Firefox 3 Beta 3 available, plus an inline tweak
Firefox fans will be happy to know that Beta 3 of the newest browser version is available for download. I’ve got it on both an XP and a Vista tablet, but haven’t had much time to play just yet. Looks like some Tablet items that don’t work in Vista do work in XP; for example, the TIP does appear when tapping fields on a web page in XP, but not in Vista. Since I didn’t spend much time with Beta 2, this could be the same behavior as before. While the TIP does appear in the URL address bar, it still doesn’t have the web context in either version of Windows, i.e.: the buttons for common web bits like "http:" and ".com".
Atlhough this tweak from How-To-Geek won’t fix the TIP issues, you can get inline address completion in the browser by changing one Firefox setting. If you type "about:config" in the address bar of the browser, you’ll be taken to a page with bunches of programs settings. Look for the one labeled "browser.urlbar.autoFill" and click it to change the setting from False to True. Now you’ll have inline URL auto-completion in the address bar to save some time. I’ve paired this with the TIP in XP by inking part of a URL and then clicking Insert on the TIP; the ink text is sent to the address bar so you can then choose the full URL if it appears from your browsing history. It’s less than ideal compared to full, native support, but it might save time for tablet and notebook users alike.
Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
Subscriber content. Sign up for a free trial.
The new OS X theme doesn’t look very good to me. If I want to look at a Safari knock-off, I may as well just run it. Wish I could get the old theme back or use the Linux theme which looks good. Glad we’re (supposedly) using the Mac’s builtin spell check this time around. In limited use, it seems more stable than Beta 2, though I couldn’t add a bookmark (despite confirmation).
The Google toolbar still doesn’t work and they didn’t fix an annoying bug in Java compatibility:
http://www.segal.org/java/TextFieldFocus/.
Hopefully they will not let it loose as a full release in this condition.
I see Dvorak has something to say about a bug he’s found http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=16066
In the FireFox 3 Beta 2 I was partially filling the TIP box and inserting and it was pulling my previous sites straight up with no adjusting of settings – have they turned something off now? (I haven’t installed it yet as i am still at work).
I’m sure there are lots of bugs. But until some crucial add-ons work, many people will not do the type of intensive testing that comes from using FF3 as their regular browser. As a result, many of the bugs won’t be found until later.
One of the most important features of a browser is the “word find” feature of the Google toolbar. Until the Google toolbar is working I will use FF3 only on a test computer, which I do not use very intensively.