it’s ok,baby!

Firefox 3 final is released to public early this morning, there are dozens of new features in Firefox 3 that I can’t specify all of them, but what I care and love most and would make the most dramatic difference in my future browsing come as follows.

• Multiple text selection. Now selecting text in Firefox is similar to selecting text in most text editors—just select your first piece of text, then hold Ctrl (or Cmd on Macs) to select other pieces of non-consecutive text.

• Stronger Phishing and malware protection. Firefox 3 has stronger filters and protection against malware, phishing sites, cookies, and other tools that compromise privacy and security. A malware warning shows up when you visit sites known to install malicious software, Firefox 3 doesn’t show the content of knock-off sites (like PayPal “Update Your Account” phishing scams) by default, and Firefox 3 checks against Google’s ever-growing blacklist of phishing sites. Now you can feel even better switching your less tech-aware relatives over to the open-source browser.

• Improved download manager. Never wonder where a download came from, or went to, again. Gran Paradiso’s download manager lets you search through recent files, resume big downloads after a crash or restart, and lets you keep an eye on your transfers in the status bar. This means the DownThemAll add-on is no more needed.

• Smart bookmarks. Much like iTunes’ Smart Playlists, Firefox 3’s new Smart Bookmarks function can analyze your browsing habits and create lists of links based on it. The default bookmark toolbar only comes with three standards, “Most Visited,” “Recently Bookmarked,” and “Recent Tags” (more on that later). What’s more, you can even add tag when adding a favorite bookmark.

• Smart Location Bar.Like a personal assistant who telepathically knows when you’re going to need just the right phone number (or Starbucks fix), Firefox 3’s address bar, now dubbed the Smart Location Bar, helps you get to your frequently visited, or recently discovered, sites in super-quick fashion. That application you just read about on Lifehacker, but can’t remember the name? Type “li” into your address bar, and Firefox instantly pulls the relevant sites from your history. The bar also learns through repetition, so the next time you start searching with “li,” it knows you’re looking for Lifehacker, not Linux.