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Filed under: Mozilla, Browsers

Mozilla teases us with Firefox 4.0 mockups

Firefox 4.0 mockup
Mozilla drummed up a fair amount of interest in a future version of the Firefox web browser a few weeks ago by posting a mockup photo showing a handful of new features that could be included in Firefox 3.7. But the Firefox team is looking even further ahead. Yesterday a few images of a Firefox 4.0 mockup hit the Mozilla Wiki.

One image shows a Google Chrome-like tab menu which actually hangs out above the navigation bar. This layout saves space, providing you with more room for the browser window. But it also involves removing the page title bar.

Another concept shows a combination stop/refresh/go button attached to the location bar. When you're typing a URL, you'll see a green arrow button that you can hit to visit the URL in question. While a page is still loading, you'll see a red X button that you can hit to stop the page from loading. And when you're already on a web site, it'll show a refresh arrow.

These are just concepts at the moment, and may or may not eventually make their way into the web browser.

[via CNet]

Filed under: Microsoft

Leaked docs provide a hint of how the Microsoft Retail stores could look

Microsoft Store concept
Microsoft is expected to launch a chain of retail stores in the not-too-distant future. If I had to guess, I'd say the stores will probably look like a software-heavy cross between a Best Buy and an Apple store. But the folks at Gizmodo got their hands on a leaked PowerPoint presentation that includes a number of concept designs for the store. Some of these concepts may eventually be included in the actual stores, while others may be nothing other than big ideas that'll be ready for the public around the same time as Duke Nukem Forever.

The documents depict a store that will focus on Microsoft hardware like the Xbox 360 and Surface tables, as well as software including Windows 7 and Windows Mobile. There's also a heavy emphasis in the slides on PCTV,which is a clever way of re-branding Windows Media Center as a primarily TV-focused interactive media component of Windows 7.

Microsoft has kind of downplayed Windows Media Center features over the last few years. I'm guessing that's because PC users flocked to internet video sites that let you watch media in a web browser, making the concept of a full-screen interface for local and internet media, as well as live TV from a TV tuner more of a niche product.

I'm hoping that the focus on PCTV in these slides means that Microsoft plans to add new internet content to Windows Media Center to make it a viable alternative to firing up the web browser. In fact, some of the slides show an Internet TV screen complete with Hulu. Right now there is no official Hulu plugin for Windows Media Center.

Filed under: Mozilla, Browsers

Could the future of Firefox be a browser without tabs?

Firefox without tabs mockup
The people behind the Firefox web browser have been thinking long and hard about the way it handles browser tabs for a few months now. Most of the discussion has centered around how new tabs should behave. Should they show a blank screen? RSS updates? A list of frequently visited pages? But one developer has a novel idea: what if Firefox didn't have any tabs at all?

Yeah, I know what you're thinking. Once upon a time Firefox, Internet Explorer, and all the other browsers didn't have tabs. Life has become much simpler since tabs were invented. But developer Oliver Reichenstein says browser tabs worked well back when we'd only have a few web pages open at a time. Now that it's not uncommon for users to have a dozen or more tabs, it's increasingly difficult to tell what's going on in the browser tab bar or find the tab you're looking for.

Reichenstein created a mockup of a version of Firefox that looks a lot like iTunes. Instead of tabs and bookmarks, you could tag web pages to make it easy to sort or search for pages by category. Each time you click on a link it would take you to the page as you last visited it.

Somehow I doubt we'll see Mozilla take this radical a departure from the common browser tab in time for the launch of Firefox 3.5. But perhaps a no-tab interface could be available as an option in future builds.

[via ReadWriteWeb]

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