

Announcing Firefox Aurora 10 - maratd
http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/11/announcing-firefox-aurora-10/

======
tommi
Just in case you didn't know it: Firefox release stages are: nightly, aurora,
beta, final. Had to look this one up.

Lessons learned from this: always describe in release notes with at least one
sentence what you are releasing.

------
LeafStorm
The visibility APIs look useful. Why didn't anyone come up with that before?

~~~
james33
Yeah, I hadn't even thought of that before, but right after I read that I
started thinking of countless opportunities to put that to use.

~~~
Hovertruck
You already can in Webkit-based browsers by listening for the
'webkitvisibilitychange' event.

------
BauerUK
Good to see they have finally integrated developer tools natively. However,
they're all over the place. Each tool sits in its own separate window, they
really need to bring them altogether and implement something more like
FireBug.

Oh, the JavaScript scratch pad is a nice addition. A CSS version would also be
nice.

~~~
pcwalton
The CSS version is under development:
<https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=583041>

------
ebiester
I'm looking at the page visibility API. On one hand, I can think of a dozen
ways it could be useful. On the other hand, images in my head of interstitials
pausing while they are in the background is enough to kill someone. (I prefer
not to use adblock, oddly enough.)

------
jvoorhis
The inspector is a needed improvement over previous versions. It's responsive,
and shows tag, id and class info as you hover over any element.

------
ebabchick
They really need to get developer Inspect working such that simply hovering
over the HTML highlights the relevant part of the page, not only clicking on
it. Chrome is crushing them here with that feature.

~~~
pcwalton
If I understand what you mean, that's working in nightlies.

------
xtacy
I am on the Nightly builds and I found that when Nightly was version 10.0 (now
Nightly is 11.0), Twitter broke because LocalStorage did not work. Has it been
fixed in v10?

------
bokchoi
> We fixed E4X syntax so that it is not accepted in ES5 strict mode.

I kinda like E4X even with it's warts. Why remove it from strict mode?

------
dylangs1030
I downloaded and ran it. Here's a few observations:

1\. Mozilla is stating that Aurora has focused on enhancements in HTML5, but
aside from the new visibility API for tabs not being viewed, both Aurora and
Firefox score 314 on <http://html5test.com> (behind Chrome).

2\. Aurora loads (warm, not cold) at about 2.1 seconds for me, from run to
display. In context, that's about half a second faster than Firefox opening
(again, warm) on the same computer, as Firefox opens in about 2.6 seconds.

3\. This release seems like the kind of thing very easy to glaze over because
it doesn't have immediately apparent differences with Firefox - power users
and coders will find it useful and appealing.

~~~
dvdhsu
> _Aurora loads (warm, not cold) at about 2.1 seconds for me, from run to
> display. In context, that's about half a second faster than Firefox opening
> (again, warm) on the same computer, as Firefox opens in about 2.6 seconds._

I really suggest getting a SSD if you can afford it. The amount of time it
will save you everytime you boot your computer and/or start programs really
adds up in the long run.

Once you go SSD, you can't go back.

~~~
Tharkun
Getting faster hardware to improve performance of slow bloatware is a tad
silly.

~~~
mgkimsal
But, it's about the only thing an end user can realistically do.

Spend a few hundred dollars on hardware - install once - things run faster. Go
about your business.

or

Learn to program in a variety of languages. Join multiple projects. Grab code,
start hacking. Lobby to get your patches accepted. Deal with months of
political infighting on various projects. Consider forking projects because
patches aren't accepted. Deal with your contributions being removed or broken
in future commits. Contend with slower hardware during the months (or years)
it takes for this process to occur for all the major programs you run (and
forget about the dozens of smaller programs you use daily).

Hrm... yeah, I can see why getting faster hardware is a tad silly. Not sure
what the OP was thinking.

Given that it takes 2.1 seconds, can we assume that at least some of that time
is physical loading from the drive, and has nothing to do with the actual
program itself? Faster hardware does indeed work. And I'm saying this as
someone with SSD lust, and can't quite justify the expense of a 256g or 512g
SSD. :/

~~~
polyfractal
Or you could just go get a cup of coffee instead of sperging about 2 second
load times.

I mean, really?

~~~
mgkimsal
Really?

Few second wait times are a real burden to me, because it's too long to go do
anything else productive, but still slow me down.

And when this happens multiple times per day for multiple apps - how much
coffee can you drink?

~~~
polyfractal
I'm not saying it isn't irritating, or that having a shiny SSD wouldn't be be
awesome, or that Firefox is turning into bloated software - because those are
all true statements. But when put in the context of:

A) wait 2 seconds

B) Buy a $200 hard drive

C) Fork Firefox yourself

waiting the 2 seconds seems like the sanest solution. Perhaps I've been
working on budget hardware for so long that it doesn't bother me anymore, but
the delay just doesn't seem like _that_ big of a deal.

I imagine checking your email or reading HN kills more time per day than
waiting for programs to start.

------
suivix
Why don't they automatically update yet like Chrome? Having to download
something every couple of weeks is a huge annoyance.

~~~
copper
But they do: my version of Aurora notifies me when there's a new update that's
been downloaded, and if I don't click it then, it updates the next time I
start firefox.

~~~
gcp
I suspect parent may have meant silent updates, where the browser updates
without having to notify you. (Whereas now it still asks you each time)

I think that can't work until "compatible by default" is enabled for add-ons,
which hopefully will come soon.

------
pgaurav1432
new will be anounsed yet. . . .

