Mozilla Firefox 2 Alpha 1 Available

Mini-Geek writes "Code-named Bon Echo, the first Alpha of Firefox 2.0 is now officially available. You can download it at ftp.mozilla.org. From the article: 'Here are some new features in Bon Echo Alpha 1 that require feedback: Changes to tabbed browsing behavior, New data storage layer for bookmarks and history (using SQLlite), 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'"

But...

Will it use less memory than 0.x / 1.x ??

Re:But...

I hope so, check out Ben Maurer's [blogspot.com] latest blog entry, near the bottom he talks a bit about this. Actually, the latest entry is quite informative about the new memory mapping features in the latest kernel.

Re:But...

That's why it's called an alpha developer build. It's barely beginning active development. You cannot expect it to be stable. You cannot even expect it to be safe. This is not a beta or release candidate. It's meant only for testers and active developers. Use with extreme caution.

SQLite

We all know that Firefox has had (and still has) a lot of memory issues. Will embedding a database in memory help or worsen these issues?

I haven't used SQLite, can anyone with experience using it please comment?

Re:SQLite

You believe falsely. (Possibly you're thinking of BerkelyDB). http//sqlite.org [slashdot.org] has full disclosure, even describing the virtual machine and opcodes that drive this little ~300kb, mostly-ANSI '92 compliant wonder.

Combine a scripting language for end-user forms, and you've got everything MS Access wishes it could be.

Get Hipp. Get SQLite.

Re:SQLite

I forsee no problems. It's a surprisingly minimal addition to a software package, and the problems with Firefox's memory management are very likely in unrelated modules.

"SQL" engines tend to evoke images of hulking software packages like PostgreSQL, SQL Server, and Oracle, but those things do an awful lot more than the typical desktop app needs, and the SQLite engine is much, much simpler in order to meet that lesser demand.

Re:SQLite

We all know that Firefox has had (and still has) a lot of memory issues.

We do? Funny, I've been running FF since the 0.8 days (Phoenix) and have never had any memory issue. In fact, I've never had any issue other than one mini-crash which forced me to use a default profile until I pulled up my old one. Further, I've installed FF on several different systems, including W98, and not one of those systems has ever had a memory issue.

Looking at the FF boards it appears the issue is not so much with FF but the multitude of extensions that people think they need to install.

Re:SQLite

I have firefox 1.5.0.1 on windows xp with latest adblock and filterset G updater, nothing else.

I've noticed that web pages that refresh themselves cause a run-away memory situation. Specifically the win32 MRTG package from open innovations [openinnovations.com] causes FF to use huge amounts of memory. It auto refreshes graphs I think every 10 seconds. If I leave a graph up on screen and leave for the weekend, FF will be using 1.8 GB memory when I come back on Monday. I've been unable to find out if this is a known problem or not, so I've not submitted this as a bug.

Re:SQLite

Adblock itself has had, and still does have, memory leak problems. The original maintainer shows no inclination to deal with them. It's generally recommended to use Adblock Plus, which has fixed most of these problems and also has useful new features, such as whitelisting. The maintainer of Adblock Plus has also shown strong interest in debugging and fixing any problems, including memory leaks.

There's a few problems that can cause leaks in FF itself which have been fixed in the main trunk. Almost all of those fixes are supposed to be included in 2.0.

Re:SQLite

Yes, here are the instructions [pierceive.com] for using with Adblock plus.

Re:SQLite

Mu.

The memory usage problems have been related to the image cache. (I've heard that this is often caused by an old version of the adblock extension)

Using SQLite to store profile information will probably have little impact the memory usage problems people see.

Really?

So is this any different than the Firefox 2 alpha that wasn't released yesterday?

Getting a Firefox Alpha

takes me back to the good old days when it was new, fresh, and charmingly not yet seemingly perfect, but so much the best choice!

Re:Getting a Firefox Alpha

(raises eyebrow) Getting an Alpha takes you back? Pff. I used to have a cron job that would download and compile Mozilla Nightlies every night on my Solaris box. It would automatically back up the current version just in case the new version didn't work in the morning. Every morning it was a new and wonderful experience to see how stable Mozilla would be today, if it would even run, and if there were any new features.

Back then we didn't have no "Alphas". We had semi-stable code snapshots called "Milestones" and we liked it that way! ;)

I hope they don't change the tabs too much

I've always wondered why bookmarks don't sort themselves by most often used to least recently. Maybe it will happen now. But the changes to tabbed browsing behaviour - hmm - I hope that means something like memory optimisation and not making it more like the tabs in Konqueror. Blech.

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

You don't need a database for sorting algorithms (think gnu sort), but what this will almost certainly do is complicate backup and transfer of bookmarks. I really can't understand what is wrong with a simple text file. Do they not see all the issues Microsoft has because of their registry format??? This is NOT a speed or sorting issue. (I could care less about the history, but don't think that will help anyone other than some possible edge cases there either.)

This will also almost certainly kill any chance of reusage of bookmark data by other programs - which could be a really inovative area if the barrier to entry is kept low. They need to read the Art of Unix Programming [faqs.org].

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

They aren't doing this just to get sorting algorithms. This actually improves things because right now there are a number of different formats that Firefox stores data in. Look at your bookmarks.html(HTML), cert8.db(Berkeley DB), formhistory.dat(mork... don't ask). Using sqlite reduces the amount of code for accessing all of these formats and provides some degree of uniformity. Getting data from sqlite is pretty easy(and much easier than the current situation) because we have dozens of language bindings and tools to do it with.

Yes I read the arguments against this is in AUP, but Firefox is an application that runs completely counter to most of what's in there. Firefox is never going to be a Unix application following the advice in AUP. It wants to be an operating sytem(or platform if you prefer), and not just an application.

Re:I hope they don't change the tabs too much

This will also almost certainly kill any chance of reusage of bookmark data by other programs

Not at all. SQLite is extremely easy to use -- it has bindings for major scripting languages, and trivial queries can be run on the command line. I use the Python bindings in a number of my minor scripts, and it has frequently resulted in a massive performance improvement (as opposed to using flatfiles and writing the data-munging and analysis code myself).

That's all?

Seriously - that's all the new features? How does that warrant a 2.0 label and not a 1.8? Firefox has been pretty innovative or good at putting great features together that Opera and Microsoft haven't done (yet), but now it seems IE7 has caught up in so many ways, but Firefox 2.0 will be just a minor, incremental update. Hell, bigger changes have gone in the post 1.0 releases. Come on...

Re:That's all?

It will be much more than that when Firefox 2 actually makes it out to the world. This is a very early build and according to the Roadmap [mozilla.org], it will be released near the third quarter of 2006. I'm guessing it will actually be a little later than that. I also found this Feature Brainstorming [mozilla.org] page, which seems to be closer to what's being planned for 2.0. I see a lot of new stuff.

confirmation

Here's a link that confirms this! [slashdot.org]

SVG support

I hope more browsers end up using SVG. There are some very nifty uses that can be made of it - an example of which is the porn database - http://pdatabase.dyndns.biz [dyndns.biz] (how's it going, John? :) )

So Far So Good ....

Works fine on Windoze even after 2 hours .. No crashes or memory hogs. In addition, it is co-existent with Firefox.

what's really new?

TFA doesn't say anything about new exciting features. I wonder what made them decide it to be 2.0 alpha instead of 1.6? Was it just so that they could reach the planned milestone?
I read something about they were trying to optimize the renderengine, so it could support cairo and have hardware acceleration... no promises was made, but they expected it to be in 2.0 (correct me if I'm wrong).

I guess the more comprehensive changelog (which isn't available yet) will reveal some more interesting changes - perhaps some nice performance enhancements?

ACID 2

For those who are wondering - the 2.0 alpha build renders the ACID 2 test exactly the same as Mozilla 1.7.12. (http://www.webstandards.org/files/acid2/test.html #top [webstandards.org])

I don't personally think that the ACID 2 test is the be-all end-all test, but I know the question will be asked, hence the post.

Tabbed browser update complaint

One complaint about the close buttons on the tabs:

The close button itself sucks. Take the one from the Firefox 1.5 Mac theme. It's much nicer.

Also, the button should be grayed out (or invisible) unless the mouse is on the tab bar.

XForms support?

Is there a plan to add XForms [w3.org] support to Firefox, or will they be waiting for XHTML 2.0 [w3.org]?

Firefox 2

I just hope that the greater prevalance of Firefox leads to a greater number of sites supporting it. I've had problems with some sites telling me my version of 1.5 needs to be upgraded to an earlier version!!! The site in question was the Comedy Channels's website. To many website designers seem to still design for IE only or use version checking to serve different pages. People should stick to writing valid HTML code that works across all browsers instead of making their websites unusuable for those who don't use IE.

Version inflation

ok, some features most users won't even notice, and that deserves a bump to 2.0...?

Well, Slackware did it. FreeBSD did it.

Even NetBSD did it.

I'm waiting for Mac OS 11.

Worth the jump in major numbering?

I've been toying around with the new alpha, and it has some interesting additions. But heck, the changes made do not warrant a jump in major version numbering in my books. But I guess that's because I'm used to how version numbers are in the Free Software world, where a jump in a major version number usually means there was a rewrite, or ABI was broken in favour of some fundamental changes.

I'm definitely not seeing that here with Bon Echo.

Not that this is a bad thing -- heck, I'm as much against featuritis as the next guy. But frankly I see less change here than from 1.0 to the Deer Park alphas.

IMHO the #1 thing the guys should have focused on for the 2.0 release was to make Firefox a XULRunner application.

libstdc++

Note that most FC4 machines out there will need the compat-libstdc++-33 package for the libstdc++.so.5 library. Just an FYI. :-)

FF Extensions Contest

I find it very strange that the winners of the recently posted FF Extensions contest do not work. The extensions that is. I like this alpha of FF 2 but I wish I still have the extensions / Themes I had before still working.

Portable version just posted

A portable version of this build was just posted for those that want to use this with a separate profile:
http://www.cybernetnews.com/?p=417 [cybernetnews.com]

How soon to version 3.0?

I mean, Mozilla used to be slow and steady, now they are firing out updates on .5 increments.

Is this good or bad? I think Firefox will end up becoming bloated and bug ridden just like IE if they keep up this kind of product update cycle. Firefox 1.5 hasn't even been out for 6 months and they are previewing version 2.0.

While I do think that some open source projects move a long at a pace that make snails impatient, I have found that this quick turnaround for FireFox versions isn't beneficial in the long run. I have found there to be more problems in each new version, and I have stopped using Thunderbird for several problems that haven't been addressed yet (such as opening up the wrong email when you click on a header).

I think Mozilla should slow down a bit, or at least go back to the .1 version increments. If they are just trying to drive up the version number to match I.E.'s 7.0, then they will find that Firefox performs about as well as I.E. 7.0, or even less so considering it took Microsoft 10 years to get there.

What is Bon Echo & FF2 Alpha does not update

What is Bon Echo anyhow? Yet another version of Firefox? Why does Firefox ignore Firefox 2 Alpha? Or is Firefox 2 Alpha now another dead armadillo with its legs in the air and flys buzzing around like Mozilla 1.7.11? I click on Firefox 2 Alpha help\check for updates and get the message "there are no new updates available".

Disgruntledly,
Jim

Browser dreams

I'm not all that enthusiastic about yet another iteration of Firefox... It's my primary browser and I do like it, but it will never be the browser that I would regard as the ultimate.

I envision a web browser which is the browser equivalent of Linux; a collection of simple programs performing very specific and narrowly defined tasks, all working through clean APIs or protocols. The HTML rendering being split off entirely, the javascript in its own library, image rendering separate, cookie management, security features, history management, bookmarks display, etc. Ideally, the various parts would be so simple that the barriers to development would be lowered drastically resulting in the organic rise of alternatives in the various segments; imagine having a flamewar over which js rendering plugin/library were better!

Extensions are not the solution by far. The functionality decentralization necessary to realize the vision of a browser like this far exceeds what the design idea behind extensions was.

Firefox will never be this. The only thing I've seen which might be salvaged into some sort of semblance of this vision is Kazehakaze, though that remains to be seen (I'm not sure you can even hotswap html rendering in Kazhakaze; I've never managed to keep it from crashing for long enough to test).

Screenshots

Here [osdir.com] and here [amanzi.co.nz].

My favourite bug...

Bug 9458 [mozilla.org] (referrer block for links from slash), "Implement inline-block in layout" hast its 7th birthday coming up.

How easy to retrieve SQLlite data in case of crash

This situation just happened yesterday. A client's PC went down hard. I popped out the hard drive and tossed it into my machine. I was able to copy the bookmarks file, mailbox files, etc from their Mozilla software quite easily with a single cp command. Their new PC arrives, and some quick drag and drops has everything back to normal.

Now with this SQLlite layer, will I be able to do this just as easily? I pray that Thunderbird never decides to go this route!

Faster? Smaller? Better?

Instead of making Firefox a subject of creeping-featurism, how about optimizing the code? Keeping it simple? I really don't see the need for a SQL style system just to manage my bookmarks and history (not that I even have the history function enabled). Just focus on making it start fast, and solve the memory management problems. I can't have 15 tabs open without a significant slowdown.

Fantastic - I can now write in spirals

> Support for SVG text using svg:textPath'" This mean that we can now publish texts along arbitrary paths. Searchable spiral poetry here we come! Compose in Inkscape - render in Firefox. For example [Cut and paste]

<?xml version="1.0" standalone="no"?>
<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd" >
<svg width="12cm" height="3.6cm" viewBox="0 0 1000 300" version="1.1"
xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
<defs>
<path id="MyPath"
d="M 270.18634,82.608696 C 270.37894,82.840915 269.84742,83.007795 269.71822,82.996945 C 268.86959,82.925674 268.74445,81.803663 269.00939,81.18963 C 269.65841,79.685416 271.66302,79.596056 272.90121,80.35703 C 275.16538,81.748562 275.20055,84.922795 273.75419,86.910501 C 271.47392,90.044227 266.88857,89.999872 264.03872,87.707426 C 259.93187,84.403819 260.0792,78.194605 263.36056,74.378756 C 267.81264,69.201518 275.83942,69.473029 280.71836,73.873616 C 287.05778,79.591495 286.6427,89.615704 281.00202,95.649329 C 273.90745,103.23815 261.71672,102.66154 254.44134,95.667338 C 245.5198,87.090595 246.27474,72.57296 254.72988,63.97261 C 264.88962,53.638395 281.88727,54.587527 291.8925,64.605969 C 303.71643,76.445511 302.55801,96.070078 290.87822,107.55721 C 277.26558,120.94531 254.87258,119.56319 241.82909,106.12772 C 226.80467,90.651803 228.42435,65.35361 243.70653,50.68159 C 261.13312,33.950778 289.46906,35.821338 305.83972,53.038376 C 324.34513,72.500521 322.21079,104.00295 302.97336,122.1405 C 281.39306,142.48699 246.59883,140.07638 226.62783,118.7354 C 204.37535,94.956407 207.07436,56.748181 230.59994,34.878775 C 256.65623,10.656815 298.39776,13.65604 322.22912,39.445284 C 348.48268,67.85574 345.17174,113.24725 317.04156,139.10274 C 286.20171,167.44881 237.04601,163.8149 209.10542,133.26819 C 178.60714,99.925234 182.57498,46.893408 215.61228,16.807923 C 251.53065,-15.901217 308.54841,-11.588687 340.83749,24.011808 C 375.81511,62.576566 371.14735,123.6881 332.9124,158.23845 C 291.63152,195.5412 226.32027,190.50789 189.45192,149.56848 C 149.76829,105.50292 155.1773,35.887755 198.88998,-3.3544033 C 245.80768,-45.473804 319.82929,-39.679143 361.50021,6.8744969 C 406.10945,56.71076 399.91934,135.23977 350.45812,179.39359 C 297.63787,226.54599 214.50199,219.95078 167.81191,167.51634 C 118.06379,111.64764 125.07358,23.806825 180.54589,-25.472146 C 239.52665,-77.86785 332.1691,-70.43414 384.08888,-11.860175 C 439.18337,50.295371 431.31652,147.83488 369.57801,202.44673 C 304.18576,260.29056 201.65499,251.98149 144.30046,187.01635 C 83.65735,118.32624 92.417595,10.711206 160.67067,-49.436005 C 232.71901,-112.92776 345.51023,-103.70749 408.49953,-32.105955 C 474.88871,43.360318 465.19969,161.41853 390.18987,227.29876 C 311.24668,296.63363 187.83168,286.46722 119.01221,207.99 C 46.683932,125.51155 57.336246,-3.3490338 139.33934,-75.155507 C 225.41075,-150.52443 359.80475,-139.37778 434.64551,-53.790996 C 513.1018,35.930468 501.4525,175.9448 412.22482,253.86663 C 318.7968,335.45658 173.07611,323.29637 92.026882,230.37118 C 7.2574529,133.18067 19.936719,-18.331549 116.61546,-102.55404 C 217.62384,-190.54833 375.01194,-177.34194 462.45312,-76.854164 C 553.71724,28.026952 539.97573,191.37447 435.62397,282.07934 C 326.81578,376.65785 157.42608,362.37333 63.412908,254.10313 C -34.524138,141.31402 -19.688764,-34.199876 92.55379,-131.56555 C 209.37719,-232.90491 391.09658,-217.51093 491.85857,-101.24256 C 596.64366,19.668036 580.68337,207.6735 460.3362,311.87525 C 335.28597,420.1491 140.91452,403.61489 33.22994,279.13639 C -78.575364,149.89451 -61.459685,-50.922153 67.202237,-162.1323 C 200.68734,-277.51141 408.02782,-259.80677 522.80591,-126.90977 C 641.80084,10.869728 623.49981,224.81199 486.3165,343.20009 C 344.19184,465.85253 123.57045,446.94775 1.5306108,305.42728 C -124.82072,158.90709 -105.30489,-68.470206 40.603176,-194.20319 C 191.56889,-324.29449 425.77828,-304.16035 555.24551,-153.81463 C 689.11755,1.646224

Design for FF, typically works in IE

Most web people I know design for Firefox and then check IE for any weirdness. That seems to be much better than the reverse. The only exception would probably be certain CSS tags that IE has yet to support.