Firefox 3.5 was released recently and includes a bunch of useful enhancements but a big fly in the ointment for applications like ‡biblios.net that use the Google Gears plugin. For some reason, Google did not manage to get a version of the add-on compatible with FF 3.5 ready when the new browser version was launched, so apps that relied on it broke.

Fortunately, Google has now released a compatible version of the plugin. Tonight I upgraded my installation of Firefox to 3.5, updated Google Gears, and tested ‡biblios, and I’m happy to report that it’s now working.

There were a couple quirks:

1. When I upgraded Firefox, it didn’t detect that a new version of the add-on is available. I had to remove the old version of the add-on, then go to http://gears.google.com/ to install Gears.
2. When I went there, it didn’t offer me the chance to install Gears. I eventually figured out that I could go directly to the terms of use form to force the download and installation.