May 2011

Firefox Release Recap: May 2011 Week 3

Just Released Firefox 5 Beta – May 20th Schedule this Coming Week Firefox 6 Aurora – May 24th to 31st* Future Releases Firefox 3.6.18 – June 21st Firefox 5 Final Release – June 21st Firefox 6 Beta – July 4th * As part of the new Rapid Release Schedule, dates listed for Aurora and Beta releases are listed as a range. The beginning date is when the code merge is to begin and the end date is the latest this build will be released to that channel. See this post for more details.

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Firefox 5 Beta Now Available

Firefox 5 has been moved to the Beta channel on May 20, 2011 (3-days after the May 17th code merge).  This build as far as features and changes will be very much similar to the final release due out on June 21st. The name ‘Beta’ may cause some confusion to those who are used to Mozilla’s old release system (Alpha, Beta, Release Candidate).  This particular build would fall under the Release Candidate category even though it is labeled as Beta. Development of new features is done and for the most part this build is stable. However, there may still be…

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Merge Date vs Release Date

It is still a learning process for the new Firefox rapid release schedule. Earlier this month Mozilla Developer’s News blog explained the difference between the merge and release dates. To sum it up, the dates show on the release page (as well as those posted here) are the date the code is being merged on to the particular channel. The actual release will be around 1-week to allow for testing to ensure the release is stable enough for public consumption. This however only applies to Nightly to Aurora and Aurora to Beta. However, for ‘final releases’, the date listed for…

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Ant Video Add-on Secretly Collects Browsing Data.

I never have used this but a lot of people do it looks like. A high-rated Firefox extension with more than 7 million downloads secretly collects data about every website the open-source browser visits and combines it with uniquely traceable information tied to the user, an independent security researcher said.“The undisclosed behavior of the Ant Video Downloader and Player add-on takes place even when the Firefox private browsing mode is turned on or when users are availing themselves of anonymity services such as Tor. The add-on carries a rating of four out of five possible stars and gets an average…

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Microsoft has Money burning holes in their pockets?

So last week was the big announcement of Microsoft’s $8.5 billion purchase of Skype. Some people may have forgotten back in 2008, Microsoft bought Danger (the makers of Sidekick) for $500 million. That did not work out as well as Microsoft had hoped as seen by summer 2010 release of the Kin phone (which if you blinked you missed it lasting only 7 weeks on the market). In December Microsoft washed their hands of the Kin Phone. Further the Sidekick brand ended up returning to T-Mobile. Of course there’s the on again, off again talks of acquiring Yahoo! As of…

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Thunderbird 3.1.11 Coming / 3.3 News

Mozilla has updated their release schedule to reflect an update for Thunderbird 3.1 (3.1.11) coming on June 21st. Thunderbird 3.3 has had it’s string freeze meaning no new features can be introduced for this build. There is sill a few weeks of testing down the road. No release date has been announced but could also be June 21st as well.

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Firefox Release Recap: May 2011 Week 2

Just Released None Schedule this Coming Week Firefox 5 Beta – May 17th Future Releases Firefox 6 Aurora – May 24th Firefox 3.6.18 – June 21st Firefox 5 – June 21st Firefox 6 Beta – July 4th

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Microsoft Skype

With the recent news that Microsoft is acquiring Skype, it did not take long for someone to come out with a packaging design for the new Microsoft Skype. The Super Annoying Edition (with Clippy) is one of 12 editions coming to a Microsoft Store near you. Source: Microsoft Blog

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Clarification on New Rapid Release Process

I feel I should clarify a few things about the new release schedule. Many people are saying Mozilla is moving too fast with Firefox releases. It may appear that way because of the numbering change but things are not changing that much. In the past Mozilla would release an incremental update (such as 3.6.1) which included bug patches and minor security fixes about once every six weeks. A major release (such as 2.0, 3.0, 3.5, 4.0) about every six to twelve months. Further, with these major releases they would try to implement all the new features/improvements/enhancements at once. The problem…

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Firefox Release Recap: May 2011 Week 1

Just Released None Schedule this Coming Week None Future Release Firefox 5 Beta – May 17th Firefox 6 Aurora – May 24th Firefox 5 – June 21st Firefox 6 Beta – July 4th

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