Though the final version of the Firefox 29 is expected to be available for the public sometimes in April 2014, the Firefox 29 Beta version is available now. The new Firefox 29 is based on Gecko 29 and it’s available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Android.
The Firefox 29 is powered by Firefox account that enables you to sign in and take your Firefox with your anywhere. Register and confirm your Firefox account and select what to sync such as tabs, bookmarks, passwords, history, desktop add-ons and desktop preferences.
You can simply login to Firefox in any device and access all your synced data. This is amazing as you can log out from office and login at home to access your open tabs, bookmarks, history etc. This method of synchronization is better than the old synchronization key system where you could lose your synced data if you lost your key.
Apart from the cloud synchronization feature of the Firefox 29 Beta update. There are other major highlights such as customization mode and overhauled user interface. The new Firefox Australis UI bring a cleaner look to the browser and includes a new “customization mode” in the pop-out settings menu which contains the tools and also provides space for third-party add-ons to be installed.
Other notable design changes include the curved tab shape and faded tabs to de-emphasize the inactive ones. The customization mode lets you arrange your tools just as you want them. Simply click on the new Menu button and select Customize, drag and drop add-ons or tools to anywhere in the browser.
The tabs are a bit higher in the browser with reshaped tabs tucked out of the heading to reduce clutter and allow users focus more on web content. The bookmark manager is now beside the bookmark star in your Firefox toolbar for one-click saving.
The Firefox drop-down menu has been relocated from the top left of the browser window to the far right, sporting a three horizontal bars design that is identical to that of Google Chrome. Firefox still retains a separate search box in the new UI.
The Firefox 29 Beta underlines three improvements; Client side key stretching, End-to-end encryption and Public key cryptography and the BrowserID protocol. Now let’s see in details all the features and improvements of Firefox 29 Beta.
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Check out “What’s New in Firefox 29” and “Known Issues” for this version of Firefox below.
| NEW | A set of new improvements to the Firefox user interface (learn more) |
| NEW | An interactive onboarding tour to guide users through new changes |
| NEW | A redesigned and improved customization mode |
| NEW | The ability to set up Firefox Sync by creating a Firefox account (learn more) |
| NEW | Gamepad API finalized and enabled (learn more) |
| CHANGED | navigator.plugins is no longer enumerable, for user privacy |
| DEVELOPER | ‘box-sizing’ (dropping the -moz- prefix) implemented |
| DEVELOPER | SharedWorker enabled by default |
| DEVELOPER | CSS3 variables implemented |
| DEVELOPER | <input type=number> enabled |
| DEVELOPER | <input type=color> implemented and enabled |
| DEVELOPER | Promises enabled by default |
| DEVELOPER | Console object available in Web Workers |
| DEVELOPER | Add-on bar has been removed, content moved to navigation bar |
| DEVELOPER | Enabled ECMAScript Internationalization API |
| FIXED | Echo cancellation on apprtc.appspot.com fails (974537) |
| UNRESOLVED | Text Rendering Issues on Windows 7 with Platform Update KB2670838 (MSIE 10 Prerequisite) or on Windows 8.1 has a workaround (see 812695) |
What does this mean for Firefox 29?
Updates always mean bug fixes, faster and better performance. The Firefox 29 Beta certainly feels snappy in my brief tests, loading pages almost as fast as in Chrome. Google Chrome still remains the fastest web browser.
Peacekeeper benchmark shows that Firefox 29 (scored 2,445 higher is better) is way behind Google Chrome (scored Chrome’s 3,665), but better than Internet Explorer’s (scored 2,093).
In the SunsSpider JavaScript benchmark, Firefox 29 scored an average of 254.4ms, marginally slower than Chrome 33 on 239.8ms and a long way behind Internet Explorer 11 on 132.9ms.
Note: All benchmarks were conducted on a Windows 8.1 PC, with a 1.8GHz Core i5 processor and 4GB of RAM.
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If you are as curious as me you can simply update your Firefox browser to version 29 Beta by clicking on the Help > About Firefox tab on your Firefox browser and update your browser, or if you are concerned much about your security and other things you can wait till April for the final release of the Firefox 29.
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Awesome compilation of features that will be released in Firefox 29. Great work Nwosu Mavtrevor. Firefox with the introduction of sign in features I am expecting they will take the route of Chrome to introduce market place to develop custom apps for firefox browser. We will have to wait and watch to see if Firefox also takes that route.
Interesting details about Firefox 29. I love the fact that it would eventually lead to faster loadings and convenient synchronization. I have longed for the day when Firefox can be logged in from anywhere. I think the time is now! Thanks for this update Desmond!
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Sunday – kingged.com contributor
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Currently I am using Firefox 27.0.1, no update yet.
It’s good to see such +ve changes in FF 29
Hello Sir,
Another Great post, I really enjoyed it! It sounds awesome with this fabulous, which will be very helpful.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks a lot for sharing this with us.
Firefox has been losing ground since Chrome began and this won’t do much, or enough, to remedy the trend.
Basically Mozilla depends on extension writers. [Let George do it!]. Problem there is most such coders can’t keep up with continual revisions, so extensions break, so people wander away.
Still no built in Flash, still no built in downthemall, still no always-works Back button, still no Opera-style next-page advance via spacebar. Instead: new high-end features. Earth to Mozilla: attend to the basics first, don’t act like Microsoft.