana University.  BigRed is the 42nd fastest supercomputer in the world, and relies on open source software to operate and produce results for researchers across the country.

A huge thanks to them for supporting our effort!

Hi,

 

This is my suggestion for a 468x60 banner to the Firefox 3 download page:

 

You can use it in your blog/website.

 

Thanks...

Hi All   "To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe."   May it be a dream or a thought. about enhancing firefox ..lets talk here   cheers -S