Posted: June 5, 2011/Under: Internet/By: My Digital Life Editorial Team

After releasing Firefox 5 as Beta, Mozilla has officially pushed Firefox 6 into Aurora channel. Aurora channel is meant for adventurous who wants to use the advanced version of Firefox web browser, and expect some level of stability even though the software is still in development. For past one month, Firefox 5 had stayed in alpha phase and released as nightly builds.

Firefox 5 include several new features according to Mozilla blog, which provide end-users and web developers more control over browsing and development environments while improving overall performance. Features for end-users include:

  • Data Management Window is an experimental feature that provides control over the the access that specific websites have to your browsing data, including cookies, passwords and location information. To start testing this feature type “about:permissions” in the Awesome Bar (URL Bar).

    Firefox 6

  • Add-ons Manager with Plugin Check quickly verifies the compatibility of installed plugins directly from the Add-Ons Manager.
  • Panorama Groups on Demand improves browser startup time and overall experience by allowing power Panorama users to load saved tab groups only when using Panorama.

Features for web developers include:

  • The Scratchpad lets developers quickly build and test JavaScript snippets in the browser.

    Firefox 6 Developer Features

  • Web Console adds the ability to move the console to other parts of the window or break out into a separate window.
  • Web Developer Menu provides access to developer tools from the Firefox Aurora Menu Button.

Current users of Firefox Aurora will get automatic update notification to upgrade to Firefox Aurora 6. Else, user can go to “About Aurora” menu and select “Apply update manually”. Apprently, Firefox Aurora 6 does not have 64-bit (x64) version available for Windows platform, even though it’s available while in nightly builds channel.

Download Firefox Aurora 6 from http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/channel/

With the promotion of Firefox 6 to Aurora channel, Firefox 7 has also met the world for the first time. Firefox 7 is available in nightly builds channel, and it’s available in both 32-bit (x86) and 64-bit (x64) Windows operating system.

Download Firefox Nightly Builds 7 from http://nightly.mozilla.org/

All Firefox versions are available for Windows, Mac OS and Linux.

Firefox Aurora 6 is expected to be promoted to Firefox Beta 6 by early July after Firefox Beta 5 is released as stable version by late June. As such, Firefox 7 may be already in beta status by mid July. Considering the speed of Firefox rapid development cycle, we may even get Firefox 8, Firefox 9 and Firefox 10 by end of 2011.

Update: Firefox 6

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