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14 July 2009, 11:15

Gears for Firefox 3.5

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Two weeks after the release of Firefox 3.5, the Gears plug-in has now been updated to support the latest release of the popular web browser. The plug-in allows developers to access a local SQLite database to store data on a users local machine and to run JavaScript in the background, improving the performance of web applications. Such "Web Worker Threads" were already included in Firefox 3.5, as well as Apple's Safari 4 browser, but their implementations follow the proposals of the WhatWG group more closely than the Gears implementation.

The same applies to the SQL database: Google's Database API provides developers with methods such as fieldCount() and fieldName() making it easier to use than the W3C's proposed storage interface. On the other hand, it lacks the transactions and the asynchronous execution of database commands.

One of the advantages to the Gears API is that it supports a wider variety of older browsers, such as Internet Explorer 6.

(crve)

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