Given all the press surrounding Windows 8’s preliminary browser wars, Mozilla seems to be lagging slightly in getting their program ready for release. Windows 8-optimized Chrome has been available for months at this point (though how optimized it actually is can be easily questioned) and Internet Explorer 10 is obviously nearly finalized aside from the necessary update schedule modifications. Still, with a few weeks left before the new OS reaches general availability, an early build of Firefox has surfaced in their Nightly builds.
Dubbed the Firefox Metro Preview, this build is part of their experimental branch of development and in no way considered ready for release. The Elm repository is handling all development on the Metro side of things and will continue to do so until such time as the product is ready for integration with the main browser project.
Admitting at the outset that this is a buggy build, which I’ll get to in a minute, the Firefox Metro Preview is pretty impressive. Unlike Google’s Metro release for Chrome, Firefox actually remains consistent with the Modern UI and will not cause jarring transitions for people who use the new interface.
Bookmarks, History, and Downloads are all displayed in a tiled layout consistent with the Windows 8 Start Screen when opening a new tab if you stick to default settings. It’s even possible to pin particular pages to your Start Screen using the button labeled with a familiar pin icon located next to Firefox’s star-shaped bookmark button. Tabs can be set to hide by default or stay permanently open. The whole interface is basically sound and uses the new environment rather than fighting against it.
This is definitely not a recommended browser at the moment, however. As I mentioned previously, bugs are plentiful and very little is completely finished. The interface is somewhat sluggish at the moment, syncing is partially implemented at best, and Flash can break the browsing experience quite quickly. Loading is still somewhat slow and navigation is at times painful. Use of a keyboard and mouse has not been quite finished yet, for example, so there is a distinct lack of scrollbars.
This preview does demonstrate that a lot of work is going into getting Firefox ready for Windows 8 users. They have not claimed that the browser will be set up for Metro/Modern UI by launch day and this is not intended to be a viable entry into the market. At best we’re looking at a glimpse of what the browser is likely to provide when finished.
How soon this gets finalized will likely depend on how positive a reception Windows 8 receives among users. If everybody loves the new interface and adoption is higher than anticipated then it only makes sense to push hard to be the only Internet Explorer alternative to properly integrate with it. Rushing to release would be a priority. If, on the other hand, adoption is slow and people take a while to warm up to the tiles then continuing at a semi-leisurely pace won’t hurt them at all.
We’ll have to see how things pan out after Windows 8 hits general availability on October 26th.