The most mature of the betas here is that of Firefox, whose Firefox 3 beta 5 gives a glimpse of hundreds of new features. Most of them are minor improvements, but some are significant enhancements to usability. Users will appreciate enhanced auto-completion in the address bar, so you can now type in a few letters from the middle of a Web address--not just the first few letters--and Firefox will display a list of addresses that match it.

Standard features like downloading become easier to use through a new pause button and other enhancements to the download window. When you click on an e-mail adŽdress, it can be set to open a Web-based mail application like Gmail instead of a mail program like Outlook Express.

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Firefox 3 gives me most of what I want from Firefox, such as the ability to resize the search box in the upper-right-hand corner, though I still want a few more things. Bookmark management is now a bit easier, with a star in the address bar that appears when a page is already bookmarked-so that I can click on the star and change some of the bookmark properties.

But I'd like it more if the items that I can change in the menu available from the star were also available in the Properties menu, which appears when I right-click on the bookmark itself.

Right now I have to manage book marks with two different interfaces that have two different sets of options, and I have to remember which option is on which menu. Also, the one thing I always want to do with a bookmark is rename it so that it takes up a minimum of space, and Firefox still doesn't give me a ReŽname item on a bookmark's right-click menu. I have to go to the full Properties menu instead.