Firefox for Mobile Now Available on Nokia’s N900 Maemo Platform! [Default MicroB browser still better]

FireFox has announced that it is now available for the N900 and Maemo 5. It’s been available a while as a Beta but now it’s ready. I’ve found the default MicroB To download, point your N900’s browser over to firefox.com/m

Your N900 will add “Mozilla Catalogue” to app manager and it’ll proceed to  download and install the 12.8MB of Foxy goodness.

There are some nice little UI tweaks,

• such as zooming in to places of text entry, (like log in areas),

• the left swipe for tabs and
• right swipe for settings, back/forward, favourites (I love having a simple back/forward button on touch!)
• You also get Add ons.
• All tabs stay in this app (could be negative for some)
• “Awesome Bar”. Gets more awesome the more you use it.
• Not sure if some sites render better with FF, the only one that seems to be better with FireFox is Gmail and related google software. Not thoroughly checked though…
• Great password manager. Same as FF on desktop.

However…

I haven’t used this version much but I always moved back to the main browser during the Beta versions of Firefox.

The default MicroB on the N900 is just too good.

N900’s default MicroB vs FireFox

• Much smoother panning
• I think much faster
• Wider flash support (FireFox requires addon to watch YouTube)
• Spiral Zoom (it really does help fore precision zooming!!)
• Volume zoom (haven’t quite worked out how else to zoom other than tapping with FF)
• Each MicroB tab = 1 multitask window. You get a bigger thumbnail, title, and you won’t accidentally close several tabs.
• MicroB supports portrait browsing
• Typing with the keyboard automatically brings up address bar/search bar – you have to scroll back up with firefox.
• You can cut/copy/paste with MicroB
• On screen keyboard is temperemental at popping up on firefox.
• You can leave bookmark shortcuts on home screen with MicroB. FF bookmarks are in FF’s own homepage.

I would like to see a proper back button on the N900’s default browser. The panel of previously viewed pages is nice, but 99% of the time, I just want to press the back button and see the previous pages really quickly. [hardware keyboard is only option at moment]

Tags: FireFox, Maemo, Maemo 5, N900, Nokia, Nokia N900, Nseries

Category: Maemo, Nokia

Firefox for Mobile Now Available on Nokia’s N900 Maemo Platform! [Default MicroB browser still better]

FireFox has announced that it is now available for the N900 and Maemo 5. It’s been available a while as a Beta but now it’s ready. I’ve found the default MicroB To download, point your N900’s browser over to firefox.com/m

Your N900 will add “Mozilla Catalogue” to app manager and it’ll proceed to  download and install the 12.8MB of Foxy goodness.

There are some nice little UI tweaks,

• such as zooming in to places of text entry, (like log in areas),

• the left swipe for tabs and
• right swipe for settings, back/forward, favourites (I love having a simple back/forward button on touch!)
• You also get Add ons.
• All tabs stay in this app (could be negative for some)
• “Awesome Bar”. Gets more awesome the more you use it.
• Not sure if some sites render better with FF, the only one that seems to be better with FireFox is Gmail and related google software. Not thoroughly checked though…
• Great password manager. Same as FF on desktop.

However…

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Tags: FireFox, Maemo, Maemo 5, N900, Nokia, Nokia N900, Nseries

Category: Maemo, Nokia