John Slater, the Creative Director over at Mozilla, has given some early insight into the Firefox 3 website redesign process. Just like with Firefox 2, a new website will be accompanying the next big milestone release of the browser which is planned for early next year.
There four different design directions that they are considering: global, agile, open, and for the people by the people. The different designs can be viewed here, but instead of making you shuffle through several different pages we decided to thumbnail a bulk of the different designs below. Keep in mind that these are just concepts at this stage, and are likely to change before they hit final form.
Before we jump into all of the different mockups I wanted to point out a few general observations that I’ve made that is consistent throughout the designs:
- One of the common issues I noticed in the designs is that the download button doesn’t pop out and slap you in the face. In the current design the download button is a bright green, and it’s nearly impossible to miss! It’s almost as if they are trying to make the download buttons blend in this time around.
- An abundance of text! Almost all of the designs, with the exception of the “Agile” ones, could definitely turn people off who hate reading. I definitely think that they should have a “click here to read about more features” link somewhere, but don’t try and list out every feature on the main page.
If I had to pick a winner it would be the “Agile” set of designs. It’s got a classy look to it, the download button is semi-prominent, and it provides a nice screenshot of what users will see after installing the browser. What would be really cool is if they try to detect the user’s operating system, and display the screenshot that corresponds to the OS they’re running!
Okay, now it’s time to checkout the mockups. After you get done looking at them be sure to drop off a comment below with which designs you like the best.
–Global–
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–Agile–
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–Open–
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–For the People, By the People–
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Agile seems to be the smoothest looking design. I help people all the time and I think all the other busy designs would confuse people and make it more difficult to download Firefox.
Nice designs specially the ‘Open’ and ‘Agile’ designs but I think the [url=[mozilla.com]]current design[/url] is the best
btw, the version and size in 2nd and 4th pic is wrong
The ‘Open’ and ‘Agile’ designs are nice but I think the current design (for ff2) is the best
btw, the size and version in ‘Agile’ and ‘For the People, By the People’ screenshots are wrong
I think the Open design is best. I love blue but I think the blue is too dark in Agile. I think the download button should be the one they use in Agile. Open’s download button blends in too much like it is. I think you have a good idea Ryan about detecting the user’s operating system and displaying the appropriate screen shot. That would be a nice touch.
“Agile” is hands down the best theme for the new website.
First two are OK I guess.
3rd one is just ugly.
4th one is a mess.
Looking at all the options, I’ll take the “Agile” theme. The blue shade looks great.
I like what Firefox is doing with their website designs.
Regards,
Omar.-
I would have to say that ‘Agile’ is my favorite also.
They’re still gonna tweaks these, right? Honestly, none of these would look good as the Firefox website. I do respect the people who took the time to give it a try though, I know how hard it can be to develop a website design.
My favorite thing about this is that Mozilla is such a great open-source company. There’s nothing we can’t find out about what they’re doing, and not like we have to dig for information, but they’re very open about it. Like with this website redesign and the betas! So cool!
Mozilla now has a Firefox support forum open to public though it is still being worked on.
[blog.mozilla.com]
I like Open the most among those four but they should change the grey to some other colour..Agile also seems to require reading….People is okay…Global is horrible and unbearable.
I’m glad to see that most of you agree with Agile being the best in the mix.
Nah, I’m sure they will change quite a bit by the time they are released, and they’ll do a lot of usability testing before launching a new site I assume. I think they are primarily using these designs for layouts, and the color schemes will be worked on to intrigue the users.