On Tuesday, October 14, 2008 at 2:42 pm PT, Mozilla came up with its new Firefox 3.1 beta 1.

The updated version has now been made available for download. With this launch of Firefox 3.1 beta 1, Mozilla is mainly attempting to test the added new features and incorporate changes in core functionalities of Firefox 3.1.

One can follow the ongoing planning for Firefox 3.1 at the following :

So what are the much-hyped additional features incorporated in this upgraded versions. From new shortcut buttons meant for tab-switching to additional support for CSS properties, there are many indeed. A complete list of these changes are presented as follows:

  • The version features standards web improvements in the Gecko layout engine.
  • There has been support added for CSS 2.1 and CSS 3 properties.
  • Provision of a new tab-switching shortcut. The shortcut also shows previews of the tab you’ll be switching to.
  • The version features improved control over the Smart Location Bar by using special characters to restrict searches.
  • There is also support for various new web technologies, such as the <video> and <audio> elements, the W3C Geolocation API, JavaScript query selectors, web worker threads, SVG transforms and offline applications.

You can access more information on the new developer features of this version in Mozilla’s Web Tech Blog Post.

You can directly download the Firefox 3.1 Beta 1 for your different Operating System’s of ‘Windows’, ‘Mac OS X’ and ‘Linux’ in 36 different languages. Developers are encouraged to first go through the ‘Firefox 3.1 for Developers’ article on the ‘Mozilla Developer Center’.