Mozilla’s Firefox Mobile browser has been one of the more popular browsers on the Android Market since its release. Considering its popularity in the desktop arena, this isn’t such a huge surprise, though it also just happens to be a useful and attractive browser. According to Ian Barlow of the Mozilla Mobile Team however, Firefox Mobile is about to get even better for tablet users. Barlow wrote on his blog that the team is preparing to release a major overhaul of the tablet-based browser, featuring upgrades in both function and aesthetics. These upgrades include themes, modifications to Mozilla’s unique “awesome bar”, and a beautiful remodeling of the browser’s tab system. All in all, its looking to be a very positive change in the app itself, and hopefully a good step for mainstream developers to add something to Android’s lacking tablet-centric app selection. Some pictures of Firefox Mobile in the flesh after the break!
Firefox looks right at home on Android 3.0, drawing its overall theme from Honeycomb’s minimalist design language. Of course, 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.
On Firefox for phones, we meticulously tucked away all of our UI elements to free up the screen for unrestricted browsing. On a tablet, the bigger screen let us to bring some of those helpful elements back onto the screen, like tabs, for example. In landscape mode, tabs exist in a persistent left bar, allowing for quicker browsing. You can switch through tabs with your left thumb, and scroll through web content with your right. In portrait mode, this tab bar gets rolled up into a menu item at the top of the screen, to free up browsing space below. 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.
