Mozilla Drops Firefox 68 For Desktop And iOS With Improved Extension Support And Dark Mode
Firefox users have spoken up and Mozilla has listened. Firefox 68 is available today for iOS and desktop, with the new update including a number of features like dark mode for Firefox Reader View, new extensions and bookmark editing, and more options for IT professionals.
Firefox or “Firefox Quantum” desktop and iOS users can now enjoy “blackout shades” in Firefox Reader View. Reader View strips away extras like advertisements and allows users to alter the size and color of a page’s text. Before this update, “dark mode” only affected the text. Now dark mode will apply to all sections of a page, including sidebars and images.
Mozilla has also created a list of “Firefox Recommended Extensions”. These extensions have been reviewed for security and can be found under the Firefox Add-ons Manager. Users will also be able to more easily report harmful or broken extensions. This past spring, Firefox temporarily broke add-ons and then pushed a temporary fix that collected telemetry data. It appears that Mozilla was much more focused on extensions security and usefulness with this update.
Mozilla has made a few changes based specifically off of the requests of iOS users. Firefox for iOS now includes bookmark editing. Users will be able to reorder and update the names of their bookmarks. iOS users can also set certain sites to always open in desktop mode. Any site that is being displayed in desktop mode will include a handy identifier badge.
Last but not least, IT professionals can now add a support menu so that they can easily communicate with their team and other coworkers. They will also be able to remove or highlight certain tabs and turn-off search suggestions. These kinds of practices are essential in midsize to large businesses.
Firefox 67 was released this past May and contained a major security vulnerability. According to Mozilla “ a type confusion vulnerability can occur when manipulating JavaScript objects due to issues in Array.pop. This can allow for an exploitable crash.” Hackers could have potentially installed malware on users’ devices. Although the vulnerability was not discovered for a few weeks, it was immediately patched once it was found. Let’s hope that no such vulnerability appears in Firefox 68.
Firefox or “Firefox Quantum” desktop and iOS users can now enjoy “blackout shades” in Firefox Reader View. Reader View strips away extras like advertisements and allows users to alter the size and color of a page’s text. Before this update, “dark mode” only affected the text. Now dark mode will apply to all sections of a page, including sidebars and images.
Mozilla has also created a list of “Firefox Recommended Extensions”. These extensions have been reviewed for security and can be found under the Firefox Add-ons Manager. Users will also be able to more easily report harmful or broken extensions. This past spring, Firefox temporarily broke add-ons and then pushed a temporary fix that collected telemetry data. It appears that Mozilla was much more focused on extensions security and usefulness with this update.
Mozilla has made a few changes based specifically off of the requests of iOS users. Firefox for iOS now includes bookmark editing. Users will be able to reorder and update the names of their bookmarks. iOS users can also set certain sites to always open in desktop mode. Any site that is being displayed in desktop mode will include a handy identifier badge.
Firefox 68 dark mode, Image via Mozilla Blog
Last but not least, IT professionals can now add a support menu so that they can easily communicate with their team and other coworkers. They will also be able to remove or highlight certain tabs and turn-off search suggestions. These kinds of practices are essential in midsize to large businesses.
Firefox 67 was released this past May and contained a major security vulnerability. According to Mozilla “ a type confusion vulnerability can occur when manipulating JavaScript objects due to issues in Array.pop. This can allow for an exploitable crash.” Hackers could have potentially installed malware on users’ devices. Although the vulnerability was not discovered for a few weeks, it was immediately patched once it was found. Let’s hope that no such vulnerability appears in Firefox 68.
