Mozilla this week provided a glimpse into its Firefox browser strategy for tablets.
"Firefox for tablets is an evolution of its phone based predecessor, with some added enhancements that take advantage of a tablet’s larger screen size," Ian Barlow, a designer on the Mozilla team, said in a blog post .
Barlow said his team has been "working tirelessly" to make sure Firefox looks "awesome" on tablets, and that includes putting a spin on Firefox staples like themes, the Awesomebar, and tabs.
The Firefox browser has been optimized for the tablet-specific Android 3.0. The overall theme is drawn "from Honeycomb’s minimalist design language," Barlow said, but "this is still Firefox, so we’ve made sure to keep familiar visual elements in place, like our signature big back button and a distinctive tab shape."
The Awesomebar (above) retains its tabbed menu for quick access to bookmarks, history, and synced desktop activity. On the tablet, however, these tabs are on the left-hand side, which Barlow said "makes them easier to reach and increases the number of results that can be displayed above the keyboard."
Full browser tabs, meanwhile, will display differently depending on which way you're holding your tablet. In landscape mode, the tabs will show up in a persistent left bar that you can thumb through and quickly access. In portrait mode, there will be a little menu option next to the URL box, which drops down and lets you switch between tabs. Click right for a larger image.
"So whether you like keeping lots of tabs open and quickly switching back and forth between them, or if you prefer to just open a page and see nothing else on the screen, Firefox has you covered," Barlow said.
This approach differs from Firefox for phones, where "we meticulously tucked away all of our UI elements to free up the screen for unrestricted browsing," Barlow said.
Mozilla recently switched to a more frequent release cycle and just unveiled Firefox 6. There was some controversy over whether the browser was going to lose its version numbers, meanwhile, but developers said they will remain , for now. For more, see PCMag's full review of Firefox 6 and the slideshow below.
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