Firefox Mobile coming "within weeks"

 

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By Barry Collins

Posted on 7 Oct 2008 at 13:39

The first alphas of the mobile version of Firefox should appear within weeks.

A video demonstration released earlier this year revealed a radical looking prototype of the Firefox Mobile browser.

Now Mozilla says the browser could be ready for testing before the year is out. "We want to make sure that the web on mobile is more like the web than what the mobile industry offers today, which is closed, separate networks and not a very good information-getting experience for the user," CEO John Lily, claimed in an interview with Mercury News.

"The first thing is to bring Firefox to mobile devices. We're working on that and we'll see some alphas in a few weeks."

The prototype browser banished the normal browser buttons (Back, Forward etc) from the viewing window, devoting the entire display to the web page. Controls are accessed by dragging the page to the far left.

Similarly, users return to the main browser window by physically flicking the page to the right with their finger, as if they are tearing out the page in a magazine.

The Firefox Mobile prototype centered purely on touchscreen controls. Whether Mozilla will also make a browser for non-touch devices awaits to be seen.