Mozilla Corporation, which makes the Firefox browser, has named its next CEO: Gary Kovacs. This was a planned transition — current CEO John Lilly wants to become a VC at Greylock Partners — but perhaps not an expected choice, given Kovacs comes from outside the Mozilla fold. Read more »
Motorola released not one but six new Android phones this week. These cover a wide range of forms and target audiences, and the Droid Pro looks like a winner. This week hackers discovered the new T-Mobile G2 has hardware that detects and removes unapproved software modifications. Read more »
The first beta version of mobile Firefox for Android has been released and is now available in the Android Market. We have taken it for a test drive and while it shows good potential, it may be solving a problem that doesn’t exist on Android. Read more »
In a death match between native and mobile web apps, which one walks away the victor? That was the heavily paraphrased question posed at the Mobilize conference today and while a panel of experts did its best to weigh in, the less sensational answer is that there’s room for both. Read more »
If you leave a lot of comments on other people’s blogs, having to fill out your details each time can feel like a chore. easyComment is a Firefox extension that can save time by automatically filling out the required fields in the click of a button. Read more »
Siphon is an add-on that lets you sync a list of add-ons between multiple Firefox installs. Big deal, you might be thinking, Firefox already has Firefox Sync. You’d be right, except that Siphon provides the ability to manage which add-ons are installed via a management interface. Read more »
Mozilla released an updated version of Fennec, its mobile browser for Nokia’s N900 and Google Android devices. Along with improved JavaScript performance, the web client includes Firefox Sync so users can seamlessly have access to bookmarks, passwords and open tabs between the desktop and smartphone. Read more »
Kyle Dreger responded to a Lifehacker article comparing Windows browsers based on pixel-usage by making his own version with Mac browsers. What struck me was how few browsers he used: only four, and all of them were cross-platform. Read more »
Google open sourced its WebM video format in May, and more and more applications as well as video vendors are starting to support the new format. However, how do you actually play back WebM videos? This handy little guide tells you all you need to know. Read more »
Last week saw the arrival of Firefox on the iPhone, but not as we know it. Mozilla’s new app, known as Firefox Home, is not strictly a browser — instead it brings your desktop browsing session direct to your iPhone. Read more »
Today on the Net: More rumors about Hulu’s subscription and mobile device plans emerge, Mozilla commits to adding WebM support in the next version of Firefox and AT&T U-verse adds ESPN 3-D ahead of the World Cup, making it the third affiliate to do so. Read more »
Google’s Chrome browser continues to grab market share as Microsoft’s Internet Explorer continues to decline, according to the most recent surveys of browser usage. StatCounter said that in May, usage of IE 6 fell below 5 percent in the U.S. and Europe for the first time. Read more »
There is a lot of talk about Firefox losing to Chrome. And that may be true in early adopter circles, this exclusive data about Firefox’s daily active users and the number of downloads shows that Mozilla’s game changing browser isn’t out of the game just yet. Read more »
Up until now, those who wanted to watch HTML5 video in the Firefox browser were unable to access content that was encoded the H.264 format. But that could soon change, as a new project seeks to remedy this by marrying H.264 video to Mozilla’s Firefox browser. Read more »
John Lilly will step down as CEO of Mozilla Corporation after just two years on the job, the company confirmed today after a report by BoomTown. Mozilla is carefully calling the move as a “planned leadership transition,” saying Lilly had always wanted to be a VC. Read more »
Mozilla’s experimental Contacts add-on for Firefox, an in-browser contacts manager that can sync with contacts from other services, and which Imran described as an “Awesome Bar for People” when he wrote about at launch, has recently been updated with a host of useful improvements. Read more »
Mozilla has appointed Aza Raskin as the creative lead for Firefox. Raskin is one of the foremost experts in user interfaces and over the years has developed expertise in web user interfaces. In 2008, Raskin joined Mozilla and worked for Mozilla Labs. Read more »
Perspectives is a useful free add-on for Firefox that improves the usability of the browser and provides an additional layer of security when connecting to sites using SSL. Read more »
Mozilla is ceasing all work on Firefox for Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7 devices, as Microsoft doesn’t offer an NDK. That doesn’t leave many mobile platform choices for the Mozilla team. What does this say about open source in the mobile marketplace? Read more »
Contacts makes your browser “aware” of contact lists and address books you’re using elsewhere on the web, but rather than simply providing a view of these aggregated contacts, the add-on integrates them into form elements, so that names and addresses are auto-completed as you type. Read more »
Since early March, some European versions of Microsoft Windows have been delivered with a “browser ballot screen,” designed to give users a choice of 12 web browsers instead of forcing Microsoft’s Internet Explorer on them. The ballot screen is working, but there are problems arising. Read more »
Mac users are missing out on cheap (read: free), social customer relationship management. Windows users have xobni, a simple tool that integrates with Outlook, and Microsoft will also be releasing a solution in Office 2010 called Outlook Social Connector. But what if you have a Mac? […] Read more »
Firefox Mobile for Maemo arrived last month, but without many devices to take advantage of it, people are wondering which platform will be the next one to see Mozilla’s browser. Microsoft’s clean break with Windows Phone 7 just might push Mozilla to Android first. Read more »
Another nail in OS X 10.4 Tiger’s coffin was recently hammered in a post by Mozilla Foundation’s Josh Aas. Support for Tiger Already Terminated Aas reveals that development support for OS X 10.4 Tiger was terminated as of September 2009, but much of the code required to […] Read more »
Still running a PowerPC Mac and hurting for some serious browser speed, up-to-date security and web standards compatibility? Being open-source applications, Mozilla’s web browsers and Thunderbird email client are open to being breathed on by third-party developers, several of whom specialize in optimization of particular versions […] Read more »
I have a keen interest in portable apps from my time spent working on client sites. Having a suite of productivity applications on a USB flash drive has come in handy many times in my consulting career, especially when I’ve needed a graphics application. Read more »
Mozilla, which recently released its Weave Sync add-on for Firefox has released a set-of APIs that will allow developers to use Weave Sync services in new products independent of the browser. Weave services offer an opportunity to build new apps that leverage browsing/browser specific data. Read more »
Good news for HTML5 proponents: MPEG LA has announced that it will extend its royalty-free license of the H.264 video streaming format for an additional five years. In doing so, the license holder has agreed not to charge for use of the near-ubiquitous H.264 encoding format […] Read more »
Now that Firefox Mobile for Maemo is out the door, where will Mozilla turn? The Windows Mobile alpha is long in the tooth, but might it get leap-frogged by Firefox for Android? Here’s a few sites where you can watch the development progress. Read more »
Mozilla’s new Firefox for Maemo is an impressive new mobile browser designed to provide a seamless experience for users across phones and PCs. But in an era built on smartphone apps and app stores, can a browser-based strategy win? Read more »
