Firefox 10 is scheduled to release on 31st January 2012. It will be the first update for Mozilla Firefox in the year 2012. Firefox 10 will have many new features for the end-users and developers, and will solve one major issue related with the add-ons.

Add-ons Default to Compatible

On every new version release, Firefox users face a serious problem. Many add-ons fail to remain compatible with the latest version of the Firefox. In reality, most of the add-ons work smoothly with the newer versions but as they have not been checked and marked “compatible” by the respective developers, these add-ons get disabled. This results into frustration for the add-on users.

Firefox add-ons are used by over 85% Firefox users, and the add-ons compatibility is one major issue still pending with the Firefox. Although, there are tricks to bypass compatibility checks and modify add-on files to work with the future Firefox versions – an end user has to miss some of the favorite add-ons on every update.

Now, Mozilla team has addressed this issue and Firefox 10 will get an important feature to solve the compatibility problems. Starting with Firefox 10, most of the add-ons will automatically be compatible with the future versions of Firefox. This will not include several types of add-ons like those having binary component, marked to follow strict compatibility checking by the developer, tested and determined to not be compatible with any specific version of Firefox etc. Future releases of Firefox will be able to self-test add-ons for compatibility issues to enable or disable add-ons accordingly.

Dynamic Forward Button

The most visible feature of Firefox 10 is the dynamic forward button, which disappears when there is no page to forward to:

Easier Sync Setup process

Starting with Firefox 10, the built-in sync feature of Firefox will have an easier setup process, which will not require user’s desktop computer for adding new devices like Android phone or tablet.

New Developer Tools

Along with the above features, Firefox 10 adds many new built-in developer tools for the web developers; like Page Inspector & Style Inspector, CSS3 3D, Scratchpad with Orion Code Editor and Full Screen API. The page/style inspector can be launched from the context menu (right-click menu).

You will notice many new features in these developer tools in future releases. As the built-in developer tools are getting powerful features, we hope that the dependency on Firebug will reduce.

    Related: Firebug May Die Soon!

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