Firefox Version 1.5 available

Mozilla has released Firefox Version 1.5. This is the full official release ... no longer a "beta" version.

Spread Firefox plans an all out community marketing campaign for Firefox 1.5!

Browsers Face-Off

Here's a good article comparing Explorer 7 Beta 1, Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 1, and Opera 9 Preview 1. The article doesn't declare a "winner", but rather reminds folks they have several options to choose from, to find what's right for you.

Getting Extensions To Work In Version 1.5

If you're not familiar with Firefox and it's extensions, you may be asking "What are they?" Extensions are small add-ons that can help you customize Firefox to do what you want it to do. That's the beauty of this browser ... it's not crammed full of features you don't need ... but you can add features that you want. You can browse page after page of available extensions to find ones you might find useful. Simply download and install it (they install themselves), restart the browser ... and your new extension will be active!

However, if you're using and testing Firefox 1.5, you may find some extensions disabled or incompatible. This usually means, they have not yet been updated to work in version 1.5. If you've gone from a working version, such as 1.0.7 to 1.5 RC3, then not having your favorite extensions working, can be frustrating.

There IS a solution! Download and install the Nightly Tester Tools extension, and restart the browser. Now "update" your extensions, which can be found under Tools > Extensions. If you have any marked "incompatible", click on the "Make all compatible" button. This should get them working for 1.5.

You may try to install a new extension, and get a message that it's incompatible. On the small "Software Installation" box that pops up, check the box "Install using Nightly Tester Tools to overide compatibility". This will solve the incompatibility issue, and install your new extension.

New extensions are being added all the time. If you haven't found what you're looking for, be sure to check back in a few days ... it may be there!

Similar to extensions, are themes, which allow you to change the look (or skin) of the browser, and plugins which add more features. Also check PluginDoc for more plugins.

By adding extensions, themes, and plugins, you can create your own "custom" browser, to look the way and do the things you want ... giving you a more enjoyable surfing experience!

Firefox 1.5 Review By PC Magazine

In the space of a roughly a year, Firefox has gone from relative obscurity to being the second most popular browser in the world. It's got only about 9 percent of the Internet browsing market, but that's incredible for a version 1.0 product, especially since the top browser, Microsoft Internet Explorer, comes bundled with new PCs. The release of Firefox 1.5, the first major upgrade since Firefox 1.0 came out in November 2004, is almost certain to drive adoption rates even higher.

Article

Happy Birthday Firefox!

One year ago today, Firefox was released to the public for general use (although I'd been using a beta version for a month or so earlier).

Today, Firefox has been downloaded over 100 Million times, has reached 11% market share, and version 1.5 is soon to be released (I'm using a 1.5 pre-release version and it works well, except for certain extensions that haven't been updated yet).

It's been a great year for Firefox ... let's hope we have many more!