Firefox 3.0 is Coming on Tuesday, 17 June 2008

Mozilla Developer Center made the announcement on 11 June, saying, “After more than 34 months of active development, and with the contributions of thousands, we’re proud to announce that we’re ready. It is our expectation to ship Firefox 3 this upcoming Tuesday, June 17^th”.

Coinciding with this event, Mozilla is also pursuing a campaign to hit Guinness World Record for the most software downloads in 24 hours.

Remember, however, if you want your participation to be counted in the “Download Day" campaign, you must download the complete version of Firefox 3.0. Updating your previous versions from beta or release candidates will not make your action officially counted. Moreover, if you are serious on taking part in this “would be” record event; you can simply hop to Download Day Headquarters. You will also receive a customized certificate by downloading your Firefox 3.0 copy from this site.

But why would I download the new version?

Well, reports revealed the new version has more than 15,000 improvements. Firefox 3.0 is faster, safer and smarter than before. In fact, Firefox 3.0 is already enjoying nearly 1.3M in total pledges from around the world, as of this post, due to these anticipated features.

What do you think?

I guess, this is going to be extremely exciting for Firefox fanatics like us.

Well folks, go ahead, calendar this day and be among the first few recipients of these new and powerful improvements of the web’s best browser.

Oh YES! Do something good. Spread the word and help other people enjoy web surfing to the next level.

NOTE:Time is fixed on Tuesday, June 17, 2008 at 10:00 AM San Francisco time, i.e. Wednesday, June 18, 2008 at 1:00 AM Manila, Philippines time.

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Group Chatting in Gmail's GTalk?

Yes! Recently, Google has included a new feature to their Gmail webmail service. Gmail now wires in a "Group Chat" capability inside the email client via GTalk. The newly added goody lets you chat with many friends at once in a single window, a feature very much present and have been very useful in Yahoo group chatting long time ago. One thing unique in the application, though, is that anyone involved in the chat can invite any other member to the group chat. There is also no limit to the number of people you can chat with. Moreover, enhanced emoticons have also been added to make the chatting experience more bubbly and lively.

To initiate a group chat, click "Group chat" from the "Options" tab in the lower left corner of the chat interface when chatting. Enter the names of the people you want to add, and, bingo, you are in your very own chat room. All the familiar features such as chat archiving and taking the chat off the record still work as well.

According to gmailblog writer Sergey Solyanik, these features only work with the latest version of Gmail, which they are still rolling out to IE6, international and Google Apps users.

Although people always expect a lot of things from Google whenever they launch a new product, these new features seem to be “million miles” behind when compared to Yahoo’s YM and other popular chat applications. However, as they say, better late than never.

For a Gmail fanatic like me, I find this development rather totally disappointing. Primarily because I am looking for unique features or breakthrough applications in chatting which other contenders, like YM and MSN Messenger, have not yet implemented.

I don’t know. Maybe I was just craving for too much.

What do you think?

Do you like these new GTalk chatting features?

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Happy weekend!

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Are You Ready for Gmail v2.0?

Nearly 44 months ago since Gmail first surfaced online. I got my free account roughly 38 months ago, though. Throughout this period, this blockbuster webmail application has remained in beta-testing status. Recently, however (sometime late October or early November this year), I have been receiving feeds that, finally, Google is gearing to release Gmail v2.0, although I hardly recall if there was ever a launch for v1.0. Nevertheless, it is still something to look forward to for passionate Gmailers like myself.

So, what are the reported new features then?

I found a comprehensive review about this release from googlesystem blogsite. After reading this review, I went on to see if my account is already active with all the features that have been mentioned.

So far, I am convinced that it loads faster than the “previous version”, although I still find some slower performance each time I get to load the inbox interface. Once the interface is loaded, however, it simply works like a charm for the pre-fetched emails and other known new features.

The best new feature IMHO is the integration of IM networks (with option to select from Gtalk, AIM, Yahoo, MSN, ICQ, & Jabber). I haven’t tried it, though, but since it is clearly visible in the new Contact Manager module, I guess it is going to be one of the new killer applications Gmail v2.0 would be very popular about.

What is my general impression?

Google has made important changes in its Newer version of Gmail, but its too early to provide general comment/s on its performance.

Now, are you ready to switch? Go ahead and load your mail interface and see for yourself if you are one of the privileged few who can start playing around with Gmail v2.0.

Tips:

1. You have the new version if you can see a link to an "older version" at the top of the page (as shown in the image below), which means you can enjoy the new features: mail pre-fetching, updated contact manager and other small updates.
   
2. If you don’t see the "magic word" in tip #1 try loading this link: https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2
   

What do you think?

If you find this post useful, kindly leave your comment/s and rate the entry.

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