How to Install Firefox 6 (beta) in Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal?

Not that long ago Mozilla foundation decided to follow the "Google Chrome Philosophy" of releasing a new version pretty quicker than usual. So because of this move, now one of the most secured web browser of the world (I felt like bragging about it :D), the Firefox do let her faithful users have the ability to enjoy a new major version once ever 3 or 4 months, if I remember correctly.

Update: Hey guys, since Mozilla has released the stable (means the official version) 6 version few hours ago. So for Ubuntu 10.10 and 10.04 users I wrote a new post today, please read this post for installation introductions. 

I wrote this post (the one that you're reading) sometime ago and it only installs using the "beta" channel, not the official one. For the Natty users, it seems we'd have to wait till hits the repositories (which is simply a matter of hours and it might even available as you read this!).

The recent two upgrades was a big success to Mozilla Firefox community because, although Google Chrome is still the rising web browser but when compared with the 3.6x series both Firefox 4 and Firefox 5 was a massive success nonetheless.

Although the recently released Firefox 5 did not bring major GUI changes but it did improve the performance and HTML 5, CSS animations support are among the noticeable ones.

Anyhow, as most Ubuntu Linux geeks knows, Ubuntu has a Mozilla team of their own and a PPA project which they use to release both official and the nightly builds (beta versions, yikes! :P) which makes the installation or the upgrade a breeze for the Ubuntu users.

The latest news is that few hours ago Mozilla team has released the stable/beta version of the upcoming Firefox 6!, available through the above mentioned PPA project page. Yep... for all ya risk takers (tempting isn't it? :P) now you can get to know how the upcoming Firefox 6 is gonna taste like!.

What's new...

There!, said you wanted proof ;-)... also note the "bold" URL section of the root-domain ("blogspot.com" in this instance) which is a new feature...

*. Further enhanced performance on HTML 5 and CSS animations.

*. The Unity appindicator menu related bug fix which used to show the Firefox menu inside the window rather than the panel.

*. Profile migration wizard is removed.

*. KDE-Firefox integration related bug fixes.

*. Plug-in new version checker feature added to the add-on manager.

*. Improved start-up times (oh good!, because this is one of the reasons why many like Google Chrome, impatient dudes :D).

*. Enhanced address-bar/URL - Meaning that the root-domain of the current page that you're viewing is highlighted as can be seen with the above screenshot.

*. Better Java script support + easily build and test Java-scripts via the Web-developer tool "Scratchpad". 

*. Although there may be but I couldn't detect any major GUI change in the main Window.

*. Interestingly it is said due to the optimizations some users may even notice a 30% reduce in their memory consumption! (concerning FF of course)... these are just the "major" ones to mention at this moment.

Okay, let me cut the bullshi* and tell you how to install firefox 6 (beta) in Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwhal (should also work in 10.10 and 10.04 as well). So open your GNU/Linux Terminal window and enter the below commands.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mozillateam/firefox-next

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install firefox

To be honest, I did encounter few errors during the installation. But nothing major it seemed because (guess some hassle with the shortcuts and icons, etc) afterwards I was able to launch the all new Firefox 6 in my Ubuntu 11.04 Laptop without any issues.

But remember, although firefox is a highly stable, secure web browser but this is the "beta" version thus you should expect bugs and few bumps on the way (minor ones hopefully). Enjoy!.