Firefox 2.0 Codenamed Bon Echo Released

    The first beta of Firefox 2.0, code-named Bon Echo, is available on official FTP for free access. Here are direct links to distributions for Windows (5.4 MB), Linux (8.9 MB), and Mac (17 MB). Localized versions of Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 in Russian are available from this page .

    Grammar checking in Firefox is approximately the same as in the MS Word text editor. Wrong spelled words are underlined by a red wavy line. When you click on such a word with the right mouse button, a context menu appears, where it is proposed to enter the word in the dictionary or replace it with another word ( screenshot ).

    In the new version of the browser, extensions and themes are combined under the general concept of " add-ons ". Thus, now it has become easier to manage and update them ( screenshot ).

    As developers announced in advance, the second version of Firefox will have the most popular extensions built into it that have proven their worth. A typical example is the tab recovery feature after a browser crash. Now, if the computer or browser freezes, then after restarting, you can open all the web pages that were opened in the browser directly at the time of “freezing” ( screenshot) Recently closed tabs are also listed in the History - Recently Closed Tabs menu, or you can simply right-click on any tab and select the “Undo Close Tab” command ( screenshot ) from the context menu .

    In the second version of the browser, it became much easier to manage the list of search engines that are available through the search panel. Now they can be easily edited: swap, delete and add new ones ( screenshot ). Right from the search panel, an autocomplete function similar to Google Suggest ( screenshot ) is now available .

    Another new feature is the anti-phishing filter, which was previously built into the Google Toolbar, and is now integrated directly into the browser ( screenshot) By default, Firefox checks the local list of dangerous sites without having to go to the Google server for this, but the settings can be changed ( screenshot ).

    It’s now easier to subscribe to feeds. By clicking on the orange icon in the address bar, you can now automatically add the feed to a third-party RSS reader: Outlook, MyYahoo, Bloglines or any other ( screenshot ). To change the default RSS reader, you need to edit your browser settings ( screenshot ).

    To test Bon Echo, it’s not at all necessary to abandon the current stable version of Firefox. The beta version of Firefox 2.0 copies itself to a different directory and does not try to become the default browser.

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