Less than two months ago, Mozilla announced a renewal for the Firefox the browser that, until seven years ago, was the favorite of everyone who did not use Safari (on Mac) or Internet Explore (on PCs) and was quickly supplanted by the formidable beast called Google Chrome. The idea was to make the browser lighter and faster, dispelling the image of a "stupid workhorse" that Firefox has acquired in recent years, and who knows how to win back a portion of the public that abandoned it.
Now, version 57 of the browser is so different that it has even been given a special name: Firefox Quantum is officially available for download.
Starting with performance and performance improvements, Mozilla claims that the new Firefox uses 30% less memory than Chrome; the architecture of multiple processes allows the content of each tab to be loaded independently (in this way, if one of the open pages “breaks”, it is not necessary to restart the browser). Speaking in this way, it does not seem that there is anything new Safari and Chrome itself have worked like this for years. The difference that Mozilla promises here is an intelligent process delegation system that joins multiple tabs under the same “roof” and thus saves memory.
In terms of visual novelties, version 57 of the browser gained a storefront and is more "flat", clean and square, following all the design trends of 2017. Some interesting features added here include a native tool for taking screenshots of pages , a renewed library of history and favorites, and a feature that decreases the tracking requests of the websites visited, increasing the page loading speed. The version also supports WebVR technology, for sites that want to enter the world of virtual reality.
It is worth noting that, due to the profound changes, some of the extensions for the browser, those written in XUL, stopped working in the new version and are now called “Legacy Extensions”. Firefox will indicate to the user a close alternative so that he does not run out of functionality.
Firefox Quantum is now available for download for users of macOS, Windows and Linux. Anyone who already has the browser downloaded will receive the update automatically. Those who have already tried it can leave their experiences below in the comments and say: there is still a chance for Fire Fox regain its relevance?
