The fifth public alpha build of Firefox 3 has been officially released. The new alpha build, which is codenamed Gran Paradiso, features early components of the revamped Places system, a cohesive storage framework that will unify bookmark and history storage. An earlier prototype of the Places system was tested in early Firefox 2 alpha (Bon Echo) builds but was removed because it couldn't be completed within the Firefox 2 release timeframe.

The current implementation of the Places system is still a work in progress, but the final version will support features like bookmark tagging, full-text indexing, extended metadata search, built-in syncing functionality, and support for exporting bookmarks in a broader number of formats. The Places user interface hasn't been developed yet, so there really aren't any aspects of the Places system that are visually apparent in the alpha 5 build. This alpha release primarily incorporates infrastructure elements of the Places system. In particular, alpha 5 migrates bookmark storage from the current XML data format to the SQLite-based MozStorage system. Bookmarks can now be found in the places.sqlite file in Firefox profile directories.

Firefox 3 alpha 5 also features a new password manager. Firefox developer Justin Dolske has ported much of the C++ code used in the previous password manager to JavaScript and increased the component's modularity to facilitate support for alternate backends. "These changes should now make it much easier to write a component integrating Login Manager with the OS X Keychain (or the Gnome Keychain, or whatever)," says Dolske in a blog entry.









Firefox 3 bookmark tagging mockup

An assortment of new minor features are also included in Firefox 3 alpha 5. A new crash reporting system called Breakpad is now available in some Mac OS X and Windows builds but is not yet supported on Linux. Support for the Growl notification framework and native controls are also available in Firefox 3 alpha 5 builds for Mac OS X.

One of the most significant features in Firefox 3 is Gecko 1.9, a vastly improved Cairo-based HTML rendering engine. As we reported in our early review of the first Firefox 3 alpha, Gecko 1.9 can pass the Acid 2 test, a CSS test case developed by the Web Standards Project to illuminate flaws in HTML/CSS rendering engines. Support for Cairo-based rendering in Gecko 1.9 also ensures higher quality SVG rendering.

Gran Paradiso alpha 5 source code and binary builds for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux are available for download from the Mozilla.org web site, but users should keep in mind that Firefox alpha builds are primarily intended for testing and debugging rather than regular use. The compressed Bz2 archive containing the Gran Paradiso alpha 5 build and associated files for Linux is about 8.6 MB, but it expands to about 25 MB after decompression. As usual, we recommend caution when testing alpha software.

Users should back up their Firefox configuration directories and create alternate profiles for use with alpha builds. When testing the alpha 5 release, users should keep in mind that the bookmarks.html file is migrated to the places.sqlite file only once. If you are using the same profile with Firefox 2.x and a Firefox 3 alpha (which is probably not a good idea), bookmarks added with one version won't be accessible by the other after the initial conversion.

The official Firefox 3 schedule does not include an anticipated release date for Firefox 3. One more alpha release is expected to occur at the end of this month which will incorporate most of the features planned for inclusion in Firefox 3. The first beta release will occur in late July following the final feature and user interface freeze, and a second beta is planned for September. After the second beta release, additional betas and release candidates will be released as needed until the final Firefox 3 release.

With support for Gecko 1.9 and the long-anticipated Places system, Firefox 3 promises to be a powerful and impressive release. Firefox market share continues to climb and is currently estimated at anywhere between 12 and 20 percent by various sources. The addition of compelling new features in Firefox 3 should help Firefox's ascent.