New In Firefox Nightly Builds: Copilot Chatbot, New Tab Widgets, JPEG-XL Support
The blog OMG Ubuntu notes that Microsoft Copilot chatbot support has been added in the latest Firefox Nightly builds. "Firefox's sidebar already offers access to popular chatbots, including OpenAI's ChatGPT, Anthropic's Claude, Le Chat's Mistral and Google's Gemini. It previously offered HuggingChat too."
As the testing bed for features Mozilla wants to add to stable builds (though not all make it — eh, rounded bottom window corners?), this is something you can expect to find in a future stable update... Copilot in Firefox offers the same features as other chatbots: text prompts, upload files or images, generate images, support for entering voice prompts (for those who fancy their voice patterns being analysed and trained on). And like those other chatbots, there are usage limits, privacy policies, and (for some) account creation needed. In testing, Copilot would only generate half a summary for a webpage, telling me it was too long to produce without me signing in/up for an account.
On a related note, Mozilla has updated stable builds to let third-party chatbots summarise web pages when browsing (in-app callout alerts users to the 'new' feature). Users yet to enable chatbots are subtly nudged to do so each time they right-click on web page. [Between "Take Screenshot" and "View Page Source" there's a menu option for "Ask an AI Chatbot."] Despite making noise about its own (sluggish, but getting faster) on-device AI features that are privacy-orientated, Mozilla is bullish on the need for external chatbots.
The article suggests Firefox wants to keep up with Edge and Chrome (which can "infuse first-party AI features directly.") But it adds that Firefox's nightly build is also testing some non-AI features, like new task and timer widgets on Firefox's New Tab page. And "In Firefox Labs, there are is an option to enable JPEG XL support, a super-optimised version of JPEG that is gaining traction (despite Google's intransigence).
Other Firefox news:
There's good news "for users still clinging to Windows 7," writes the Register. Support for Firefox Extended Support Release 115 "is being extended until March 2026."
Google "can keep paying companies like Mozilla to make Google the default search engine, as long as these deals aren't exclusive anymore," reports the blog It's FOSS News. (The judge wrote that "Cutting off payments from Google almost certainly will impose substantial — in some cases, crippling — downstream harms to distribution partners..." according to CNBC — especially since the non-profit Mozilla Foundation gets most of its annual revenue from its Google's search deal.)
Don't forget you can now search your tabs, bookmarks and browsing history right from the address bar with keywords like @bookmarks, @tabs, and @history. (And @actions pulls up a list of actions like "Open private window" or "Restart Firefox").
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Inside Patrick Schwarzenegger's star-studded wedding to Abby Champion… as he beams in white tux and father Arnie holds court
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Will Smith seen publicly with wife Jada Pinkett for first time in 10 months amid bizarre marriage arrangement
The pair - who were last pictured together on a rare date night in November 2024 -tied the knot back in 1997 and are parents to son Jaden, 27, and daughter Willow, 24.
Jamaican PM pictured with Sussexes 'called the King to say they'd not told him they were coming'
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Shamed surgeon who chopped off both his legs in sex fetish blew his £500k compo on a hot tub, Playstation watches and a new car
Dr Neil Hopper, 49, used dry ice to freeze his legs to the extent that they required amputation - then claimed he had developed sepsis following a family camping trip.
Moment knifeman slashes neck of police officer before colleagues wrestle him to the ground during arrest
Glynn Leedell, 46, charged at an officer responding to reports of threatening behaviour at Kimberworth Park in Rotherham on July 17. He inflicted a nasty wound to the back of the policeman's neck.
Ronan Keating publicly defends Rylan Clark by dedicating song to him live onstage after backlash to TV star's controversial immigration comments
Rylan, 36, was embroiled in controversy last week, after his comments about migrants on This Morning, during a discussion about Reform leader Nigel Farage 's plans for mass deportations.
HANNAH BETTS: I'm a beauty editor - here are my five top gel polishes which are TPO-free and non-toxic
European officials banned TPO (trimethylbenzoyl diphenylphosphine oxide), found in some gel polishes over fears it could be toxic. For now, it remains on sale here in the UK.
They've got a type! As Kevin Costner's new love's likeness to his estranged wife is revealed, which male stars have dated their ex's doppelgängers
Kevin Costner's new romance has got tongues wagging - for a very intriguing reason.
Wealthy businessman is ordered to tear down Indian gastropub built 188m from Shakespeare's wife Anne Hathaway's Cottage
Rakesh Singh, 57, has lost his battle over The Cask N Tandoor (pictured), which sits just 188m (618ft) from Anne Hathaway's Cottage in the village of Shottery, Warwickshire.
Dr Michael Mosley's widow Clare says she and their children returned to Greek island where he died on the anniversary of his death
The popular broadcaster and Daily Mail columnist was tragically found dead near the resort of Agia Marina on Symi last June, four days after he went missing while on a walk in searing 40C heat.
The Essex teachers banned in the last academic year because of their misconduct
Some teachers were banned for life, while others even faced prison time
Broadcasters are ordered to censor any Donald Trump protests at US Open as President gatecrashes Jannik Sinner-Carlos Alcaraz final
Broadcasters have been ordered to censor any protests or reactions to president Donald Trump when he attends Sunday's US Open men's singles final between Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.
EXPOSED: In lawless Britain, the shops where smirking staff offered undercover reporters £20 for iPhones they KNEW were stolen - and even told us which models they preferred
A young Pakistani shop assistant inspects the device. His eyes widen as he reads the message on the screen: 'This phone has been stolen. Please return.'
Man, 41, dies after being hit by a car near Essex woodland
He was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics
Neighbour-from-hell businessman who waged war on the couple next door during two-year campaign where he sprayed water at them and even damaged their bird house is handed restraining order
Peter Rushton, 43, was accused of abuse and harassment that included setting up a sophisticated CCTV system that he used to follow his neighbours' movements and set off an alarm when he saw them.
Myleene Klass took off her engagement ring and fiance Simon has vanished from her socials. Now worried friends tell KATIE HIND: 'It's like he doesn't exist...'
Tickling the ivories with a lively rendition of Chappell Roan's hit Pink Pony Club at London's St Pancras station last week, Myleene Klass entertained the throng of commuters.
The massive Essex Tesco where shoppers 'go in for milk and come out with a new sofa'
Its said to be the largest in the UK, too
'Cyber warfare defence colleges' to be set up with £182million government funding
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32% of Senior Developers Say Half Their Shipped Code is AI-Generated
In July 791 professional coders were surveyed by Fastly about their use of AI coding tools, reports InfoWorld. The results?
"About a third of senior developers (10+ years of experience) say over half their shipped code is AI-generated," Fastly writes, "nearly two and a half times the rate reported by junior developers (0-2 years of experience), at 13%."
"AI will bench test code and find errors much faster than a human, repairing them seamlessly. This has been the case many times," one senior developer said...
Senior developers were also more likely to say they invest time fixing AI-generated code. Just under 30% of seniors reported editing AI output enough to offset most of the time savings, compared to 17% of juniors. Even so, 59% of seniors say AI tools help them ship faster overall, compared to 49% of juniors. Just over 50% of junior developers say AI makes them moderately faster. By contrast, only 39% of more senior developers say the same.
But senior devs are more likely to report significant speed gains: 26% say AI makes them a lot faster, double the 13% of junior devs who agree. One reason for this gap may be that senior developers are simply better equipped to catch and correct AI's mistakes... Nearly 1 in 3 developers (28%) say they frequently have to fix or edit AI-generated code enough that it offsets most of the time savings. Only 14% say they rarely need to make changes. And yet, over half of developers still feel faster with AI tools like Copilot, Gemini, or Claude.
Fastly's survey isn't alone in calling AI productivity gains into question. A recent randomized controlled trial (RCT) of experienced open-source developers found something even more striking: when developers used AI tools, they took 19% longer to complete their tasks. This disconnect may come down to psychology. AI coding often feels smooth... but the early speed gains are often followed by cycles of editing, testing, and reworking that eat into any gains. This pattern is echoed both in conversations we've had with Fastly developers and in many of the comments we received in our survey...
Yet, AI still seems to improve developer job satisfaction. Nearly 80% of developers say AI tools make coding more enjoyable... Enjoyment doesn't equal efficiency, but in a profession wrestling with burnout and backlogs, that morale boost might still count for something.
Fastly quotes one developer who said their AI tool "saves time by using boilerplate code, but it also needs manual fixes for inefficiencies, which keep productivity in check."
The study also found the practice of green coding "goes up sharply with experience. Just over 56% of junior developers say they actively consider energy use in their work, while nearly 80% among mid- and senior-level engineers consider this when coding."
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