Firefox v157 beta 5 addresses nearly 20 bugs including an annoying Windows taskbar issue

The latest Firefox v157 beta fixes various experience-breaking bugs and also addresses a complaint about the Windows taskbar whenever full-screen mode is activated.

Before getting to the main list, I’ll briefly touch on the Windows issue. Due to a bug, the taskbar at the bottom would show up even after entering full-screen mode while playing a video. It happens with all videos in full-screen mode, and it’s specific to Firefox, so it isn’t an issue in other browsers. This might interrupt content and just looks distracting, since full-screen mode isn’t supposed to show the taskbar.

A Mozilla employee responded to the post, acknowledging the issue. The company is actively working on a fix for this issue, which should ship with the stable v157 update. The fix is already included in the 5th beta of the version as well.

Moving on to the rest of the changes, this update fixes almost 20 bugs. The screenshot attached below shows the Bugzilla changelog, which describes some of the changes. 

Here are the ones I found important:

1. The VPN feature on Firefox for Android is turned on by default in over 200 countries. The built-in VPN is no longer limited to a small market.
2. Various issues with Firefox crashing on some Android devices have been fixed.
3. PDFs opened as email attachments would not show a selection highlight, though the copying action still worked.
4. SVG issues and stutters were fixed.
5. The VPN toolbar notification dot has been removed.
6. Issues with Firefox crashing on Windows after sleep mode have been solved.
7. The Windows full-screen taskbar that I mentioned at the beginning of the article.
8. Other bug fixes, including extra VPN location telemetry on Android, a Nimbus switch, and more.

This is not a public release, and since it’s a beta, bugs are expected. It’s not recommended as your main browser if you’re not a developer or tester.

Note: Not all the changes mentioned in the official Bugzilla list have been mentioned here; the highlights have been covered.

In other Firefox news, the much-anticipated (and polarizing) Nova redesign is slated to launch with the stable version of v157, which is due on September 29. The company recently broke down all the changes, and we covered that here.

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