Archive for: Fennec
Android users who’ve managed to install Fennec onto their devices thus far have probably come to the general conclusion that it’s slow, buggy, and simply not that great. It’s not without reason though — Fennec was never officially released for Android in any form. But good things come to those who wait.
According to Mozilla/Fennec team member Matt Brubeck, this fall will see the release of Fennec 2 for MeeGo….and Android. Obviously, major performance and reliability improvements are slated for release, namely new features called “electrolysis” and “layers” as well as Firefox Sync. The first, Electrolysis, is simple a splitting of one major resource (as Fennec operates currently) into several smaller resources, which greatly improves performance and is more resistant to crashing. Along the same lines, the GPU of your device will also be called into action with Layers, helping with the aforementioned performance increase by relieving the CPU of being the only worker on the job. The same offloading of tasks to the GPU is finally gaining steam on the desktop front, so it’s nice to see the mobile sphere following the same path so quickly.
Lastly, Firefox Sync is a simple tool to keep your Mozilla favorites, bookmarks, etc. organized across browsers, platforms, and computers. It’s a useful tool that truly doesn’t show it’s real value until you being using multiple computers daily.
With waning market share on the desktop front, can Mozilla’s mobile efforts make up for that slack and win you back over? Or, are other platforms/browsers (iOS and Safari, Android and mobile Chrome etc.) too far ahead for you to care?
Firefox 4 beta 2 may be the latest talk of the town in browser land — No joke, it’s pretty awesome! — but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other important matters to talk about. On that note, some curious Droid-Life readers started poking around Mozilla’s FTP site and found a freshly updated version of Fennec that was uploaded on July 24th 2010. I went ahead and downloaded the update myself and have found it to be more or less a crap shoot on my Moto Droid running Froyo. Looks like they haven’t really grabbed the Froyo bull by the horns yet, as plenty of FC’s wreaked havoc on my little plastic bundle of love. Of course, this is an unofficial ganked copy, so I won’t complain too much.
I’m just glad they’re still working on it. It seems like f. o. r. e. v. e. r. ago that we heard about Fennec coming to Android. Anywho, go on ahead and get the Fennec update yourself and let us know how it goes for you…
Test dummies and those who want to be on the bleeding edge of relevancy, take notice. Mozilla has decided tonight is the night to take the wraps off of Fennec for Android — “officially” — by releasing a version for mere mortals to play with. Now take heed as this release is by no means a final version. In fact, if the thought of rooting your phone or having to pull the battery to force a reboot scares you, run away fast. Very fast. But if not, continue on…
Love to live on the edge? Want only the best in mobile browsing? Generally speaking, Mobile Safari on the iPhone is bar none, the best mobile browser. Opera Mini and Chrome on Android are both close seconds with everything else falling in somewhere distantly behind. Fennec however is extremely promising though only currently available in “official” form for the Nokia N900. WinMo has it’s little dev port as well but that is pretty much dead. Android — we know it’s coming but “late 2010/early 2011″ has been the often touched on date — until today.
Some devs with a few moments on their hands took it upon themselves to compile Fennec for the DROID. I’m downloading and installing now so I’ll let you know how it goes once I’m up and running. The early word says it’s mighty pretty though still kinda slow in it’s infant form. Also, it hangs on the first launch requiring a restart of the phone itself.
Obviously, this is a highly beta, I’d even wager alpha build. Bugs will be there in ample amounts. Enough talking. The Android geeks out there just want Fennec and want it now. Can’t argue with that. Go get it (Direct Download link).
**Update: After a solid 20 minutes, I can say it’s (obviously) not a replacement for whatever other Android browser you currently use — more of a novelty for the time being. The browser is extremely slow and choppy. But — and that’s a mighty but — the rendering is extremely true to the desktop version and tabbed browsing is super easy and well laid out. And did we mention it looks sexy as hell?
Gizmodo > XDA
Mozilla may have been coy about Android’s flavor of Mobile Firefox, dubbed “Fennec”, but after a few weekend sightings, it appears that development behind the new mobile browser is moving along at quite a decent clip. This past weekend, a picture of Fennec running on a MOTO DROID was spotted on Mozilla’s Faecbook fan page as was a new picture several hours later of the same browser running on the Nexus one thanks to Mozilla developer, Madhava Enros.
If development was having any kind of trouble or hangup, we wouldn’t be seeing so many leaked images, would we? The actual release still hasn’t been revealed, though “later this year” is still more or less the “official word”. One thing’s for sure, I can’t wait. Multiple browsers may seem trivial to the end user, but in actuality, the more choices the better. Not to mention, while the stock Android browser is pretty damn good, there’s always room for improvement. Any Android users out there looking forward to Fennec?
ElectricPig
[Image Source]
- February 11, 2010 12:57 pm
Holla! Whoop whoop! Time to get excited. Skyfire is coming to Android!
Mobile browsing has steadily gotten better over the last several years with better hardware and software teaming up. Regardless of what OS, processor, or type of display you have, the only thing that truly matters in mobile web browsing is the browser itself. Even today, most phones have pretty craptastic apps installed called “browsers”, with some manufacturers even going as far as to brag about the “HTML” aspect. Even with “HTML”, most standard browsers suck.
Truth be told, today we have several viable options that are worth a look, or two, or three. There’s the standards such as Mobile Safari on the iPhone and Mobile Chrome on Android, but those are more dependent on the OS. Instead, more “universal” browsers that are actually worth talking about include Opera Mini, Opera Mobile, Fennec, and SkyFire.
Opera Mini is an amazingly successful mobile browser that spans across hundreds of devices and offers fast speeds in a light footprint. Opera Mobile requires more powerful hardware, but still offers an even fuller featured browsing experience while on the go if not a slightly slower pace. Fennec is the new wonder browser that debuted on the Nokia N900, with plans to move onward to Android in the not too distant future. But the real reason we’re talking about mobile browsers today is Skyfire.
Skyfire, like Opera Mini users server-side compression technology to compress each and every page you browser before it actually gets to your phone. Doing that removes a solid 60%+ from your actual device’s data stream making your wait times and data usage much less — a very good thing. It’s already been highly talked up in it’s current Windows Mobile dressing for it’s speed, rending accuracy, and overall ease of use. Best of all (to some), it is 100% fully Flash compatible. Good news for Android users, it’s coming home.
In an announcement today, Skyfire announced that they have acquired Kolbysoft — the company which makes the Android “Steel” browser — in hopes to better develop a new Android browser.
According to Skyfire’s CEO:
By adding kolbysoft’s talent to Skyfire, we’ll be able to fuse the best of Skyfire’s famed cloud-computing multimedia capabilities with the Webkit browser movement to create a better hybrid model for Android. Steel has been the most acclaimed browser in the Android Marketplace, adding features atop Webkit. Together, we’ll be able to do so much more.
Don’t go waiting in any digital line to get early news on Skyfire’s new Android development as they’re still in the early stages. Now with Kolbysoft’s talent in the Android realm however, things should pick up. One last thing worth mentioning before we leave is that the Skyfire Android browser will run atop the WebKit rendering engine already used by the stock Android browser. Some may see this as a sour point. But, if Skyfire can work their magic in conjunction with the server-side compression technology, Skyfire for Android could be even better than Fennec for Android. Well, ok. Maybe I’m getting a little ahead of myself there.
Geeked?
Gizmodo > Skyfire
Say it isn’t so?! FireFox Mobile (or Fennec as some prefer) could be out as early as February according to Camp-firefox.de. I don’t have too many bones to pick with the stock web-kit browser other than it’s lack of multi-touch out of the box as well as it’s less than smooth scrolling. But as far as rendering and speed goes, it’s isn’t too bad. So why the excitement for another browser?
More options is always a plus. Not to mention, after seeing the various early builds of Fennec on Nokia Maemo devices such as the N900, it’s hard not to be impressed, yearning for your very own copy of Fennec to grace your mobile handset (in this case, Android) of choice.
February is but a few days away so the wait to waiting more isn’t too far off. Excited for Fennec or think it’s over-hyped? Sound off below.
Unwired
- December 10, 2009 3:47 pm
If you were beginning to lose hope in Fennec, Mozilla’s venture into the mobile browser world, have I got a juicy treat for you. Like many of you out there, I was beginning to feel as if Fennec was months upon months away from an actual release. Such long spans of time are torturous for us “gotta have it now” folks. At least one small niche group of users will soon be able to start rocking an official Mozilla Fennec web browser. Thanks can be sent to Jay Sullivan, Mozilla´s Vice President of Mobile Division. It was he who mentioned yesterday that Fennec RC1 would be available by the end of the week with an official final version dropping by the end of the year. Think of it as a nice “Happy New Year” from Mozilla.
Now for the bad part. While many users across various platforms would love to spend some one on one time with their mobile devices, exploring everything that Fennec has to offer, for the initial launch set for end of ’09 anyway, Nokia’s N900 will walk away as the one and only supported device. Now don’t confuse Fennec’s initial support being solely for the N900 as it is actually more for Maemo 5. It just so happens that the N900 is the only device with Maemo 5 that supports Fennec for the time being. Confused yet?
Now don’t get too upset. Put the pitchforks and flamethrower down. Jay followed up the RC1 statement saying that the Fennec beta version currently available for Windows Mobile will also get a more legitimate option come 2010. Maemo 5 users won’t be the only ones getting to have all the fun.
Wait just one more second, don’t you go running off yet as I saved the best for last — according to Jay, they have begun work on an official Android version of Fennec. Can you say hellz yeah!? Dolphin is ok and all as a second Android browser, but even seeing videos and accounts of Fennec’s beta product already have me convinced a final product will blow away the competition, Android or not.
2010 is already lining up it’s fair share of big stories and highlights. It’s going to be one hell of a year.
Phone Arena > Cnet
The “mobile browser war” seems to in for a year of fierce competition. With Mobile Safari so far dominating mobile web use, the other mobile OS developers aren’t sitting down. Opera Mobile, Opera mini, Mozilla’s Mobile Firefox (Fennec), and Bitstream’s BOLT browser are all competing for you love and attention. In a press release to more or less gloat (hey with numbers like those above I would too) about their success in the last month. What kind of success? How about over 300,00 users who collectively visited over 15 million pages! That is a huge amount of traffic in just one month! So mobile web users have you used BOLT yet? Likes/Dislikes? Let us know! If you haven’t downloaded the Bolt browser yet you can get a copy right here. Hopefully BOLT keeps up the momentum as it is a very promising browser.
Source: Into Mobile
