Mozilla releases the second alpha of the mobile version of Firefox for Windows Mobile 6 platform, supplying touch-screen support and other mobile functionality. Mozilla Firefox has been gaining enterprise browser share, although Microsoft Internet Explorer continues to hold a majority share of the enterprise market.Mozilla has released the second alpha of its mobile version of Firefox for Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6 platform. Code-named Fennec,
the June 28 release is intended for testing purposes, and applies the Firefox design
principles to mobile functionality such as touch-screen support.
Besides engaging Mozilla community teams and testing the user experience,
the release is intended to solicit feedback from Web developers and
"encourage add-on developers to port existing add-ons and invent new ones
for mobile," said a release note accompanying the download on the Mozilla Website.
"This Windows Mobile alpha release continues to focus on stability,
performance and integration with the Windows Mobile OS," the note
continued. "This version also includes numerous fixes and our new [shiny]
theme."
Other features new to the second alpha include a built-in JavaScript error
console, and improved add-on support and panning performance. Also present are
security features such as instant Website ID, a password manager, a popup
blocker and the ability to clear private data.
In addition, the new version builds on the feature set of the previous
releases, including a smart URL bar, tabbed browsing with thumbnail images,
bookmarks, integrated Web search built into the URL bar and access to multiple
search engines.
Mozilla has been recently expanding its share of the U.S.
browser market.
In April, a research report by Forrester found that Firefox had been steadily gaining market share in the
enterprise desktop browser market, although Microsoft Internet Explorer 6
and 7 continued to take the top two spots. Google Chrome and Apple Safari have
also been seeing adoption by business users.
That survey, which drew its data from a pool of 51,913 enterprise client
users, found that Microsoft's overall share of the enterprise browser market
stood at 78.0 percent in December 2008. At that time, Mozilla Firefox had 18.2
percent, a gain of 1.3 percent over a six-month period.
The accompanying Forrester report found that the enterprise is often
reluctant to upgrade its browsers for a variety of reasons, including IT
administrators' fears that new versions of browsers could have security and
compliance issues, as well as a lack of internal pressure to support particular
browsers.
Mozilla Firefox 3.5 Beta 4, released on April 27, included
new features such as Private Browsing Mode and support for JSON and Web worker
threads.
Mobile & Wireless 
