Firefox 76: Audio worklets and other tricks

A new version of your favourite browser is always worth looking forward to, and here we are with Firefox 76! Web platform support sees some great new additions in this release, such as Audio Worklets and Intl improvements, on the JavaScript side. Also, we’ve added a number of nice improvements into Firefox DevTools to make development easier and quicker.

#developer tools #javascript #programming #js

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High Performance Web Audio with AudioWorklet in Firefox

AudioWorklet was first introduced to the web in 2018. Ever since, Mozilla has been investigating how to deliver a “no-compromises” implementation of this feature in the WebAudio API. This week, Audio Worklets landed in the release of Firefox 76. We’re ready to start bridging the gap between what can be done with audio in native applications and what is available on the web.

Now developers can leverage AudioWorklet to write arbitrary audio processing code, enabling the creation of web apps that weren’t possible before. This exciting new functionality raises the bar for emerging web experiences like 3D games, VR, and music production.

#audio #featured article #firefox #firefox releases #web apis #audio worklets #audioworklet #web audio api #webaudio

Coming through with Firefox 82 – Mozilla Hacks

As October ushers in the tail-end of the year, we are pushing Firefox 82 out the door. This time around we finally enable support for the Media Session API, provide some new CSS pseudo-selector behaviours, close some security loopholes involving the Window.name property, and provide inspection for server-sent events in our developer tools.

This blog post provides merely a set of highlights; for all the details, check out the following:

• Firefox 82 for developers on MDN
• Firefox 82 end-user release notes

Inspecting server-sent events

Server-sent events allow for an inversion of the traditional client-initiated web request model, with a server sending new data to a web page at any time by pushing messages. In this release we’ve added the ability to inspect server-sent events and their message contents using the Network Monitor.

You can go to the Network Monitor, select the file that is sending the server-sent events, and view the received messages in the Response tab on the right-hand panel.

For more information, check out our Inspecting server-sent events guide.

Web platform updates

Now let’s look at the web platform additions we’ve got in store in 82.

Media Session API

The Media Session API enables two main sets of functionality:

1. First of all, it provides a way to customize media notifications. It does this by providing metadata for display by the operating system for the media your web app is playing.
2. Second, it provides event handlers that the browser can use to access platform media keys such as hardware keys found on keyboards, headsets, remote controls, and software keys found in notification areas and on lock screens of mobile devices. So you can seamlessly control web-provided media via your device, even when not looking at the web page.

#developer tools #featured article #firefox #firefox releases #css #firefox #firefox 82 #firefox developer edition #firefox release #web extensions

Debugging Variables With Watchpoints in Firefox 72

The Firefox Devtools team, along with our community of code contributors, have been working hard to pack Firefox 72 full of improvements. This post introduces the watchpoints feature that’s available right now in Firefox Developer Edition! Keep reading to get up to speed on watchpoints and how to use them.

#debugging #developer tools #featured article #firefox #firefox releases #breakpoints #debugger #debugger for firefox #firefox devtools #firefox visual studio code extension #watchpoints

Firefox 81 Release Kills High-Severity Code-Execution Bugs

Mozilla patched high-severity vulnerabilities with the release of Firefox 81 and Firefox ESR 78.3, including several that could be exploited to run arbitrary code.

Two severe bugs (CVE-2020-15674 and CVE-2020-15673) are errors in the browser’s memory-safety protections, which prevent memory access issues like buffer overflows. CVE-2020-15674 was reported in Firefox 80, while CVE-2020-15673 was reported in Firefox 80 and Firefox ESR 78.2. Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release) is a Firefox version that’s based on an official release for desktop, for use by organizations who need extended support for mass deployments.

“Some of these bugs showed evidence of memory corruption, and we presume that with enough effort some of these could have been exploited to run arbitrary code,” according to a Mozilla Foundation security advisory, released on Tuesday.

#vulnerabilities #web security #buffer error #cve-2020-15673 #cve-2020-15674 #cve-2020-15675 #firefox #firefox 80 #firefox 81 #firefox esr 78.3 #memory safety #mozilla #mozilla foundation #use-after-free #vulnerability #webgl

Looking fine with Firefox 89

While we’re sitting here feeling a bit frumpy after a year with reduced activity, Firefox 89 has smartened up and brings with it a slimmed down, slightly more minimalist interface.

Along with this new look, we get some great styling features including a force-colors feature for media queries and better control over how fonts are displayed. The long awaited [top-level ](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Operators/await#top-level-await)await keyword for JavaScript modules is now enabled, as well as the PerformanceEventTiming interface, which is another addition to the performance suite of APIs: 89 really has been working out!

This blog post provides merely a set of highlights; for all the details, check out the following:

• Firefox 89 for developers on MDN
• Firefox 89 end-user release notes

forced-colors media feature

The forced-colors CSS media feature detects if a user agent restricts the color palette used on a web page. For instance Windows has a High Contrast mode. If it’s turned on, using forced-colors: active within a CSS media query would apply the styles nested inside.

In this example we have a .button class that declares a box-shadow property, giving any HTML element using that class a nice drop-shadow.

If forced-colors mode is active, this shadow would not be rendered, so instead we’re declaring a border to make up for the shadow loss:

.button {
  border: 0;
  padding: 10px;
  box-shadow: -2px -2px 5px gray, 2px 2px 5px gray;
}

@media (forced-colors: active) {
  .button {
    /* Use a border instead, since box-shadow is forced to 'none' in forced-colors mode */
    border: 2px ButtonText solid;
  }
}

Better control for displayed fonts

Firefox 89 brings with it the line-gap-override, ascent-override and descent-override CSS properties. These allow developers more control over how fonts are displayed. The following snippet shows just how useful these properties are when using a local fallback font:

@font-face {
  font-family: web-font;
  src: url("<https://example.com/font.woff>");
}

@font-face {
  font-family: local-font;
  src: local(Local Font);
  ascent-override: 90%;
  descent-override: 110%;
  line-gap-override: 120%;
}

These new properties help to reduce layout shift when fonts are loading, as developers can better match the intricacies of a local font with a web font. They work alongside the size-adjust property which is currently behind a preference in Firefox 89.

Top-level await

If you’ve been writing JavaScript over the past few years you’ve more than likely become familiar with async functions. Now the await keyword, usually confined to use within an async function, has been given independence and allowed to go it alone. As long as it stays within modules that is.

In short, this means JavaScript modules that have child modules using top level await wait for that child to execute before they themselves run. All while not blocking other child modules from loading.

Here is a very small example of a module using the >a href=”https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Fetch_API”>Fetch API and specifying await within the export statement. Any modules that include this will wait for the fetch to resolve before running any code.

#featured article #firefox #firefox releases #mdn #css #firefox