Our most popular Mozilla User Experience designer, Alex Faaborg, has updated his blog with a post detailing some of the visual improvements in Firefox 3.5.

The visual refresh touches some well spotted UI elements, such as the glyphs used to switch tabs, scroll through tabs (if overflown), and the new tab button. Another change specifically for Mac (but considered for Windows) is the removal of the etch behind the back/forward combo (keyhole). On Linux the plug-in icon has changed, and they are considering more changes related to the sizes in default GNOME themes.

All these changes are minor, major changes are expected in Firefox 4, where more will be done to integrate it with the different platforms (especially Windows Vista/7).

The upcoming Firefox 3.5 release is quite an important one. Not only does it include features like private browsing, but also TraceMonkey to speed up JavaScript, a faster way of rendering pages, color profile support (on by default, with performance enhancements) and many more changes. Alex Faaborg, User Experience Designer at Mozilla, therefor wants to alter the icon of Firefox, to show the internal changes externally.

Currently the new icon is in iteration 5 and sports the fox with a much spikeyer tail, while reducing a bit of furryness compared with previous iterations.

The new icon is based on work done previously by Jon Hicks (working at Opera now), Stephen Horlander and Anthony Piraino (The Iconfactory). And as will almost all icons at Mozilla, it looks quite good (yes Opera, you should use a new icon, right now, after all these years of hearing complains about it).

Of course artwork doesn't end with a new icon/logo just yet. For Firefox 4 better system integration is a priority, especially the current looks are not top-notch when using Windows Vista/7.

While the Western parts of the world seem to have settled between Internet Explorer and Firefox, the central and eastern part of Europe think differently.

Recent reports from both camps indicate that at least one party is on the losing side, Microsoft's Internet Explorer is clearly not popular there. Some weeks ago David Storey, from Opera Software, made a nice post with an SVG image on the Central and Eastern European market shares per country. In some countries Opera has a market share of up to 49%, and for instance Russia stands on 38%.

Now Firefox is also in the game for Central and Eastern Europe, and recent numbers show that Latvia has joined the 50+% barrier, following Macedonia, Poland, Bosnia, Slovenia, and Slovakia. Runner ups are Finland and Hungary, which are both in the high forties already.

Now if the Western world would pay more close attention...

One of the key elements that has made Firefox so immensely popular is the support by the community. Unlike any other browser (vendor) out there Mozilla created Spread Firefox, a site dedicated to those who promote the Firefox web browser.

With the release of Firefox 3.5 slowly approaching and increasing competition (Chrome, Safari) it was time to boost the community face of Firefox. The new Spread Firefox has a clean design which allows easy access to stuff that matters, such as: discussions, running projects, community pictures, and of course ways to help.

Anyway, congrats to the folks at Mozilla for creating yet another pretty web site (compared with the previous version). And competitors (Choose Opera?), watch and learn from the masters :)

Besides a security update, Mozilla the fourth beta of Firefox 3.5 (previously 3.1), which will be the next major release this year for the most ferocious rebel browser in the world.

The fourth and final beta, before we see release candidates, sports a new feature, which allows you to restore Firefox windows next to restoring tabs. Other changes include polishing of the user interface for private browsing mode, which now integrates nicely with the settings for history.

If you've forgotten, or haven't followed the latest and greatest Firefox betas, 3.5 comes with: a faster JavaScript engine named TraceMonkey (similar in performance to Chrome's V8 and Safari's Nitro), private browsing mode (for anonymous browsing, without interfering with cache/history), geolocation, native JSON, web worker threads, faster page rendering, increased standards support (including web fonts), and much much more.

Of course it remains a beta, but Firefox 3.5 looks to become a solid evolution and eager users and web developers are invited to test this release.

Quick on the heels of Firefox 3.0.9 there is 3.0.10, which was released with a sole purpose: security. If you ever think Mozilla doesn't take security seriously, here's proof that they do.

The critical security issue has popped-up in 3.0.9 and concerns a crash in nsTextFrame::ClearTextRun(). Mostly users of the HTML Validator add-on were affected as it caused memory corruption similar to a previous security bug.

As always this is a recommended update for all Firefox users and can be obtained through Help -> Check for Updates if it has not yet appeared automatically.

Following Mozilla's release plan of regular updates, the ninth maintenance release of Firefox 3 is here. Packaged with security and stability fixes by default, it also contains some other fixes and is a recommended download for all Firefox users.

With nine security fixes it is a heavy load, even though Firefox 3.0.8 was released prematurely for security reasons. However only one is deemed critical and involves memory corruption. Two high issues revolve around same-origin violations using XMLHttpRequest, XPCNativeWrapper.toString() and Adobe Flash.

Besides security it also includes stability fixes and addresses several other issues, such as: a corrupted local database leading to the loss of cookies, inline image attachments not appearing with popular web mail clients, sometimes long forms take longer to submit, and more.

You can download the full binary from Mozilla's site, or if not done automatically, trigger the auto-update system using Help > Check for Updates (except Linux users depending on repositories).

Google has introduced their take on a 3D API for the web, named O3D. Although still early in development, it does show potential.

Of course Google does introduce some friction, as Khronos (of OpenGL fame) with Mozilla is already working on an open 3D API for the web. Khronos is considering OpenGL (ES) within ECMAScript, while Google uses their own API defined in JavaScript with the help of the O3D plug-in. The O3D plug-in in turn uses OpenGL or Direct3D to render graphics with the GPU processing power on your screen. Of course a fast JavaScript engine is very welcome in this case, such as V8, Nitro or TraceMonkey.

Best of all is of course that Google seems to be a few steps ahead and the first preview of O3D is available, including developer documentation, plug-ins for Camino, Chrome, Firefox, Safari (Mac only) and Internet Explorer (no Opera?) for Windows, Linux and Mac. There are some hardware requirements, such as a graphics card with DX9 (or higher) support (VS2.0 and PS2.0 support) for Windows or an Intel Mac. A few samples are available to see what's possible on their web site, waiting for you.

Go ahead and explore Google's latest experiment!

The first draft document of things to come for Firefox.next has appeared. Of course Firefox 3.5 (previously 3.1) isn't here yet, but it's at a stage that huge new features cannot be added, and that's where Namoroka comes in.

Let's first say that Namoroka's release is not yet determined to be Firefox 3.6 per se, it could end as Firefox 4. Therefor Mozilla likes to refer to it either by its code name or by saying Firefox.next.

Performance is a point of focus for this release, but this doesn't mean just JavaScript or rendering, it also means responsiveness (opening new tabs, etc.) and start-up time. With regards to personalization and customization Mozilla tends to ease the way for installing and managing customizations, no restarts (for light add-ons) and adaptive user interface elements. Other improvements are in the areas of task based browsing, web based application support and improved system integration.

When should you expect the first glimpse? Early-to-mid 2010.