Firefox 2.0 looks awesome

I spend a lot of my time on a computer; and a lot of that time is spent in a web browser. It’s important for me to have a nice experience in the place(s) I spend a lot of time… agreed? Well, the Mozilla team thinks so as well.

I don’t have many complaints (if any) over my current version of Firefox (1.5.0.7). It’s by far the best web browser I’m aware of. I like the ideas Flock brings to the table, but it might be too much for me. I don’t need any “blogging” tools and I’m happy with the del.icio.us bookmarklet extension (rather than the star in Flock). To be honest, I probably would use it more, but it was a little buggy when I tried it. I’m not sure if they’re out of beta yet, but that was the extent of my Flock experience. Firefox just feels more stable to me. But in the end it’s a personal choice, of course.

Anyway, back to the subject. The new Firefox adds so much more to an already sweet browser. Here are a few of the changes:

• Google suggest integrated into the search box
• Built-in textarea spellcheck (I really appreciate this one)
• Built-in advanced anti-phishing (lightbox-style notifications)
• Tracks your closed tabs and allows restoring (you can also specify to load previous session when opening—similar to Opera)
• Specify your RSS reader and then the little orange icon in the right of the address bar adds it in with one click (perfect!)
• Visual effects when hovering over tabs (plus a “X” to close on each tab)

I think these changes make sense. It’s not too much, but just enough. There is talk of this being released officially very soon. I’m always reluctant to be one of those early adopters, so I’ll keep waiting for the official release. Good stuff.