You are viewing information archived from Mozilla.org on 2013-08-16.

This is an early developer release of the mobile version of Firefox, for testing purposes only, intended to:

  • get wider community feedback on our approach to the user experience
  • engage Mozilla community teams, including localizers, add-on developers, and testers
  • get feedback from Web developers

The initial focus of development was on building a new user interface that reflects Firefox's design principles, and adds touch screen support and other features that are appropriate for mobile phones and other handheld devices. For alpha 2, we focused mainly on performance, improving the responsiveness of panning and zooming, both while pages are loading and when they have completed loading. There are still many improvements we intend to make, including enabling TraceMonkey by default.

To help out, visit the Mozilla mobile page to learn about our public weekly meetings, how to find our community on IRC, and more.

These Release Notes provide a "quick start" for the impatient, some highlights of what's included in this version, download and installation instructions, known issues, and frequently asked questions. Please read these notes and the bug filing instructions before reporting bugs to Bugzilla.

Quick start

This release is available for the OS2008 ("Maemo") software platforms that runs on the Nokia N810 Internet Tablets. If you're viewing this on an N810, install Fennec.

Don't have an N810? Don't worry, you can still experiment with Fennec, provide feedback, write add-ons, and get involved by installing a version of Fennec for your desktop PC:

The idea behind releasing the package for PCs is to give people who don't have a Nokia Internet Tablet the ability to localize, experiment and build add-ons. Note: The desktop version of Fennec is not a supported product.

What's in this version?

New for alpha 2:

  • Faster panning
  • Faster zooming
  • Improved responsiveness while pages are loading
  • New content manipulation hooks for extension authors
  • Look and feel improvements to improve usability

This builds upon the feature set of alpha 1:

Easy navigation to Web content:

  • Bookmarks, including tags
  • Smart URL bar ("awesome bar")
  • Tabbed browsing with thumbnail images
  • Integrated Web search - built into the URL bar
  • Easy access to multiple search engines

Web content:

  • Maximize content by auto-hiding controls and URL bar
  • Zoom in and out

Security:

  • Instant Web site ID ("Larry")
  • Password manager
  • Popup blocker
  • Clear private data

Devices services integration:

  • Click on a phone number to initiate a call
  • JavaScript API to get device location

Also:

  • Searchable download manager
  • Preferences pane

Installing Fennec

System requirements:

  • Nokia N810 Internet Tablet running OS2008 ("chinook" or "diablo")

Installation:

Install a version of Fennec for your desktop PC:

Tips and tricks

  • to use the full screen for browsing, click the button on the left hand side on top of the device (to the left of the -/+ buttons)
  • swipe left to expose back/forward/bookmark buttons and the URL bar; swipe right to dismiss them
  • swipe right to expose tabs; swipe left to dismiss them

Known issues

  • plug-ins are disabled
  • bookmark folders are not implemented yet
  • Bug 458741: Allow panning/scrolling in iframes - Websites that display large amounts of content in IFrames, including Google Mail and Reader, will be very hard, if not impossible, to use

Give us feedback