TechCrunch reports that Mozilla has introduced its Australis redesign for Firefox into its highly experimental UX release channel. The new version of the browser introduces some design elements that seem ripped straight out of Google Chrome, but Mozilla says it’s all about making the browser simpler and easier to use.

Even if the base UI looks a lot like Chrome, Mozilla will be setting itself apart with its new Australis design. One of the major selling points of Firefox is its strong customization options. That will continue to be a thing in Australis as Mozilla wants to encourage users to make Firefox their own. To that end, users will be able to add and remove anything from the Firefox experience to make their own custom browser.

So, when you will be able to take a test drive in Australis without having to deal with a UX release? Mozilla plans to have the Australis theme ready in time for the Firefox 25 Nightly in the coming week. It may not hit the stable release of Firefox 25, however, if Mozilla deems that the design still needs work. Either way, you’re going to see the new Firefox redesign before the end of the year.

If you want to try out Australis right now, you can download it here. Just be aware that it’s still highly experimental and it’s not exactly stable. The UX channel is intended for developers and those without the requisite knowledge will get nothing out of it.

[Image: Softpedia]

In a blog post from Thursday, Mozilla’s Brendan Eich said that Mozilla has delayed the implementation of its new anti-cookie patch in Firefox so that it can test for false positives and false negatives. As you may know, the new anti-cookie policy is meant to block third party cookies from sites you haven’t visited while leaving cookies from previously visited sites intact. Eich says that fales positives and false negatives may get in the way of how this policy is meant to work:

False positives. For example, say you visit a site named foo.com, which embeds cookie-setting content from a site named foocdn.com. With the patch, Firefox sets cookies from foo.com because you visited it, yet blocks cookies from foocdn.com because you never visited foocdn.com directly, even though there is actually just one company behind both sites.

False negatives. Meanwhile, in the other direction, just because you visit a site once does not mean you are ok with it tracking you all over the Internet on unrelated sites, forever more. Suppose you click on an ad by accident, for example. Or a site you trust directly starts setting third-party cookies you do not want.

The anti-cookie patch will be turned off by default in the Firefox 22 beta will Mozilla works on these issues. Users on the beta will be able to turn on the patch, however, and mess around with the settings. Mozilla, of course, encourages feedback as it works on it. Those who are using the Aurora release will find that the anti-cookie patch is turned on by default however.

In the end, Eich says that Mozilla’s work on the patch doesn’t represent any change to its previous anti-cookie philosophy:

We have heard important feedback from concerned site owners. We are always committed to user privacy, and remain committed to shipping a version of the patch that is “on” by default. We are mindful that this is an important change; we always knew it would take a little longer than most patches as we put it through its paces.

For those who read this as Mozilla softening our stance on protecting privacy and putting users first, in a word: no. False positives break sites that users intentionally visit. (Fortunately, we haven’t seen too many such problems, but greater testing scale is needed.) False negatives enable tracking where it is not wanted. The patch as-is needs more work.

[h/t: PC World]

Mozilla announced this week that Firefox OS Simulator version 3.0 is now available to all as a stable release. The original preview from March added features like push to device, rotation simulation, basic geolocation API simulation, manifest validation and more. The new stable build includes all of the above features, plus some new ones:

With this new release, Mozilla has also decided to revamp its Firefox OS Simulator documentation. You can take a look at that here. While you’re at it, you should also check out the Firefox OS Simulator walkthrough example for some tips and tricks.

If you have yet to start developing for Firefox OS, you can grab the latest stable build of the Simulator at the Firefox add-ons Web site.

Engadget reports that both the Keon and Peak Firefox OS dev units are now available from the Geeksphone online store. The Keon will cost you $119 and the Peak goes for $194. The phones may be cheap, but good luck actually buying one. Geeksphone’s online store has been taken offline because of incredible demand, or unplanned maintenance. It’s hard to say at this point.

Maybe you should reacquaint yourself with the Firefox OS hardware while you wait for the store to go back up. First up, the Keon is the budget phone that Mozilla plans to get into the hands of as many people as possible in developing countries. For $119, you get a Qualcomm Snapdragon S1, 3.5-inch display, and 512MB of RAM. The slightly more expensive Peak has a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4, 4.3-inch display, and 512MB of RAM.

Both devices will be able to connect to either 2G or 3G networks. Both also come unlocked so you can add it whatever carrier you like.

The site should be available again later today if you really want to get your hands on the first Firefox OS dev units. We’ll update this story once the site is available again. If you find yourself unable to wait, however, you can always install Firefox OS on one of Sony’s Xperia E smartphones.

Engadget reports that Geeksphone will start selling the Keon and Peak Firefox OS dev units next week. The Keon will retail for €91, while the Peak will retail for €149. It seems cheap, and that’s because developers will be getting cheap phones. The hardware isn’t going to win any awards and it isn’t meant to. Firefox OS hardware is targeting developing markets, and the cheap price reflects that.

If you do want at least a little power, you’ll want to go with the Peak. It’s a mid-range smartphone with a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 and a 4.3-inch display. The Keon only has a Snapdragon S1 so developers will have to get a little creative when designing apps around the lower end of the hardware spectrum.

Thankfully, Geeksphone will be selling the phones worldwide instead of just in the countries where Firefox OS will be launching. Developers in the U.S. will be able to build apps to take advantage of the increasingly lucrative smartphone market in developing countries.

If you can’t afford or don’t want one of Geeksphone’s smartphones, you can always use the Firefox OS simulator. The simulator piggybacks off of your Firefox desktop installation to emulate the Firefox OS experience on the desktop. From there, you can test and debug any HTML5 apps you may have in the works.

Mozilla Labs, the group that brought us Open Badges, Popcorn and more, has unveiled its latest project – TowTruck. In essence, TowTruck is an open source HTML5-based tool that lets multiple people work on the same Web page together. The tool uses WebRTC to enable video/audio communications between parties while they edit and browse the Web together.

Here’s an early proof of concept video that shows what Tow Truck looked like two months ago. The version that’s available now has WebRTC:

Tow Truck – Proof of Concept in Progress from Simon on Vimeo.

TowTruck is obviously built with developers in mind. Many Web designers no longer work in the same office, let alone the same state or country. A tool like TowTruck would be incredibly useful for these designers as they can now show others examples of their work, including the code, in real time. The others can then help refine that code in real time.

If you want to try out for TowTruck for yourself, you can do so here. Mozilla also provides the JavaScript necessary to integrate TowTruck into your own site at the above link. That being said, Mozilla warns that TowTruck is currently in alpha and doesn’t recommend that you use it in production at this time.

[h/t: The Next Web]

Mozilla announced today that Kovacs will be stepping down as the CEO of the non-profit later this year. He won’t be gone entirely, however, as he plans to stick around as a member of the Board of Directors.

“The past two and a half years have been pivotal in the evolution and rapid growth of Mozilla,” said Gary Kovacs, CEO. “I am very proud of our accomplishments as a team. In our mission to empower the next two billion Web users, we’ve made great advances in desktop and mobile and in our ability to lead at the pace of the market. With this solid foundation and a strong team in place, this is the right time for me to announce the transition plan and a vote of confidence in the abilities of the leadership team. I am grateful for the privilege of leading this organization during this period of rapid growth, and I look forward to helping guide Mozilla’s impact on the future of mobile.

Kovacs stepping down isn’t the only executive change happening at Mozilla over the next few months. The non-profit also announced that Mitchell Baker and Brendan Eich have expanded their roles to Executive Chair and Chief Technology Officer & Senior Vice President of Engineering respectively.

Jay Sullivan will be moving up from SVP of Products to the position COO. He will still be directly involved with Mozilla’s product strategy and the Firefox OS development team.

Harvey Anderson, Corporate Secretary for Mozilla, is now also the SVP of Business and Legal Affairs. In the new role, he will “have oversight for the apps marketplace initiative and continue to lead mobile and strategic partnerships.”

Finally, Li Gong is Mozilla’s SVP of Mobile Devices. As the title implies, he’ll be in charge of global Firefox OS adoption as the handsets featuring Mozilla’s mobile OS launches later this year.

Over the next few months, Mozilla will be on the lookout for its next CEO. It will interesting to see who the non-profit ultimately ends up choosing as they will be in charge of Mozilla as it attempts to stake its claim in the ever growing mobile market.

So, what’s wrong with our current Web payment services? Sure, services like PayPal can sometimes be a pain, but it’s not like the entire system needs to be uprooted, right? Mozilla objects to that line of thinking and offers three reasons why the current Web payment system is broken:

To help solve these problems, Mozilla has introduced navigator.mozPay() in Firefox OS. Mozilla says the JavaScript API was inspired by Google’s Wallet API, but contains a few modifications that support multiple payment providers and carrier billing.

Here’s how navigator.mozPay() works in its current incarnation on Firefox OS:

When a web app invokes navigator.mozPay() in Firefox OS, the device shows a secure window with a concise UI. After authenticating, the user can easily charge the payment to her mobile carrier bill or credit card. When completed, the app delivers the product. Repeat purchases are quick and easy.

If that sounds interesting to you, you can start testing it out right now on test builds of Firefox OS. The API can’t accept payments just yet, but Mozilla encourages developers to start working on implementing the API into their Firefox OS apps now.

Interested developers can check out the Web payment API documentation here. If you want the code libraries, Mozilla currently has them available in Node.JS and Python. Other libraries for more languages are on the way.

Mozilla and Samsung jointly announced today that they have begun work on an advanced Web browser engine called Servo. The engine will be built in Rust, a new programming language in development at Mozilla that the non-profit hopes will “fill many of the same niches that C++ has over the past decades.”

A new Web browser engine is already pretty big news, but that’s only half of the story. Mozilla and Samsung are also bringing Rust and Servo to Android and ARM devices. It seems its both parties’ intention to make a next generation Web browser engine for mobile devices that “can fully utilize the performance of tomorrow’s massively parallel hardware to enable new and richer experiences on the Web.”

At the moment, there isn’t much to show for Servo, but Mozilla says it’s now putting more resources into the project to prove that it can “build a fast Web browser with pervasive parallelism, and in a safe, fun language.” At the same time, the non-profit will also be working on completing the first major revision of the Rust language.

Like most Mozilla projects, the non-profit is inviting the community to help them develop Rust and Servo. If you would like nothing more to poke and prod untested code, you can grab the source code for Rust and Servo at their respective GitHub repositories.

Mitchell Baker, Chair of the Mozilla Foundation, wrote a short post today explaining what spurred Mozilla to rethink the Web 15 years ago:

Looking back, Mozilla’s plan was as radical as the Web itself: use open source and community to simultaneously create great software and build openness into the key technologies of the Internet itself. This was something commercial vendors weren’t doing and could not do. A non-profit, community-driven organization like Mozilla was needed to step up to the challenge.

Baker emphasizes the importance of keeping the Web open multiple times, and says that Mozilla will play a central role in making sure the Web remains open for future generations:

In the coming era both the opportunities and threats to the Web are just as big as they were 15 years ago. As the role of data grows and device capabilities expand, the Internet will become an even more central part of our lives. The need for individuals to have some control over how this works and what we experience is fundamental. Mozilla can — and must — play a key role again. We have the vision, the products and the technology to do this. We know how to enable people to participate, both by contributing to our specific activities and coming up with their own ideas that advance the bigger cause of enriching the Web.

It’s an exciting time for Mozilla and the Web. Another two billion people will join the Internet community in the coming years. It’s critical that these people all have access to the openness and empowerment that the Web has brought to date. The browser is a necessary piece of making sure this happens; yet we need to do more.

Baker also mentions a couple of upcoming projects from Mozilla that he feels will help more people become intimate with the Web. The first is Firefox OS, Mozilla’s mobile operating system. The second, and personally more interesting project, is Webmaker. This particular project will help people who have no experience in coding move from Web consumers to Web creators.

Looking forward to the future isn’t the only thing Mozilla is doing on its 15th anniversary. The non-profit will also be sharing 15 facts about Mozilla throughout the day with the #Webstory hashtag. Mozilla encourages users to share their own stories about Mozilla, Firefox or just what the Web in general means to them with the same hashtag.

The Web has changed tremendously over the past 15 years, and Mozilla is no longer the only major alternative to Internet Explorer. In fact, the browser market is more diverse than ever before. Regardless, Mozilla and its Web freedom allies still have an important part to play as the Web continues to grow over the next 15 years and beyond.