Mozilla has announced that it is shuttering its Test Pilot programme which allowed Firefox users to install new browser functionality as add-ons. After testing the add-ons, Mozilla incorporated the features into the browser itself or made them available as a public add-ons.
Mozilla said that those running add-on experiments can continue doing so, it will just migrate users from Test Pilot versions of the add-ons to ones publicly available on the Mozilla Add-Ons site. Some of the affected add-ons include Notes, Firefox Color, Side View, Price Wise, and Email Tabs. The Firefox Send and Firefox Lockbox experiments which are web-based services will also continue active development this year as independent products, allowing for their continued use by end users. According to Mozilla, Send and Lockbox will receive significant launches in the near future.
Anyone who visits the Test Pilot site from January 22nd will be greeted with a farewell message and visiting the webpage will also cause the Test Pilot add-on to automatically uninstall from your browser. You can also uninstall it manually, neither method will affect the other installed experiments.
Going forward, users can keep an eye on the Firefox Test Pilot blog in order to keep up with any updates to experiments.