OStatic

John Resig, a member of Mozilla's Firebug development team, announced yesterday that the final version of Firebug 1.2 had been released. Firebug is a debugger for HTML, CSS, and JavaScript that sits within the Firefox Web browser. It has become an essential tool for Web developers, particularly those who use the modern technique known as Ajax ( asynchronous JavaScript and XML ).

JavaScript has become an increasingly important part of the Web application ecosystem. JavaScript is the key to many of the Web's most interesting applications, using the Ajax paradigm ( Asynchronous JavaScript and XML ). This has led to a renaissance in the use of JavaScript, as well as a flurry of libraries aimed at making it easier to use and cross-browser compatible. It was thus with a great deal of excitement that several JavaScript developers announced late last week that a new JavaScript engine, known as Tracemonkey, will be a part of Firefox 3.1 when it is released. The Tracemonkey engine is dramatically faster than the existing JavaScript engine, with some actions running 20 times faster.

One of the keys to the success of Firefox, the popular open-source browser produced by the Mozilla Foundation, is its extensibility. Earlier this summer, the Mozilla Foundation sponsored a contest, dubbed Extend Firefox 3, that offered prizes to the best add-ons that developers would submit. Last week, contest judges announced the winners.

If you're a Web developer, it's a pretty good bet that one of your most important tools is Firebug, an open-source debugger for HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and Ajax that works inside of the open-source Firefox Web browser. Since it was first unveiled several years ago, Firebug has taken the Web-development world by storm, revolutionizing developers' ability to modify, test, and debug Web applications. In the last month, Firebug has received hosting and development assistance from Mozilla, a change that will almost certainly benefit both the software and the community.

Internet Explorer is the most popular Web browser, with substantially higher market share than its nearest competitor, Mozilla's Firefox browser. That's true in spite of the fact that Firefox's market share has been steadily climbing.

But Internet Explorer has also been a source of frustration for Web developers, because of its selective approach to standards. Microsoft promises that the next version will be different. Why is this significant change underfoot?