Firefox 3.6 is now available as a Windows 7 integration, and it’s a great addition to the browser. Firefox 3.6 has many new features, including support for the new Windows 7 Aero interface. To get started with Firefox 3.6, you’ll need to install the Windows 7 integration software, which is available from the Mozilla website. Once you’ve installed the software, open it and click on the Firefox 3.6 icon in the top left corner of the screen. The Firefox 3.6 window will open and you’ll be able to use all of the same features as usual, including browsing through your bookmarks and history, opening tabs and windows, and using keyboard shortcuts. The only difference is that Firefox now supports Aero graphics in addition to traditional text-based windows and tabs!

The Aero Peek Tabs

If you simply hover your mouse over the Firefox button in the Windows 7 taskbar, you’ll see a list of all the open tabs. This works best if you only have a few tabs open—too many, and it’ll just stop showing them.

Enhanced Ctrl+Tab (optional)

The really awesome new feature is an enhanced Ctrl+Tab, but you’ll have to turn it on with a simple tweak if you want to use it. Once you’ve done that (detailed below), you can simply hit the shortcut key combination to flip between the tabs. Note that it only activates if you have 3 or more tabs open.

Enhanced Ctrl+Shift+Tab, with Tab Search

Ever wanted to be able to just start typing in the name of a tab in order to switch to it? Once you’ve enabled the Ctrl+Tab setting, you can use Ctrl+Shift+Tab to pull up this alternate tab switching interface, and then start typing in the name of a tab to filter it down.

For example, if I typed in “tiny” into the textbox in the above screenshot, you would only see the TinyHacker tab on the dialog.

Enable or Disable Ctrl+Tab Enhancements

This one isn’t enabled by default (at this point), but you can enable or disable it by typing in about:config into the address bar, and then filtering for the following key:

You can simply double-click the key to change it between true and false.

If you want to also be able to activate the new tab switcher with the button on the right-hand side of the tab bar:

You can open up about:config and filter for this key, making sure to enable it:

Enable or Disable Taskbar Aero Peek Enhancements

This one is enabled by default in my testing, but if you want to disable it you can type about:config into the address bar, and then filter for the following key:

 

Just like above, double-click to change between true and false.

Note: the article originally went out without proof-reading, but this should be correct now.

Download the Beta!

All the usual conditions apply, it’s a beta, it will break everything and drink all your coffee, etc.

Download Firefox 3.6 Beta 1 from mozilla.org