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Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo
For those of you looking to run Firefox on mobile devices: the
first Firefox 4 beta for mobile is available. "Firefox 4 Beta
includes Firefox Sync to create a seamless Web browsing experience between
desktop and mobile. With Firefox Sync, you can take your browsing history,
bookmarks, tabs, passwords and form-fill data with you anywhere so you
never have to retype passwords or long URLs again."
(Log in to post comments)
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 15:20 UTC (Fri) by dcbw (guest, #50562) [Link]
It's a hell of a lot better than Fennec 1.1. Now if only they'd fix the N900 Zoom button responsiveness to not lag 1 - 2 seconds after you press the button. They've still got a ways to go with direct responsiveness too (ie, when I swipe start moving immediately even if you're rendering). Still not snappy (or light) enough to replace MicroB for everyday stuff but I hope they get there.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 16:58 UTC (Fri) by clump (subscriber, #27801) [Link]
I've tried a build of Fennec prior to the announcement and it wasn't ready. Android's Chrome would be fine, except that advertisements are extremely obnoxious and invasive when browsing on a telephone screen.
Plugins will make the difference. Should I enjoy the same superb Adblock+/Flashblock experience with Firefox on Android that I do on PC's I'd be delighted.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 18:21 UTC (Fri) by knobunc (subscriber, #4678) [Link]
If you are rooted, AdFree Android is excellent for blocking ads in all apps and in any web browser (by fiddling the hosts file).
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 19:01 UTC (Fri) by bjacob (subscriber, #58566) [Link]
There's more to ad-blocking than just blocking hosts!
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 20:06 UTC (Fri) by knobunc (subscriber, #4678) [Link]
Yes... but blocking hosts kills most ads everywhere. I still want AdBlock in firefox. But AdFree Android is a great tool.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 8, 2010 18:38 UTC (Fri) by juanjux (guest, #11652) [Link]
If have root you can use Adfree. It just updates the hosts file.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 9, 2010 4:15 UTC (Sat) by JoeF (guest, #4486) [Link]
They need to seriously slim it down.
With 31MB, it is by far the biggest app on my phone (the B&N nook e-reader comes in second with 12MB.) And that's with the .apk being on the sd card.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 9, 2010 9:53 UTC (Sat) by maakuth (subscriber, #65492) [Link]
And the fact that it can't be installed on SD card certainly makes it worse. I for one don't have that much free space on my HTC Desire.
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 9, 2010 18:57 UTC (Sat) by matp75 (subscriber, #45699) [Link]
hello,
It seems since july android update(probably 2.2) version, apps are installable on the sd card on htc desire. my brother has one and it works for him. do you have an updated os ?
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 9, 2010 20:46 UTC (Sat) by JoeF (guest, #4486) [Link]
The app has to allow it, or you have to have the phone rooted.
I have my Nexus One rooted, and did put the Firefox on the sd card. But it still uses 31MB on the phone memory (it is 40something MB if you don't have it on the sd card.)
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 12, 2010 1:58 UTC (Tue) by jamesh (guest, #1159) [Link]
That would be due to the native code. Any shared libraries inside the APK container get extracted and stored on the phone's memory (in contrast to Dalvik byte code, that gets run directly from the APK file).
Android 2.2's support for moving apps to a memory card only applies to the APK file rather than shared libraries extracted from the APK (I guess they had problems getting it working on a FAT32 volume).
Firefox 4 beta for Android and Maemo Posted Oct 9, 2010 22:40 UTC (Sat) by kripkenstein (subscriber, #43281) [Link]
> They need to seriously slim it down.
Very true, and later releases should be better in that respect. See this link for some details about the issue:
http://limpet.net/mbrubeck/2010/10/04/why-fennec-is-diffe...
(specifically 'Installation size: Problems and solutions').
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