As you’ve no doubt heard, Firefox 3 Beta 3 is now available as a download. Mozilla is stressing that this is a download at your own discretion, after all it is a beta release. I downloaded a copy and I gotta say it feels finished to me… it certainly is faster than 2.0.0.12.

This beta feels so close to done that I would use it as my primary browser except all my add-ons which I use on a daily basis are currently not supported, who knows how long it will be until they are. I just ran across an interesting article at Lifehacker.com detailing how to turn off compatibility mode in Firefox which would allow you to run your add-ons in Firefox 3.

Excerpt from lifehacker:

If you’re an impatient risk-taker who needs your extensions back NOW, here’s a cheat that may get them to work. Big Honking Warning: Only do this if you’re willing to deal with possible bleeding edge extension bugs and security risks!

• Type about:config into Firefox’s address bar and click the “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button.
• Right-click anywhere. Choose New>Boolean. Make the name of your new config value extensions.checkCompatibility and set it to false.
• Make another new boolean pair called extensions.checkUpdateSecurity and set the value to false.
• Restart Firefox.

All goes well, and any extensions that aren’t yet officially Firefox 3 Beta 3 compatible and don’t have secure updates (like Better Gmail and friends) will be enabled. Final warning: These changes may lead to unexpected wacky behavior. Proceed at your own risk!