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Firefox Users Stay Ahead On the Update Curve
Reader Alex links to news of a study comparing the currency and patch level of various Web browsers, excerpting:
"Firefox users were far and away the most likely to use the latest version, with an overwhelming 83.3 percent running an updated browser on any given day. However, despite Firefox's single click integrate auto-update functionality, 16.7 percent of Firefox users still continue to access the Web with an outdated version of the browser, researchers said. The study also revealed that the majority of Safari users (65.3) percent were likely to use the latest version of the browser between December 2007 and June 2008, after Safari version 3 became available. Meanwhile, Microsoft's Internet Explorer users ranked last in terms of safe browsing. Between January 2007 and June 2008, less than half of IE users — 47.6 percent — were running the most secure browser version during the same time period."
This is understandable, considering the level of obnoxiousness. Firefox gives you a discrete notice that it has downloaded an update, and you can choose not to install it right away, but instead having it installed next time you start firefox. Windows Updates are so damn obnoxious that I always consider turning it off and doing my updates manually. I know how to update my computer manually, but I suspect the bulk of users out there, just get frustrated about the constant bells and whistles of Windows Update, that they turn it off and leave it like that.
The majority of IE users use IE "because it's there." These people see no reason to download a different browser because one is already provided for them. These are the same people that usually end up relying on Automatic Updates to secure their browser, in most cases not even aware that these updates were taking place to begin with. Chances are that these people don't know that their browser even has updates, much less that they are running an insecure, outdated browser.
Users of alternative browsers, by contrast, use their browser deliberately. They know that IE is there, but they blatantly decide to go against the tide and use something else. Whatever the reason for this depends on the user, but most of them share this common trait. Said browsers can't use Automatic Updates, so they must have their own update checking mechanisms in place. Every alternative browser I've used will check every so often for an update and display a pop-up for the user. The user then knows that their browser is out-of-date. Such users also tend to want the latest version, again for various reasons. Firefox is a bit more aggressive that most, downloading the update by default and installing it regardless of whether the user chooses to have it done now or later, which better explains its higher percentage.
Oh, wait.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
for me the reason is not the need to reboot but the constant nagging reminding me every five minutes that i need to restart my machine. I f*ing know! a tray icon with a warning sign is good enough. I will do it as soon as i am done with what i am doing. If they don't believe that turning off reminder is a good idea at least let me change the reminder frequency.
Well I still use version 1.5.0.12. Just minimize those annoying upgrade popups every time they pop up. 10 clicks & they just give an error & next day it's another popup for another upgrade. You mean those weren't advertizements? Well, probably just destroyed someone's TimeWarner stock.
Now that it's mentioned, there really is something about Firefox's update feature that gets you to install and use the latest version. Maybe it's that it's so easy and doesn't mess up anything, e.g., by making drastic changes to the appearance of the browser, etc. I would say that most of the nearly 20% who are running outdated versions are probably the paranoid type who think that updating their software will mean introducing problems, you know, the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." But this study is totally correct: Of all the browsers, Firefox makes updating the easiest.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
Not to mention Apple sneaking in Safari with an iTunes critical update and many programs having regressions in updates.
Can we trust Apple not to issue a firmware update that makes the iPod stop working with 3rd party media players?
I myself keep everything updated (as much as Ubuntu repos let me anyway). But things like kernel updates force my to recompile my wifi driver so I can understand how people don't upgrade.
Unicode in Slashdot
No reason to fix what isn't broke.
Oh it's broke. You just don't know.
Firefox users are already going to be people who care more about what software they're using and security. IE users are everyone who doesn't really care and never actually chose what browser to use, everyone who doesn't know too much about computers and on top those who do care and chose IE, but those are only a minority of the IE user group. So it's logical that in the firefox user group people are going to update faster, it's not directly related to the browser but to the user group.
I wonder how much of the old Firefox usage is old installs in Linux? You can't use the built-in updater if you installed the RPM/DEB because the permissions are (or should be) wrong for letting you write to the folder. AFAIK there's only a few distros who have moved to Firefox 3 so far, so the rest would be showing up as out-dated.
Similarly for Windows, if they're counting Firefox 3 as "up to date" then how many people are still on old v2s because they don't know about v3?
Newer is NOT always better.
.59 only to find that ctrl/shift + mouse clicks were bugged, therefore screwing me in WoW. Had to revert back.
Anyone who uses linux should know this.
For example, wine v0.9.58 works perfectly for me; I blindly updated to
Usually, updates are a good thing, but not always.
I use Camino as my browser on my Mac and choose to leave the home page as the default "Camino Start" page. Its very minimalist, just shows a small Google search box, and a link to the latest version which changes colour to red if my version is outdated.
No in-your-face messages, no irritating popups, no external syncing software... though I guess it only works if you keep it as your home page. Makes sense to use a feature that's built into every web browser (sarcasm aside): the ability to load a web page!
Cheers, ~ Ruben
I know you were joking, but: (1) You can tell Firefox you'll restart later AND IT LISTENS TO YOU. You don't have to worry about it restarting randomly in the middle of a Counter Strike league match or some such. (2) When Firefox restarts, you're given nearly the same situation you left it in. Worst comes to worst you have to re-find where your youtube video was. When Windows restarts you're left crying 'cuz you're out for the season. (Yes, a few years back Windows did restarting during a CAL match. No, it didn't cost us the match: I sucked to much to make a difference - we'd have lost either way :D)
"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire
How am I suppose to tell grandma to do that.. frankly if you need a command line to do that it's not ready for desktop.
Looking at google analytics for some high traffic sites... No, don't really see that overwhelming majority of business users visiting to make a difference to be honest.
Looking at the browser versions, the amount of users that use IE6 definitely exceeds (by almost four times) the amount of users on business connections too. So I really doubt that this is something caused by big businesses.
I would say using a outdated version of IE is sad... But I find using IE is quite sad to begin with.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Out of curiosity, what percentage of the internet is still on Dialup?
I find that autoupdates are impossible over a dialup connection so I switch them off. I'm willing to bet that this is the most common reason for people using an old version of Firefox.
You're approaching this too much from a geek's perspective. Updating "the system" is too esoteric for the majority of users. If the user has to be bothered with such a concept as a package manager, it's bad UI.
Anyway, microsoft has a package manager, somewhat, and they have a consistent auto-update system that takes care of dependancies. And yet half of IE users use an old version.
Such a standard exists not so much as a standard under Linux. Each distribution does this.
The reason is that each distribution CAN do this because of GPL or other licenses.
When you are talking about closed source, this will become almost impossible.
Obviously Microsoft can do this for their own product. What if you run Opera and Photoshop as well? Microsoft can not be asked to do the updates for them, because they did not provide them.
It could work with some sort of contract, but then there are companies who might not be able to get such a contract. This due to unwillingness at both sides.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
(Warning: Self-promotion)
In my eWEEK column on this study I point out numerous problems with it. Many have been mentioned by others.
The main issue is that the study is based on user-agent string data from Google's logs, and Microsoft does not supply minor version information in that string, unlike Firefox, Safari and others. Microsoft considers this to be an "information disclosure vulnerability" because it would help an attacker to commit version-specific attacks.
Because of this, the authors only know about IE major versions (5, 6. 7, 8) and decided that all IE7 users were secure, while nobody else was. Microsoft is still providing security updates for IE5 and IE6; while they are not as secure as IE7 for a variety of reasons, it's not reasonable to lump them into a group with people who don't update their browser. Conversely, if you have IE7 and haven't applied any of the security updates to it, the study says you're up to date.
Be that as it may, as others have said, the issue here is that business users use IE and the other browsers have minimal footprint in it. Firefox, by default, has no support for managed updates, and IT in a big company would (make that should) never allow users to apply updates willy-nilly to their systems. Another point is that while Microsoft supports old version for years, at the demand of their customers, Mozilla withdraws all support for old versions within 6 months of a new one being released. In fact, support for Firefox 2 will end in December of this year. Businesses won't tolerate this. IE5 support on Windows 2000 will continue till 2010 and IE6 as late as 2015.
Unlikely, anybody knowledgeable enough to not be running an admin account in Windows is knowledgeable enough to know when a new version is out.
I suppose it's possible, but considering the many applications that don't work right as a non-admin user, I'd be surprised if those people were the ones not updating.
And yet half of IE users use an old version.
Yes, but I'm sure that a lot of them prefer IE 6 to IE 7. For me IE 6 was good, rendered pages rather quickly, had a decent looking UI, sure it didn't have tabs, but that wasn't a big deal for me. I had seen IE 7 on another person's computer and I decided not to upgrade to it, it's UI was ugly and it seemed to be a bloated version of IE 6, sure it was more secure but really, when running a Windows box, security isn't that big of a deal. I later wiped the HD and installed Ubuntu.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Lets see... From installing Firefox 3 on my EEE from a directory in my home directory, I still am running at a limited user (as in not root) and can auto-update. You can auto-update just fine as long as Firefox isn't in your /usr/bin directory. And considering that just about every Linux user uses Firefox, I expect that just about every Linux user will run as a limited user.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Actually, the Windows XP way is to run "Computer Management", then go to "Services" and stop the appropriate service. Computer Management is found inside Administrative Tools, which by default appears in Control Panel. You can also make it appear in other locations. No idea where they put it in Vista, but it makes actual logical sense in Windows XP. I'm not really sure what they were thinking, changing the XP GUI layout so much.
Microsoft is way way WAY behind the curve on basically everything but market position, but boy did they get XP right (for a very Microsoftian value of "right".)
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The problem with Internet Explorer is that the version of your OS determine if you can upgrade to the latest version or not. For example, Windows 2000 users can't use Windows Internet Explorer 7. It simply won't install. So they have to keep using Microsoft Internet Explorer 6. I even suspect IE 7 to require Windows XP Service Pack 2. Perhaps Internet Explorer 8 will require Windows Vista who knows... So many Internet Explorer users don't update because they don't want to but rather because they can't. On the other hand, browsers like Opera, Mozilla Firefox or SeaMonkey allow you to update whatever your OS version is. I even installed latest SeaMonkey painlessly on a Windows 98 box...