Mozilla released Ff 8 today, seven weeks after their last version.

So what’s new?

Ff 8  features for the new browser releases (Win, Mac, Linux and mobile for Android) include Twitter search integration, on-demand tab group loading, and more WebGL graphics hardware acceleration support. Mozilla has added "support for Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS), which lets developers load WebGL textures from other domains in a secure way." according to them but Microsoft and Apple disagree as to the safety of WebGL. Mozilla has added to the Android version of Firefox 8 a Master Password feature to protect all the logins used on the device.

Ff 8 also includes a new security feature (always a good thing) preventing extensions from adding other third party extensions without the user’s consent (and frequently, knowledge).

The user is now given an opt-in. Upon upgrading, the new version will ask users to select their add-ons. You aren’t told expressly (at least I wasn’t) which extension is new, however you should be cognizant which you have (and why) so pay close attention during the installation.

You can get Ff8 here:  http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/   or by navigating to Help>About Firefox and restarting the browser.

According to PCMagazine :

• Pros

  More-efficient memory usage and faster startup than previous versions. Panorama tab group organizes sites. Excellent standards support. Cool bookmark organization with Panorama. Pinned sites for all-the-time access. Syncing for tabs, history, passwords and more. Graphics hardware acceleration. Cross-platform.

• Cons

  Update breaks some extensions. Still trails Chrome and IE9 on some benchmarks. Lacks client-side tracking protection like that of IE9. Lacks Chrome's built in Flash, PDF reader, and Instant page view. Trails Chrome in HTML5 support. No new-tab page helpers. Slower startup than Chrome and IE9.

• Bottom Line

  Firefox remains a lean, fast, customizable browser that can hold its own against any competitor, especially with its graphics hardware acceleration. Version 7 adds much-desired memory usage trimming. – PCMagazine ( http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2349494,00.asp#fbid=xcx2wnb3dyP )

By the way… be careful what you tweet, and write…. the “vengeful librarians” are watching… do read Sarah Yin’s article here: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2395904,00.asp#fbid=gBAx1czPwy7

Sources:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2349494,00.asp#fbid=gBAx1czPwy7

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2396043,00.asp#fbid=gBAx1czPwy7