As much as I like Firefox, I have to say that on my Mac it’s been relegated to second choice behind my new favorite: Google Chrome. Even though Firefox 3.6 is pretty quick, Chrome has blistering speed, and I love the fact that in Chrome a crash in one tab does not kill the entire browser. Chrome doesn’t yet have the massive extension ecosystem that makes Firefox so useful (and is the reason why I will probably never uninstall it), but it’s going to take a lot of improvement to the speed and stability of Firefox to get me to switch back and make it my primary browser again.

How about you? Do you still use Firefox, or have you switched to Chrome?

As PC World notes, Firefox 3.6 will have a number of enhancements, including faster JavaScript handling, better Bookmark synchronization, page load enhancements, a better approach to restoring sessions, a way of checking for outdated plug-ins, and more. The Mozilla team has steadily been working on some of version 3.5’s stability issues, and there will be lots of bug fixes in version 3.6. Mozilla has also confirmed that a much overhauled Firefox version 4.0 will arrive next year.

The Google Chrome browser’s new Artist Themes are quite eye-popping. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that they could make good conversation starters when you’re working around other people. You can get a sense of how they work and look from this OStatic post. The theme seen atop this post was produced by fine artist and poster maven Yulia Brodskaya, while Wes Craven has supplied a spooky theme. To add a theme to Chrome, you just open Chrome and go to the Chrome Theme Gallery, pick one you like, then click “Apply theme.”

While it’s unlikely to become your primary browser, if you have a need for a very lightweight browser, Arora is out in a new version .10. It’s based on the open source WebKit engine, and you can use it on Windows, the Mac, and Linux. Download Squad notes that you can easily enable ad blocking in Arora with one click. I also think it’s lightweight and snappy enough to make sense as a portable browser to carry on a USB flash drive.

Which open-source browser do you use, and why?

Chrome 3.0. Google’s announcement post on Chrome 3.0 provides walkthroughs of several of the new features in the browser. There are improvements to the Omnibox, which is the combination search/address bar in Chrome. You can now get drop-down lists in the Omnibox that show not only URLs, but also bookmarks, search options and more. Themes are also now supported in Chrome, and there are also HTML5 enhancements, which could make working with video and audio much more flexible.

Probably the biggest news about Chrome of all, though, is that the JavaScript performance is much improved. Below are Google’s own benchmark charts showing JavaScript tests (bigger is better in the first chart, and smaller is better in the second one).

Internet Explorer 8. I rarely use Internet Explorer any more, and I feel that most of the meaningful innovation is going on in the open-source browsers, with Firefox and Chrome leading the way. However, AnandTech came out this week with a very interesting browser face-off, which focused entirely on which browser preserves battery life the best on portable computers. The surprise winner was IE 8. The tests involved constantly loading and unloading various browsers and tracking battery life. I would have thought Chrome or Opera would win in these kinds of tests, but no.

Firefox and SeaMonkey. Mozilla released its Jetpack project a few months ago, and this week it updated Jetpack to version 0.5. Jetpack is an API and framework designed to make building extensions for Firefox easy enough for non-developers. You can get the new Jetpack here, and create your own extensions. Meanwhile, Mozilla has also released a second beta of version 2.0 of its SeaMonkey project, which is a collection of Internet apps. At the core of the collection, there is a speedy browser based on the same engine that Firefox uses. You also get a simple HTML editor, IRC chat functions, and more.

Is IE8’s apparently low power consumption enough of a reason to use it?

When Aliza originally reviewed the software, it was free beta release software. Now that it’s reached version 1.0, it comes with a $39.95 price tag for registration. Users can still download a free trial, so you can take Postbox through its paces before deciding to make a purchase.

I tried Postbox back when it was still in beta, right around the time Aliza originally reviewed it, and there are some definite improvements in the 1.0 release.

Better Search

One of Postbox’s main selling points is its advanced search capabilities. In Aliza’s original review, she talked about how you can search for all emails within a certain time period, or search for attachments and links within emails. Postbox also now boasts a number of search operators usable without opening the advanced settings panel, including “from:name” and “subject:keyword” if you prefer doing things all from one window.

Search and email indexing is also much faster than it used to be. Even with a large archive of messages, many of which are heavy on images and links, it took almost no time at all to download and make available my entire MobileMe archive; much less time than Mail takes to perform the same task.

More Add-ons

Add-ons like Lightning for Postbox, which brings your calendar into your Postbox window via a new tab, are a big part of the program’s appeal. There are utilities for Google Calendar access, message import/export, to-do lists, backup services, Growl notifications, and managing multiple identities on a single account. More are being developed every day, so expect the list to continue to grow.

One of my favorite Postbox-compatible plugins is ThunderBrowse, which allows you to view web pages directly in the application, without having to switch over to your browser of choice: great for digging in and really trying to conquer your inbox during a marathon session.

Easier

It’s hard to put my finger on exactly what usability changes occurred between earlier betas and this final release, but in general things seem redesigned with greater ease in mind. One great example is the ability to drag and drop email messages across accounts in the sidebar. It’s great for keeping your inboxes organized according to how you want to respond to messages, instead of according to how misinformed senders might try to reach you.

Postbox’s already impressive Conversations view for threaded viewing of replies also got easier, with on-the-fly notification of updates sent while you’re reviewing. That way, if someone sends an email continuing a conversation you’re currently reading, you need only click a button to view the latest response.

A Lot More Social

Maybe the biggest change since Aliza’s early experience with Postbox is the addition of multiple social network support. Postbox users can now sign in to their Facebook, FriendFeed and Twitter accounts via the application’s web services menu.

Doing so will not only allow you to post new status updates to those services via Postbox, it will also enable profile photo matching in the links/additional info sidebar to the right of the message reading window. If, for example, you get a DM from someone, Postbox will automatically retrieve that person’s current Twitter profile pic and display it. Messages you receive directly from contacts you also have on Facebook or Twitter will likewise display their profile pic from those services, though I’m not sure which takes precedence in the case of double matches.

For Aliza, the problem with switching to Postbox was that she had become so used to Gmail that learning a different system seemed like re-inventing the wheel. For me, it was that the early betas were actually fairly buggy, and just didn’t feel like something that could be a full-time solution for what is a core tool in my web working arsenal. This final version seems much, much more capable, and will definitely see full-time service on my Windows 7 machine. Will it replace Mail.app? As Aliza pointed out, old habits die hard, so we’ll have to see if I can avoid a relapse.

Let us know your thoughts on Postbox in the comments.

I recently moved to a new computer, which compelled me to revisit my Thunderbird add-ons. Here’s a list of my favorites. I’ve put them into a WebWorkerDaily Thunderbird Collection to make it easy for you to find them all.

AttachmentExtractor: Adds more power to Thunderbird’s attachment management feature. With AttachmentExtractor, you can save all of the attachments to an email to frequently-used folders. You can also save all, delete all and detach all files, rather than having to do it one-by-one.

Enhance attachment management with Attachment Extractor

Attachment Reminder: Most of us will have sent an email from where we have forgotten to include an attachment. Attachment Reminder looks for the presence or certain keywords (attachment, attach, etc.) in the text of your email. If the keyword is present but no file is attached when you go to send the email,  a window will pop up, asking if you need to attach a file.

Check and Send: Checks for keywords in the message body before sending, so can perform the same role as Attachment Reminder; which one you use is a matter of preference.

Contacts Sidebar: Adds a sidebar containing your contacts list for faster access.

Disable Drag and Drop: This genius feature stops you from accidentally moving one folder into another. I’ve had this happen to me before. If you need to move your folders around, disable the feature and then enable it again (you’ll need restart Thunderbird after disabling and enabling).

eMarks: This add-on enables you to bookmark important emails for later reading.

Lightning: Adds a calendar feature to Thunderbird. If you use Google Calendar, Lightning can sync with it, with a little help from Provider for Google Calendar.

Lightning adds a calendar to Thunderbird

LookOut: Have you ever received an email that has an attachment called “winmail.dat” or “body_part”? Sometimes Outlook sends an email and puts the contents in an attached file. LookOut opens up the contents so you can read it rather than go through the complicated process of trying to convert the encoded file into English.

Nostalgy: Improved productivity by creating keyboard shortcuts to instantly change folders, move messages into a specific folder, change between the To, CC and BCC fields, use folder name auto-completion, and more.

Quote Collapse: If you’re bothered by excessive quoting in emails or newsgroup posts, this add-on can help you by automatically collapsing them. You can expand them again by clicking on them.

Signature Switch: An icon appears on the toolbar instant switching between email signatures. You can also set up auto-switching by recipient.

I install new add-ons one at a time rather than a bunch in one sitting. This way I can test each add-on to ensure it works before adding another. Also, before downloading an add-on, remember to verify its compatibility with your version of Thunderbird.

What are your favorite Thunderbird add-ons?

In addition to improved performance and standards compliance, Firefox 3.5 also features new privacy controls, location-aware browsing, and the ability to play video and audio content without using plugins. A quick video tour of the new version is available here.

Firefox 3.5 is a free download for Windows, Mac and Linux from Mozilla.

Share your thoughts on Firefox 3.5 in the comments.

Quick overview for those new to Firefox: Add-ons are little free tools that make your application experience better and easier. Add-ons don’t stop at browsers, either. Email applications like Thunderbird have them, too. They’re very easy to install. Just go to Firefox add-ons, browse, click “Add to Firefox” and click “Install” in the popup window. Once installed, you’ll need to restart Firefox to complete the process.

Here’s my list of current favorites (note: if you like this list, be sure to check out the WebWorkerDaily Firefox Add-ons Collection):

Adblock Plus — No. More. Popup. Ads. Or auto-playing videos. You might also want to download a Filter Subscription. You can still create your own filters to block ads on specific sites.

Better Gmail 2. Two great feature additions for Gmail. Folders4Gmail lets you have labels in folder-like sub-folders. Attachment icons replace the useless paperclips with the icons of the app that the attachment uses. If it’s a Word document, it’ll show Word’s blue W icon. Better Gmail 2 has other good features, too.

Download Statusbar. Get rid of the download pop up box. Instead, downloads appear across the bottom of Firefox where they don’t intrude. When you’re ready to open one, just double-click the relevant filename in the status bar.

Firefox Environment Backup Extension (FEBE). Any kind of backup tool for an application is worth it because it restores data with little effort. This one backs up your add-ons and rebuilds them.

Long URL Please. Twitter increased the use of URL-shortening services. But some of us like to know where we’re going before we click. This add-on automatically expands shortened URLs. Even if you can’t see the full URL, you can mouse over the link to see the full link tooltip-style.

Print/Print Preview. Adds a print icon to the tool bar with a down arrow giving you the choices of Print, Print Preview or Page Setup. I limit printing to stay green. This add-on helps because it ensures I print only what I need and nothing more.

Read it Later. I’ve always saved articles to read later by opening them in a tab and keeping it there until I read it. No, it didn’t lead to having a bunch of open tabs. Because I don’t like many tabs, it compels me to read them soon so I can get rid of them. Read it Later took over the job. The add-on puts a checkmark in your browser. Click the checkmark to add the page to Read it Later, click it again to remove.

Web Developer. I’m not a web designer, but this toolbar has helped me out many times. You can disable Java, Javascript and colors, manage cookies, change up styles with CSS, adjust form options and much more.

Word Count Plus. Anyone who writes web content where word counts matter needs this. Simple tool where you highlight the text, click the icon and see the word count. Now it just needs an added feature to count characters for Twittering outside the box.

Xmarks. A bookmarks synchronizer that works between computers and across networks. I first used it back when it was Foxmarks, but encountered issues. Those issues are now gone, and the add-on comes with more features. It can synchronize passwords, give you information about a web page and create separate profiles. You can have a profile for each computer so you can pick and choose which bookmarks to display at each location.

I’m sure I’m still missing some of your favorite add-ons, but I limit how many I install because Firefox does become a memory hog. So here’s your chance to fill in the blanks.

What are your favorite/most frequently used Firefox add-ons?

Mozilla’s post says only that the updates in Release Candidate 3 are in response to “user feedback.” The organization intends to move quickly toward a final release of Firefox Version 3.5. In all likelihood, the differences between this version and RC2 consist of bug and/or security fixes.

I’ve been steadily using both the betas and the Release Candidates of Firefox 3.5, and it’s both speedy and substantially more feature-rich. It’s stable, too. If you’re already running a Firefox 3.5 beta or Release Candidate version, you can obtain an update to RC3 by selecting “Check for Updates” from the “Help” menu. Here are the official Release Notes for more information.

Mozilla Labs today released a preview version of the next major version of its Ubiquity extension for Firefox: Ubiquity 0.5, downloadable here. I’ve been steadily using the beta releases of it, and Mozilla has ambitious plans to make Ubiquity a standard part of Firefox. It’s a command-line tool, and while that may cause some to roll their eyes at the idea of typing commands in the age of the graphical user interface, it’s actually very useful. The new preview version has many major additions, including localization features.

If you download the Ubiquity Preview Release and restart Firefox, you can hit your Ctrl key and your Space key at any time to conjure the extension. You can hit your Esc key at any time to shut it. There are many built-in commands for Ubiquity, and it becomes very intuitive to figure out which types of commands will perform which types of functions. All you have to do is type the first few letters of a command to conjure up a set of command choices from which you can pick.

For example, in the screenshot above, I have begun to type in an “email” command, and I already have options available to me for sending an email and more. Ubiquity is very web-aware, especially in the new Preview Release, so for many commands, it will immediately know that you might want to check a Wikipedia entry for a given term, or check your primary e-mail application, or convert a web page to PDF, and more.

The new Preview Release is much more globally focused than any of the betas were. It features a new input parser that has been rewritten to support many languages other than English. I also noticed that it does a good job of guessing what I want based on my location. For example, below I am typing in “weather” and Ubiquity guesses that I want the weather for San Francisco, which is where I am. This raises my eyebrows a bit because of the implied privacy concerns, but it is nonetheless useful, and very fast.

As another example of a command in action, below I have started to type the word “calculate,” and before I’m done typing, Ubiquity gives me quick choices for calculating, or for checking a Google calendar:

One major addition to the new Preview Release of Ubiquity is an interactive tutorial to help you get started. You don’t even have to invoke the tutorial. It’s available as soon as Firefox starts, after you install the Ubiquity extension. It consists of pop-ups that provide you with sample commands to try, and explains the suggestions that pop up as results.

This Preview Release is intended mainly for developers who want to test it and suggest improvements. I noticed a little herky-jerky interface behavior here and there, but no major bugs. It’s quite useful, and it works with the new Firefox 3.5. Consider giving it a try, unless you find a command-line interface to be completely retrograde. Sooner or later, Ubiquity will likely be built right into Firefox. Hopefully sooner.

Do you use Ubiquity? What useful commands have you found? What’s the No. 1 reason you’d recommend Ubiquity to people who aren’t yet using it?

Mozilla released a new initiative this week for users of the Firefox browser, called Collections, with an introduction and an explanatory video available here. We covered it on the OStatic blog, and it looks like anyone who works with Firefox and appreciates how extensions add to the power of the browser can get a lot out of Collections. They are essentially sets of useful extensions, usually associated with each other according to similarities in what they do.

Among other things, Collections let you click one link to put a whole set of your favorite Firefox extensions on a new installation of the browser. You can subscribe to and install someone else’s Collection of extensions, or you can post your own Collection. You can also save your set of favorite extensions as a Collection, and then when you install a new instance of Firefox on any device, add all your favorites at once.

There are already several Collections found on the right of the Add-ons for Firefox page.  Even if the idea of installing a pre-built set of extensions doesn’t appeal to you, you may still appreciate Collections as a way of discovering extensions that may be similar to ones you use, or that you never knew about before.

For example, this is the Download Squad Pack Collection. It consists of 19 Firefox extensions that the folks over at the Download Squad blog love, and these folks write about useful Firefox extensions nearly every day. In their Collection, you’ll find TabMixPlus, which greatly enhances how you can work with tabs in the browser, Better Gmail2, which extends what you can do with Gmail, and more.

If you’re a web developer, check out this Collection of add-ons for the well-loved extension Firebug.  It has extensions that complement and extend what Firebug does. Likewise, the Social Circuit Collection delivers you 16 extensions for social networking sites and applications.

Not every Firefox user will want to add groups of extensions to their browsers all at once, but you don’t have to. I’ve found a number of extensions that I want to try by simply pursuing the early sets of Collections being posted. These are worth a look, especially if you live in Firefox all day.

What extensions will make it in to your personal Firefox Collection?

One feature that surfaced in recent nightly builds that’s included in this beta is the ability to reopen accidentally closed browser windows. Firefox has had the incredibly useful “Undo Close Tabs” feature for a while, so the ability to recall closed windows should also be handy. You can access closed windows under “Recently Closed Windows” in your “History” menu, or quickly re-open the latest closed window by hitting Ctrl+Shift+N(Windows)/Cmd+Shift+N(Mac).

It’s important to note that this is still a beta version so there may still be some bugs to squash yet, but I’m using it to write out this post and it seems quick and stable.

See the full list of features or download the beta.

What do you think of the new Firefox beta?

Ubiquity had a major update in January, and I’ve been using the new version since then. Here are a few applications for Ubiquity that those of us who live in browsers all day will appreciate.

Ubiquity is a free Firefox extension, and once you install it, you can pop it up at any time by pressing Ctrl + Space. That combination of keys puts your live cursor directly into Ubiquity’s command line. In the screenshot above, I have begun typing the command “e-mail,” and even before I’m done typing I’m presented with a series of commands. I can choose to mail the web page I’m at to a colleague, or turn it into a PDF file, and more.

Ubiquity doesn’t restrict you to only canned commands, though. You can write your own commands easily, and Mozilla recently pointed out this online video as a good tutorial for beginning to create commands. The command shown built in the video is designed to look up members of Congress by zip code, but the instructions are detailed enough that you can start to create your own commands.

In my own use, I’ve found Ubiquity particularly good for on-the-fly web searches, and very fast definitions of terms I’m reading about online. I can execute the searches faster than I would if I navigated to a search engine, and if I type in a term such as “VPN” I’ll immediately see enough search results in Ubiquity that I know the term stands for Virtual Private Network, and have a sense of what one is.

If you build your command skills in Ubiquity, you can do much more advanced, scripted things, bordering on full-blown applications. I predict that a lot of Firefox users who aren’t yet using Ubiquity will appreciate once it’s in the browser by default. A command line interface may seem like retrograde, but Ubiquity gets its name from how ever-present it is, and how very fast it is for on-the-fly tasks such as searching or jumping into an e-mail message.

I recently had the opportunity to talk with two Intuit staff members to talk about Thumbstrips, Fashion Your Firefox, developing for Mozilla, and Intuit Labs.

Tara Tarapata, Group Manager for the Intuit Innovation Lab, and Scott Williamson, Software Engineer and an early developer of Thumbstrips, both gave me the impression that Intuit is an organization staffed by passionate people who are trying to shake things up in software development.

While I did not mention Thumbstrips by name in my initial overview of Fashion Your Firefox, I’ve since come to regret the omission. Since downloading the add-on, it’s become an integral part of my Firefox browsing experience.

Put simply, it allows you to view your history as a visual filmstrip of thumbnails in a pane at the bottom of your browser window. Definitely saves you time time digging for that page you forgot to bookmark when you’re involved in a deep dive and can’t be expected to keep track of every little link that might prove useful. Tara pointed out other uses, including comparison shopping, bug-testing for web developers, and as a live screenshot demo reel for giving presentations.

The add-on itself is only the beginning of the story. If you’re involved in developing apps for Mozilla, a behind the scenes peek at how Thumbstrips became one of the most-downloaded add-ons available is particularly illuminating.

Thumbstrips took its first steps in the Intuit Innovation Labs, a breeding and testing ground for promising ideas and applications in development at Intuit. The Labs allow software end-users to become an integral part of the development community. According to Tara, the purpose of the space is to make sure that the applications that end up in the hands of users has the functionality that they actually need. Using the website’s “Count Me In” feature, you can sign up to become even more involved. You’ll get access to new ideas as they arrive, interact with Intuit software engineers in the development process, and help guide the future of Intuit Labs itself.

From the labs, Scott said the next step was getting listed on the official Mozilla add-ons page. Once they were listed, download numbers skyrocketed. Eventually, Thumbstrips became so popular that the Intuit team decided to apply to become a Recommended app. Yes, that is a developer-initiated process. Thumbstrips was accepted, and now enjoys regular rotation in and out of Mozilla’s Recommended apps.

The last step, the actual inclusion of Thumbstrips in the list of apps featured on Fashion Your Firefox, came as something of a surprise to the add-on’s development team. They’d heard about the launch of the new web app, and were curious to see what was available. Scott actually discovered Thumbstrips’ inclusion when he clicked to expand the “Digital Pack Rat” category. Since its inclusion, downloads of Thumbstrips have gone up 200-300%, up to 400+ daily. Clearly Mozilla’s initiative is sparking some interest.

What’s ahead for Thumbstrips?

Tara says they unfortunately can’t devote much more of their internal team’s time to the add-on, but that’s where the beauty of the Intuit Labs community lies. They hope to open source the software soon, handing it over to interested developers so that it will continue to grow thanks to the efforts of those who helped maked it a reality to begin with. And Thumbstrips is just the beginning. Tara, Scott, and the rest of the Intuit team hope to break new ground in allowing as much of their catalogue as possible to become open source once in-house development stops. With the help of the Intuit Labs community, this could ensure that applications live on, evolving to meet user needs well beyond the lifespan of traditional, privately developed software.

Thumbstrips is available as a free download here. To learn more about or become a part of Intuit Labs, visit intuitlabs.com.

I probably overindulge, in fact. Some people, however, are not using them to their full potential, or simply not using them at all. It makes sense if you just have a clean browser policy, but if you’re not aware of what’s available, then you could be missing out.

Mozilla’s new Fashion Your Firefox web application is designed to make add-ons more accessible, and easier to find and install.

The existing Firefox add-ons page can be daunting. Fashion Your Firefox takes the guesswork out of add-on browsing, grouping them thematically based on over-arching types. Yes, it may be reductionist, but it also saves you a lot of aimless wandering on the add-ons page.

The categories Mozilla puts forward are meant to apply to people in general, but web workers take note: each also represents an industry or professional field.

Finder and Seeker = Research Analyst StumbleUpon and Interclue are great tools for finding connections and deepening your initial information gathering phase when conducting broad, open-ended search-based research.

Social Butterfly = Networker, Social Media Professional LinkedIn Companion is valuable for any web professional, but especially for people in the business of being connected. Yoono, Facebook, and TwitterFox are likewise great tools in the socializer’s arsenal.

Shutterbug = Freelance Photographer, Media Buyer Fotofox is a must have for the online photographer, and Cooliris makes the daunting task of sifting through thousands of photos looking for just the right image for that ad mock-up a much more pleasurable experience.

Digital Packrat = Project Manager, Managing Editor Make sure you’re on the same page wherever you go with Foxmarks. I can’t count how many times I’ve said “I wish I had that bookmark on this computer” before installing this add-on. Likewise, Delicious.

Rock Star = Musician, Concert Promoter, Agent Keep track of your own or your client’s music, track similar artists to organize tours, stay on top of trends and manage your audience.

Decorator = Design Professional Mostly frivolous, but creative professionals sometimes thrive on frivolity. These themes could provide the inspiration needed to generate that layout that’ll wow your client.

Shopaholic = Professional Shopper, eBay Powerseller eBay as a constant companion. For those of you in this field, I don’t think I need to say more.

News Junkie = Reporter, Blogger If I didn’t have Wizz RSS reader and Morning Coffee, I wouldn’t be able to do my job. Also, on a side note, ForecastFox keeps my obsessive need for weather updates under control.

Executive Assistant = Well, this one’s kinda obvious. ReminderFox will help anyone stay on top of things. This is another category great for the obsessive micro-manager.

Now that I’ve translated Fashion Your Firefox for web workers, go out and get downloading.

Add-ons can be overwhelming, so it’s great Mozilla has produced this list, but don’t stop there. As you test these, see what you like and don’t like, and use those “This is nice, but I wish I could…” moments to drive your searches for better, more suitable extensions.

• Check whether a site is down
• Look up whois information, or ping a URL
• Save information to Instaper
• Create a Remember the Milk reminder
• Add pages to del.icio.us
• Grab info from microformats

Useful though these things are, one caution: in the current version, there are well-documented ways that a command author could smuggle malicious code into your machine. So make sure you understand the consequences if you start down the road of adding this functionality.

Returning to Snowl, hot on the heels of Mozilla Lab’s call for participation in exploring the future of the browser, and the experimental Weave service, comes Mozilla’s efforts to move messaging beyond email and to the types of communication now commonplace across social networks, blogs and services such as Twitter.

Mozilla’s Myk Melez describes Snowl as a browser extension that helps users ‘follow and participate in online discussions’ and track all your conversations across various networks, services, protocols and messaging types.

Snowl purportedly aggregates messages from email services, syndicated feeds, forums and social networks and seeks to rank or prioritize them in order of importance, by varying the interface used to browse them – alternating between a Google Reader style ‘river of news‘ and a more traditional email-like three pane view.

Now this all sounds very lovely, but it’s kinda ‘meh’ – all Snowl seems to do is chop up some message data into a different presentation, there doesn’t seem to be any intelligence in analyzing the patterns of communications to figure out what’s most important and relevant to the user and those they communicate with.

Everyday, I’m hammered with a couple hundred emails, as many Twitters, probably around 1500 RSS items, dozens of SMS and MMS messages, thousands of instant messages and social network notifications, and a handful of phone calls. Many of us need tools to make sense of this soup, tools that can cross reference emailers and callers with calendar entries and locations to figure out what’s important and what can be pushed aside.

Sadly, right now, Snowl isn’t helping bring together mobile, voice and internet messaging into anything useful that addresses the problem at hand. And it’s a tough problem, requiring many different technologies and interests to work well together and some real innovation in AI and user interfaces…I’m afraid a river of news and three-pane view doesn’t cut it Mozilla.

Snowway Jose!