Firefox 56 has been released and is available for download to public with screenshots, Send Tabs and updated (searchable) Preferences.
What’s new in Firefox 56
We’re just another version away from getting Firefox Quantum aka Firefox 57, with Photon UI. Firefox Screenshots tool is now available to all users and available for access on the toolbar by default.
This version of Firefox has added auto-fill functionality in the browser (en-us only).
Preferences have been reorganized into four sections from eight. Search functionality added to the preferences makes easy to find a setting/option.
You can turn the new Preferences off and revert to old options UI, for that, check Firefox 56 : How to disable new Preferences UI.
Media in a background tab will not be auto played until you select or focus on it.
Mozilla introduced about Firefox features through onboarding tour which appears when you click on fox icon in the new tab, you can disable or hide the onboarding tour if you want.
Read: Firefox 56: How to disable onboarding tour
Security or privacy point of view, this version of Firefox no longer makes speculative connections to websites.
Change log
New features:
1. Launched Firefox Screenshots, a feature that lets users take, save, and share screenshots without leaving the browser
2. Added support for address form autofill (en-US only)
3. Updated Preferences
- Added search tool so users can find a specific setting quickly
- Reorganized preferences so users can more easily scan settings
- Rewrote descriptions so users can better understand choices and how they affect browsing
- Revised data collection choices so they align with updated Privacy Notice and data collection strategy
4. Media opened in a background tab will not play until the tab is selected
5. Improved Send Tabs feature of Sync for iOS and Android, and Send Tabs can be discovered even by users without a Firefox Account
Changes
- Added hardware acceleration for AES-GCM
- Improved security for verifying update downloads
- Updated the Safe Browsing protocol to version 4
- Replaced character encoding converters with a new Encoding Standard-compliant implementation written in Rust
- Reduced update download file size by approximately 20 percent
Developer
- Added Layout Panel to CSS Grid DevTools
- Developer Information
- Users running Firefox for Windows over a Remote Desktop Connection (RDP) may find that audio playback is disabled due to increased security restrictions. Learn how to mitigate this issue until it is corrected in an upcoming release
Unresolved
- Startup crash with RelevantKnowledge adware installed. Firefox Support has helpful instructions to remove it.
- Startup crashes with 64-bit Firefox on Windows 7, for users of Lenovo’s “OneKey Theater” software for IdeaPad laptops. To fix this crash, please re-install 32-bit Firefox.