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Sun Slips Firefox Extension Into Java Update

Posted by timothy on from the we-thought-you-wanted-it dept.

pcardno writes "It seems it's not just Microsoft that have spotted a good opportunity to distribute their software through Firefox Addons. On installing the latest annoying, sysbar bubble based Java update, my Firefox informed me that I had a wonderful new Java addon automatically. Here's the addon screenshot. Yes, I could opt out of it, but why are Sun installing Addons to my Firefox without me making specific choices in the application itself? To be clear — I have never chosen to install this Addon, yet it has been installed without my permission with the latest Java Update."

15 of 311 comments (clear)

  1. You're right--convenience sucks by perspectival · · Score: 5, Informative

    Yes, now you have Java working in Firefox. Turn it off if you don't like it. Simple.

    1. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by davester666 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Same with Acrobat Reader (at least on Mac OS X, probably also on Windows), where Adobe installs, both without warning OR notification that they install Adobe AIR. And they don't use Apple's installer, so you can't even find out what files they've spammed to you system.

      Acrobat Reader 8-109 Mb
      Acrobat Reader 9-190 Mb

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    2. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by techno-vampire · · Score: 2, Informative
      so you are opting in.

      You are opting in to the update, not the Firefox extension. That's installed silently as part of the update. The only reason it was detected was that Firefox told him that it had been installed, after the fact. If it were, as you claim, opt-in, he would have been asked if he wanted it before it was installed. See the difference?

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    3. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 4, Informative

      You're downloading the wrong packages. If you download from the main java download page it doesn't include the extra crapware.

      It will still show a splashscreen for OpenOffice though. Shocking. Quite shocking.

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    4. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by meatmanek · · Score: 4, Informative

      There's a nifty program called fseventer which lets you watch file changes in real time.

    5. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      I have no idea what you're talking about, because I have no idea where else you'd get Java from. My experiences come from downloading Java from the very link you gave.

      Which means that, apparently, there is an even more bloated version of Java out there.

      That's a scary thought.

    6. Re:You're right--convenience sucks by mrclisdue · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's like throwing a stone to knock an apple out of a tree, only to find a worm in the apple.

  2. Old by RockMFR · · Score: 5, Informative

    I mentioned this during the discussion about the Microsoft add-on three weeks ago. How is this news now?

    1. Re:Old by Cl1mh4224rd · · Score: 2, Informative

      I mentioned this during the discussion about the Microsoft add-on three weeks ago. How is this news now?

      And it's been going on for longer than that; a few months at least.

      http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=921325&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=15

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  3. Unlike Microsoft, this one benign and documented by salahx · · Score: 4, Informative

    All this plugin does is speed up loading of Java applets. Its benign, and Sun provides instructions on how to turn it off: http://www.java.com/en/download/help/quickstarter.xml .

  4. Re:some info, please by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 5, Informative

    It's an automatic update watcher that runs all the time in your taskbar and keeps your JRE up to date.

    It's an optional feature that is required by absolutely nothing, and one of the things it does is updates your browser. Apparently now it adds an extra update that does some prefetching that makes java load faster, and we must all riot because we didn't specifically ask for that one.

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  5. Re:You get what you pay for. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    or mozilla can fix the fucking bug.

    https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=446139

  6. Re:Even mozilla is doing this though... by perryizgr8 · · Score: 1, Informative

    well nothing of that sort happens when you update firefox. you must have installed some sort of crap from yahoo, like messenger.

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  7. You missed something! by Trahald · · Score: 2, Informative

    You only noticed the firefox addon !
    Ha Ha. They also sneaked a service in there. Check out your control panel services thing. There's a new service "Java Quick Start".

  8. Re:You get what you pay for. by leenks · · Score: 2, Informative

    Java has been released under the GPL (pretty much all of it, bar a few small parts that are unable to be released due to patent / licencing issues). The Java you download from Sun is under their licence because it contains those patent uncumbered pieces still.

    For linux you can download IcedTea which is essentially a build of the open sourced Java7 code from openjdk.org.