Mozilla.org reports that Firefox 1.0 has been released. This is the major release that has been talked about for some time, signifying that Firefox is finally out of "beta" and "preview" releases, although I have to say that I've been using it since version 0.5 or so without too many problems. The complete release notes have instructions for downloading and installing. Most of the "new" features have been ironed out in earlier versions, so this is primarily a release that addresses bugs and stability issues, and I must say that I've been satisfied on both scores for some time now.

Late last week Mozilla Thunderbird 0.9 was also released; here are the
release notes for that version. I've been a convert to Thunderbird for a while now as well, migrating from Eudora a couple of releases ago. One of my only remaining wishes for Thunderbird is an easier way to synchronize Palm address book contacts, something that is possible via an extension but is too buggy to be reliable. As an e-mail application, I have only good things to say; the Junk filter does a very good job culling through Spam, and the application has been rock solid for me.

If you haven't already checked out these applications, I highly recommend them both. In my opinion, they are head and shoulders above their Micro$oft counterparts, both in terms of the features they offer and in the security they provide; I could easily elaborate for some time, but I've posted about that enough. If you've already become a convert, you'll probably want to upgrade to these latest stable releases.

Update: As czar pointed out in the comments, the Firefox extension site is running slowly because of the huge demand, but that should stabilize after a couple of days. Most of my extensions transparently made the upgrade, but I am waiting on updates for a couple.

The launch of Firefox 1.0 was definitely big news among bloggers and the technologically savvy, but articles about this release have quickly appeared in the mainstream press, appearing on the websites of CNN, USA Today, and the BBC, to name just a few. I'm glad to see Firefox finally accorded the respect it deserves...