Firefox 20, released a couple of days ago, has just landed in all supported Ubuntu versions. The new Firefox version brings a few long-awaited features such as per-window private browsing and a new download manager.
Firefox 20 introduces per-window private browsing: accessing File > New Private Window, you'll get a window for private browsing that doesn't affect the other Firefox windows. In previous Firefox versions you couldn't have both a regular Firefox window and a private window open in the same time.
Private browsing lets you browse the web without saving information about the sites you visit, meaning the pages won't show up in the Firefox history, the passwords won't be saved, no downloads will be listed in the new Downloads Manager and also, no cookies of cached web content are saved. However, the website can still track you so you're not completely anonymous when using this feature.
With Firefox 20, there's also a new download manager. The downloads are no longer displayed in a separate window and instead, Firefox now uses a download button on the toolbar, which displays the remaining download time and when clicked, it lists the most recent downloads and lets you open the files.
Other changes in Firefox 20:
- ability to close hanging plugins, without the browser hanging;
- continued performance improvements for page loads, downloads, shutdown, etc.;
- new JavaScript Profiler tool;
- <canvas> now supports blend modes;
- various <audio> and <video> improvements;
- more.
The latest Firefox 20 has been uploaded to the official Ubuntu repositories today so if you're using Ubuntu, you should get an update in a few minutes / hours.
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