It seemed like yet another version upgrade for firefox until I heard there were xome “cool” features implemented in it. Upon taking it out for a spin it seemed there’s been a quantum leap as far as some of the features were concerned.
- JavaScript 1.8: Not sure if I were sleeping all these years or was oblivious to JavaScript version but 1.8 seems to be out and it looks weird as far as syntax is concerned. As if there weren’t enough arcane functions and objects in JavaScript as it is, now there have been syntactical changes. Refer to Mozilla’s page on JS 1.8 support. Additionally if you have spidermonkey installed there’s a whole different realm of things you never thought you could, should or would do with JavaScript.
- More CSS fun: Support for more closely following the CSS standards and resolution of previous issues seem to be the order of the day. A quick look at Mozilla’s added CSS functionality reveals it all.
- Obvious changes: The interface looks chique with new icons/theme although some of the add-ons might not work with v3 rc1.
- Not so obvious changes: If you’re a web developer and are planning on developing for FF3 to make use of some of the new features, don’t forget that there have been changes to DOM and HTML which you need to be aware of.
Overall, the new age browser is moving forward, cnsistent to its promise on standards compliance. Would developers upgrade their code and arsenal to keep up with the change is another matter. Wonder what the folks at the MS camp are cooking up … IE8 is around the corner apparently (God help us)
ThinkingCap - plugged in to the head 