By Lee Dobbins
Internet-users all over the world undoubtedly get familiar with Mozilla Firefox, a free and open source web browser descended from the Mozilla Application Suite and managed by Mozilla Corporation.
As of March 2011, Firefox is the second most widely used browser with approximately 30% of worldwide usage share of web browsers. However, few people know in detail great achievements Firefox has achieved since it set a Guinness Record in 2008 thanks to more than 8 million unique Firefox 3 downloads within the release day.
Recently, the tech world has warmly welcomed the Firefox 4.0 and expected the launch of Firefox 5, 6 and 7 in 2011.
Now, let's discover some interesting facts about the Firefox.
Mozilla Firefox 4.0
As soon as the Firefox 4.0 was released on Tuesday, March 22, 2011, it has a tremendous amount of downloads
Within just a few short time hours after being released, Mozilla Firefox 4 had been downloaded more than a million times. Particularly, it had nearly 6 million downloads, compared to Internet Explorer 9’s 2.3 million downloads at the end of the first day’s launch.
Mozilla Firefox 4 had a good start with nearly 6 million downloads within the first 24 hours
Mozilla Firefox 4 retains great new features including a simplified interface with the new orange Firefox button (Windows only), pinned tabs for easy access to Web apps, tracking protection, and sync for bookmarks, history and passwords
It also has a faster JavaScript rendering engine, hardware acceleration support and synchronization capabilities
Version 3.0
Mozilla Firefox 3, which was launched on June 17, 2008 and used version 1.9 of the Mozilla Gecko layout engine for displaying web pages, made a Guinness World Record with more than 8 million unique downloads on the first day of release.
The Mozilla Firefox 3 fixed many bugs, enhanced standard compliance and performed new web APIs
It also featured a redesigned download manager, a new "Places" system for storing bookmarks and history, and separate themes for different operating systems
History of Firefox
The Firefox project has been changed its names several times. It was renamed from “Phoenix” to “Firebird” because of trademark issues with Phoenix Technologies. Mozilla Firebird then became Mozilla Firefox on February 9, 2004.
Logo of the Firefox project through the time
About the Author:
I am a web developer. I love technology and have a passion of writing articles about technology news, especially new products.
Articles Source: Interesting Facts About Firefox You May Not Know
