Firefox 4 Beta updated, adds Sync and Panorama

New features ready and waiting to be downloaded and tried


24 August 2010 20:48 GMT / By Stuart Miles

As Mozilla continues to update its Firefox 4 browser, it continues to add new features, two of which we got on Tuesday.

The new features - Sync and Panorama - are coming to both PC and Mac users of the internet browser and are looking to change the way you browse on a day to day basis.

"This release lets you own and control your personal Web experience by syncing your data across devices, and by helping you organize your tabs in order to juggle and prioritize your busy online life", says Mike Beltzner from the Firefox team.

Firefox Sync will let Firefox make you bookmarks, history, Awesome Bar, passwords, form-fill data and open tabs accessible across multiple computers and mobile devices all at the press of a couple of buttons.

"Firefox Sync encrypts all of your data before sending it to the server and does not track your travels throughout the Web. This means that you never have to compromise your privacy for the convenience of using Firefox Sync", says Beltzner hoping to reassure those worried about the privacy issues of such a service.

When downloading or updating to the latest version of the Firefox 4 beta, you will automatically be prompted to create a Firefox Sync account and then off you go backing up your data to the cloud.

 

Firefox Panorama: How To from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

 

Firefox Panorama is a further play on the way people use tabs and a new approach to managing them all - yes "Mr I have 25 tabs open right now" we are talking to you on this one.

The idea with Panorama is that if you juggle many open tabs for work, shopping, music, social sites, vacation planning and more, you can easily group and prioritize those tabs any way you want.

"With one keystroke you can see an overview of all tabs to quickly locate and switch between tabs or groups of tabs", Beltzner says.

Firefox 4 Beta testers will receive automatic updates, so stay tuned for the next release in the coming weeks.

Via: blog.mozilla.com

Full tags
Software, PC software, Mac software, Browsers, Firefox, Mozilla, Mozilla Foundation

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