Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 RC released

download firefox2beta1rc

Over the past few days, several release candidate builds of Mozilla Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 have been posted to the bonecho-beta1-candidates directory on ftp.mozilla.org. However, contrary to the indications given by some news outlets, Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 has not yet been released.

In common with many software projects, several release candidate (test) builds of Firefox are made available in the run-up to major milestone releases. These builds are similar, but not identical to, the final milestone releases and are designed to allow the testing community to discover any last-minute problems. Sometimes, but not always, the last release candidate builds are identical to the actual milestone release versions.

Although Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 is not intended for regular end-users, it is expected to be distributed more widely than any of the pre-Firefox 2.0 builds made available to date. There will probably be substantial media coverage and reviews in the technology press.

Yesterday, Ars Technica published a brief overview of one of the Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 release candidates. This news was picked up by Slashdot, who published a summary of Ars Technica's look at the Firefox 2.0 Beta 1 release candidate. Such high-profile coverage may mislead some readers into believing that the actual Beta 1 has been released when it has not.

According to the notes from today's Firefox 2 status meeting, Beta 1 is scheduled for release tomorrow. However, it is possible that a last-minute problem could necessitate a further release candidate, with the final Beta 1 builds being delayed until later this week.

The problem of test releases being mistaken for something more substantial is not a new one for the Mozilla project. Over the past year or so, it has become commonplace for alpha releases to not carry the Firefox branding at all and instead be tagged with codenames, which led to the Firefox 1.5 and 2.0 alphas being released under the Deer Park and Bon Echo banners respectively. Similar thinking has resulted in the nightly trunk builds (bleeding-edge test binaries that will eventually form the basis of next year's Firefox 3.0) being rebranded as Minefield (complete with a special Minefield logo).