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No Additional Firefox 4 Security Updates
CWmike writes "Unnoticed in the Tuesday release of Firefox 5 was Mozilla's decision to retire Firefox 4, shipped just three months ago. Mozilla spelled out vulnerabilities it had patched in that edition and in 2010's Firefox 3.6, but it made no mention of any bugs fixed in Firefox 4 on Tuesday, because Firefox 4 has reached what Mozilla calls EOL, for 'end of life,' for patches. Although the move may have caught users by surprise, the decision to stop supporting Firefox 4 has been discussed within Mozilla for weeks. In a mozilla.dev.planning mailing list thread, Christian Legnitto, the Firefox release manager, put it most succinctly on May 25: 'Firefox 5 will be the security update for Firefox 4.' Problem is, users are being prompted to upgrade now but are hesitant because the new rapid release of updates means many add-ons are not compatible. And without security updates in between, many could be left exposed with unpatched browsers."
...for anyone running a Linux distro :-(
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
For Firefox 6.0
All addons working with 4 also work with 5 because 5 is actually 4.1
It feels like I just updated to Firefox 4 yesterday.
Is it already time for Firefox 5?
What is the big news that brings us a whole new version-number?
Prosp long and liver.
Really? I thought it was still in beta. Well, I never.. who'd have thought it. Who'd have F****** told me, I didn't expect a release for ages.
In fact, this version number is pants, I've just decided. I have been indoctrinated to expect 4.1 release sometime soon, but now it's jumping to 5, I'm left thinking something's missing.
I understand FF5 is FF4.1, but still... it don't feel right.
...they would be fine.
However, it looks like Mozilla failed to communicate it well enough, thinking their own notice was enough. The result is that Mozilla seems to take Microsoft's path for once - refusing to patch security issues on a relatively new release, and washing their hands clean with an EOL.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
I would not be surprised if their new release cycle causes their marketshare to start shrinking in a significant fashion.
I have been a long-time Firefox user (ever since it was Phoenix) and their current release philosophy is really turning me off. They just seem so misguided and detached from reality.
Are they trying to kill their user base ?
Anybody serious deploying system WILL NOT ship a mozilla product. Obsoleting a software 3 month after its release is ridiculous. You can't try to get market share and killa release in 3 month. If you don't plan to give any support, call that a development version!
I am SO disappointed in them!
Google seems to be updating Chrome at a high rate because they want to control both the server side (all Google properties) and the client side. Google properties now use features that only work in Chrome. It's Microsoft's old "Embrace, extend, devour" applied to the Web. Microsoft tried this with Silverlight, with less success.
Whether Firefox should cooperate in this effort needs to be questioned. Whether Firefox users should go along is very questionable.
just keep trying to catch up with Chrome version numbering and emulating their release strategy, soon you'll fall in the oblivion.
I really don't want to have to push out a brand new version of FF every few months and risk breaking my users' plugins that they use.
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
This could be a maneuver to confuse the IE team, giving them some time to reverse engineer FF4 and then come out with the real one. Just a crazy thought ...
We put you on the Internet map,
www.racknine.com
Version numbers don't matter any more. This is really not a major release. It is an incremental upgrade, just like Chrome and just like the Linux kernel. It is a new way of developing software that has been happening for a while now.
Why am I the only one being shocked and revolted by stuff breaking because of a different version string?! That's like Linux 3.0 breaking scripts that are arguably broken by design.
This is the exact behavior that will drive users away. It's more disruptive than the KDE 4.0 debacle.
I've been a committed Firefox user for many years, using daily many plugins that I find irreplaceable (zotero, noscript). I'm now seriously considering alternatives. I find it irresponsible that Mozilla would not stand behind the major release of one of their products for more than three months.
Firefox 5.0 is actually 4.2
This really sucks. A copy of Firefox that I leave running 24/7 on an older notebook near my bed is already nearly worthless after having switched from Firefox 3.x to Firefox 4 because of the absurd memory demands of Firefox 4 (had dozens of sites open under 3.x, now opening 2 sites in 2 tabs is a challenge). One of the key things that I do with this systems depends on using a plug-in. Can't run Firefox 5 until the plug-in is ready and even then fear that the memory issue may get even worse. Now I'm told that security vulnerabilities will be left open if I stay on 4, which I am currently forced to do.
Chrome has a rapid development too, but I'm not sure that plug-ins for Chrome would be as version sensitive as Firefox plugins seem to be. Hard to imagine that things could be any worse. And there is even the chance that Google might fix major security vulnerabilities discovered in their three month old code without telling users that they have to upgrade and break everything else.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Does it really matter what the version is? I have worked for software companies for years and the people designing and building the code are not usually the ones who pick the version numbers - that is the marketing department. Version numbers ceased to make sense as soon as marketing realized they could manipulate them for their own worthless purposes.
I suspected something like this was coming when Mozilla first announced their new rapid-upgrade policy but I dismissed my concerns because it seemed so unbelievable. Surely nobody would push users on such an unforgiving upgrade track (especially if they wanted to tap into the corporate market where frequent upgrades are an impossibility).
Well, I guess Mozilla is serious about it after all. But - thanks largely to Mozilla's own efforts - our options for web-browsers are no longer quite so constrained as when they first started and I have a lot more choices in browsers. In fact, thanks to Firefox even Microsoft has had to get back into the game and Internet Explorer is actually a contender again. I may just switch back to that. At least that way I know I'll get security updates once a month ;-)
Mozilla just keeps making more and more retarded decisions. The last good branch was 2.x. It's been all downhill since then. I'm still using 3.6.x since I refuse to upgrade to version 4 or 5.
The only real options left:
1) Put up with their decisions
2) Fork it
3) Jump ship
I'm choosing option 3.
This whole version number thing is insane and pissing off anyone who needs a singe stable version that is supported for a reasonable length of time.
If they wanted to up the version number they should have just skipped 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 to 11 or 12. Or since everyone skips 13 anyway just go directly to 14 and be done with it. Then keep it there for at least a year.
before the new one is even fully ready for release. IOW, they deliberately break their own software. Can someone please explain what kind of sense this makes?
I do not have a sig. You are hallucinating.
Mozilla Corporation gets most of its funds from Google. Something to keep in mind in regards to the future of Firefox...
My gut says, barring some significant change in funding / lead developers, that Firefox's future is bleak - what's happening now feels to me so much like what happened back when Netscape jumped the shark with their bloated Communicator suite. People bailed in droves.
The ideal situation would be for a group of developers to fork Firefox 3.6.x, throw in some of the improvements from 4, and run with it. Many would be greatly appreciative, and likely support it in both time and donations; don't make the same mistake as Mozilla Foundation has in regards to relying too much on any one major donor.
This really sucks. A copy of Firefox that I leave running 24/7 on an older notebook near my bed is already nearly worthless after having switched from Firefox 3.x to Firefox 4 because of the absurd memory demands of Firefox 4[/quote]And THAT comment shows the issue is with you and not Firefox. FF4 has *reduced* memory requirements, not more. (Not to mention how absurd the rest of your post is.)
The average home user is not going to readily know about it unless Firefox itself pops up a window to tell them. Since what I would guess, and from my personal experience working on peoples computers, would be a large portion set their home pages to something other than the "Version Check" page they will never know there is a new version. If they could do it as a auto-downloaded incremental upgrade that would be the best.
Kosh: "Understanding is a 3 edged sword, your side, their side, the Truth."
Who, exactly, is the rapid release schedule helping? It's certainly not helping web developers and organizations who try to list their supported browser versions and actually try to code towards those versions. The quickest path to get the corporate PHBs to stop supporting your browser is to have the IT staff say "Guess what, the next version of Firefox is already out so we need to make updates." At some places, support for browsers other than IE is tenuous at best, so making it more difficult to support these browsers only hurts the browser manufacturers.
Want to gain more support? Release a stable product, with wide support for standards and add-ons, and do so on a sane, well-publicized schedule. People don't care about version numbers; updating software isn't something people want or like to do. Why are you making it more difficult and cumbersome for users to use your product?
I was an early adopter and have convinced may people to make the switch from IE to Firefox, but frankly, the updates and add-on loss caused by incompatibilities between add-ons and the current version du jour have frustrated me to the point of simply uninstalling. Hello Chrome. Sadly, it's been a while since I used my chrome install and I bet I end up with a big update there, too.
Here's the thing, Mozilla. If/As you screw over extension support, I have no reason to stay with you.
You'd better rethink the implications of your "rapid release"... nomenclature. And really, it's just nomenclature. So, you are willing to toss your competitive advantage for the sake of bumping version numbers like Chrome?
Dear Mozilla: Pull your head out of Chrome's ass.
Conservative, mod down for violating
Some extensions (*cough*Selenium) are REQUIRED for my work. I've had to drop several extensions as the 3->4->5 steamroller moves on. Until Mozilla either takes over extension compatibility maintenance or sets up a compatibility API that will be stable from release to release, Firefox will definitely start losing market share.
Although we have never gotten that pop-up here. Hmmmm.
Kosh: "Understanding is a 3 edged sword, your side, their side, the Truth."
But that is merely a symptom, not the cause.
If nothing else, the new release philosophy causes the incredibly stupid approach to add-on compatibility to be highlighted.
People have complained about add-ons 'breaking' for years with other (point) releases, usually stating that after updating the maxVersion string manually, or using Nightly Tester Tools to override, the add-on continues to work perfectly fine.
Perhaps it's wishful thinking.. but part of me is hoping that the new release schedule forces Mozilla, and the community, to re-think add-on compatibility reporting; flagging add-ons as 'broken' not by default, but after testing.
I am still using Firefox 3.6 and will stay that way until either Mozilla lay down the crack pipe or I find another browser whose UI designers aren't similarly crack addled (sorry Chrome).
========
CINC, 4th Penguin Legion
Web browsers are getting too damn complex. Why are we not using a simpler architecture?
Such as:
1. browser receives byte-code instead of HTML
2. security checks are performed on the byte-code
3. byte-code is translated (compiled) to machine code (LLVM engine)
4. checks are performed on the machine code (like NaCl's project)
5. machine code interfaces with OpenGL like layer for basic graphics and video
6. on top of that, a renderer is implemented in byte-code
Advantages:
1. Very secure, because of multiple layers of isolation.
2. Very secure, because code complexity is reduced at all levels (number of byte codes is small, javascript+html are much more complex)
3. Much easier to reach compliance between browsers (byte codes are much simpler).
4. Developers could use different languages than HTML and Javascript.
5. Heck, developers could even implement their own rendering engine.
6. Open-source developers could independently implement more interesting (and more efficient) applications/libraries.
7. Developers not wishing to dive into binary development could still use pre-made rendering engines.
Why not?
--
Moving to Madrid in 93 days! Place your bid on my old IP address!
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
I think we need a fork. Mozilla's behavior is getting worse with each release; the community needs to take control of the project before they kill it with their incompetence.
With Linux 3.0, Firefox 5, and the weekly Chrome version bump, "version numbers" are essentially meaningless.
Version numbers are really a relic of the boxed software, major release days anyway. Rolling updates seem to be the future, so build numbers may be more appropriate.
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
End Of Life after THREE FUCKING MONTHS?? Who the fuck thought this was a good decision?
CDE open sourced! https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/
4 autoupdates to 5
thanks for reading
Firefox doesn't really need to do that as it's open source and upgrading to a newer version is free.
As long as you're not doing any incoming qualification, that's dandy. Of course, in an enterprise setting you just might want to make sure that the new version supports all of your mission-critical applications. If you're running a distribution, you might want to do some QA on it.
As it is, Gentoo (to name one) still has 4.0 in unstable, and Mozilla's rapid releases are practically guaranteed to keep any of the new releases from ever reaching stable. That's not a joke; running tarballs is a quick way to hose dependencies in most distributions, and pure death in the hardware platforms outside of PC clones.
Then there are all of those plugins that will never catch up to the supported browser version ...
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
From where I'm standing, it's interesting that they patched 3.6. I can only assume that this is mainly due to market share and the need to keep it secure.
If so, they run the risk of falling into the XP trap. Ditch 3.6 now and push for a FF5 update for all, otherwise you'll have 3.6 hanging around for an eternity and potentially pulling an IE6 stunt further down the road with the "it does what I want, why upgrade" brigade...
Plugins are the *reason* I use Firefox. If they break those, I'll switch to Chrome.
we got a email from corporate like 15 minutes before I saw this article going "were updating from ie 6 to 8! huzzah! also some to firefox 4! whooopie!". I broke out laughing at the headline
Ya um I rarely have Firefox open with less then 7-8 tabs - no noticible issues. Everything I've heard is that they've reduced memory footprint issues in 4..
Seriously if your computer can't handle more then 2 tabs open - be it Firefox, Chrome, Opera or IE, your doing it wrong.
ARRRRRGGH! So I upgraded to FF 5 and the Google Personal Home Page now does not display properly. NoSquint seems to work, but that might be the problem. Who knows. This does not look good comrades, no it does not look good. I hate the new Firefox button because we hates changes we does, my precioussss. Give it a week or so, but may be time to change browsers. What you all recommend?
Why are the extensions considered outdated when Firefox 4 is largely the same as Firefox 5? Did they remove/replace enough functionality such that most of the extensions are now broken, or should the extensions be updated to take into account rapidly changing version numbers?
Twinstiq, game news
You might want to look at this /. article:
http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/06/10/2125227/Mozilla-MemShrink-Set-To-Fix-Firefox-Memory
which clearly says ""If you're like a lot of Firefox 4 users out there, you've probably noticed that Firefox has a serious memory problem — it uses more than it really should." I noticed. Shame on you for not. It is a pig on my old HP notebook. Granted the notebook is somewhat light on memory, but there is no excuse for running dozens of tabs just fine in Firefox 3.6 but bogging down in 4 with only two tabs open (and it seems challenged at that). And I've watched the memory profile for 4, it just eats too much. Wish I could just revert to 3.6 without loosing everything, security issues be damned.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
I think they broke memory management - reports of *heavy* memory leaks all over the InterWebs ...
A new major version increment is no longer equivalent to a new application. There is no Firefox 3, "firefox3.5", Firefox 4 etc. There is only Firefox - which is exactly the way it should be. Normal users doesn't and shouldn't be concerned about version numbers. They should always use the latest version and it is the application/browsers responsibility to keep itself up to date. Why separate updates and security updates? The update process should be as simple, fast, automatic and non-obtrusive as possible. This is a step in the right direction. Read: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2011/05/the-infinite-version.html
For the similar reasons, W3C has decided to skip version numbers altogether in the HTML standard. The web is continuously evolving so version number doesn't make sense there. You either supports the latest HTML or not. You cannot choose to use the Internet 3.0 because you still want to use your 3.0 browser. It doesn't work that way. Browsers should always keep up to date with the latest standards instead of clinging on a specific version number. W3C has realized that a standard is not a standard until it's actually used. The can draft together a document explaining how web sites should be compatible with the "semantic web" and call it "The Semantic Web 2.0" but until web sites actually implement it and browsers support it it's not a standard.
As I see it there are two problems that are _not_ related to the above. Please don't confuse them. First of all addons gets "incompatible" when a new major is released which cause problems for people. The upgrade process is not perfect yet, Mozilla is probably working on that. As I understand it all v4 addons automatically gets marked as incompatible with v5 - but AFAIK this is just a safety measure which will probably be changed in the future. 99% of all addons just needs to update a flag to get compatible again. There are addons that automatically can make old addons work again by updating that flag.
The second problem is that some repositories s are not fast enough to keep up with the rapid release cycle. Well, that's their problem really. Use a repository that's faster then or compile yourself... or use an OS that don't want to take away the responsibility of updating itself from the application.
Version 5.0 breaks the KDE wallet integration plugin
That's fantastic news for virus-writers! Millions and millions of Firefox 4.0s will be spamming for years to come.
Version numbers are arbitrary. They could have just named this one Firefox 4.5 or something. It doesn't matter to me. I installed 5 on WinXP Pro and Linux Mint 11. Works good for me. I understand the changes are mainly under the hood. It is supposed to be a little bit faster with a smaller memory footprint.
Oh, yeah! Wise guy, huh? Woob woob woob woob! Nyuk! Nyuk!
I wasn't even given an option to upgrade or not, it just happened without asking and broke a couple add-ons I use every day.
We're all full up on Crazy here...
They are trying to copy or catch up with Chrome on the version numbering thing, but they are missing something important here. With Chrome, it gets auto-updated all the time (at least mine is, on both OS X and Ubuntu), to where I've always got the latest and greatest, and all the inherent security fixes and such. If I had to manually download a new copy of Chrome regularly, even every three months, I would grow tired of it. But the auto-updater does it for me; I installed Chrome once and am now done with that part of it. I couldn't tell you what version of Chrome I am running, except for I know it updated itself earlier this week.
Firefox, on the other hand, won't auto-update to a "major version", like going from 4.x to 5.x. Mozilla should know they had a hard enough time getting people to download a new copy, even when it took 18 months between major versions. People are not going to re-download it on such a quick schedule.
And Mozilla needs to update Firefox's handling of extensions, with its "max version" attribute. Once again, it was bad enough when there was a new FF update every 18 months and it took forever for the extension developers to make the simple integer change. All I have read this week with FF5 is how this extension and that extension disabled itself, when it will probably work just fine.
I was a long-time Firefox supporter and didn't like Chrome at first. Now I am either going with Chrome or Safari all the time, and feeling sad for the days when Firefox was the shiznit.
:q!
Somehow there's a huge difference between releasing security updates for 3.6 and releasing a security update for 4.0 and calling it 5.0?
News flash: You have to install a new version either way. 3.6.16 did not have some magical system in place whereby it received security updates without having to download and install a new version of the browser.
Are any extensions actually broken by this update?
Companies sooner or latter manage to hurt themselves even without compentition or outside influence. Just give them enough time to do so.
Even my computer illiterate mother knows not to upgrade to major software versions because of what that means EVERYWHERE ELSE (except chrome.) Point updates are mostly bug fixes and nothing jarring that will confuse her.
Mozilla needs to realize its not just computer people and IT who hate this, it will be confusing to normal users as well. We go from the silly 2 decimal system to a whole number system; can't we go to something in between. minor updates just use 1 decimal, skip the double number mess and put major changes that may confuse users off for whole version names.
I haven't even started using 4 myself because I was waiting for 4.1 and the add-ons to catch up and now we have 5 and people complaining all over about upgrade troubles with it. Bumpy transition but it won't get a whole lot better...
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
What's the problem? Nobody would complain if they had stopped supporting 4.0 after releasing 4.1. AFAIK, this update from version 4 to 5 is pretty much the same thing: from version x.4 to x.5, where x is not shown for some reason.
Although the move may have caught users by surprise, the decision to stop supporting Firefox 4 has been discussed within Mozilla for weeks.
Who cares what the users think about EOL'ing a product that was only released a few week ago. We The Developers are going to do what we want, users be damned.
I think version numbering should be dropped completely from public view.
The effects of version numbering would come back into obvious public view once the (hidden) version number of the web browser exceeds the (hidden) maxVersion number of the add-ons that one uses. Imagine what happens between a release of a new version of Firefox and the release of the corresponding version of Flashblock: "Why are there suddenly blinking, screaming ads all over this site? It might give me a seizure!"
They make it sound as if it is the users fault. The users are not there so you can code. You should not code despite of the users.
I now need to run firefox with the -P option, because they do not allow me to run two instances at the same time (No, I do not mean a second window). Running it over ssh needs an extra parameter.
It does a lot of other things against logic, like updating itself instead of letting my distro do that.
With everything they do I get a feeling that the developers think they are holier then thou. They do things because they can and/or because it is fun to do for them.
At this moment the only thing that keeps me with Firefox is the add-ons, but I will making a list of the importance of all plugins and see if there is an alternative elsewhere.
They, of all browsers, should know how fast people can switch and loose everything again.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
If they really want to get in a version race with Chrome, why not just start skipping version numbers? Go from 4 to 7, then 7 to 11. Should help prop that number up that nobody cares about real quick. I only run FF do to the plugins, and refuse to upgrade until I know the critical ones work. Having to do all the checking every 3 months is not going to happen.
Might be a workaround for some:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/checkcompatibility/
Nightly FTW!
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
Dear Mozilla,
I just switched to Chrome. I'm done with your outdated updating system.
Regards
Given that some extensions are tied to FF4, I can't upgrade until those extensions are upgraded.
You know, kind of the same way I can't upgrade IE w/o breaking certain things.
"My God...it's full of trolls!"
Come back when you actually have to support a business instead of pittering around in Flash and going "I are the greatest web design ever!" IT has enough to worry about without Firefox stopping security updates for stable browsers and churning out a release cycle that is, in all descriptions of the word, idiotic.
v2.0.14 is probably the last version to get any updates for v2.0.x. v2.1 is the newest one to get updates. :(
See http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla.support.seamonkey/browse_frm/thread/ec51a020f4ba9587/3bd9abb6689f50a2 for my newsgroup thread about it. :(
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Christian Legnitto, the Firefox release manager, put it most succinctly on May 25: 'Firefox 5 will be the security update for Firefox 4.' Problem is, users are being prompted to upgrade now but are hesitant because the new rapid release of updates means many add-ons are not compatible. And without security updates in between, many could be left exposed with unpatched browsers."
Came to say that.
Don't the people in charge think these things through? It appears not.
The new versioning schema is the new security hole in Firefox.
And all done for no real gain or benefit.
Idiots.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
For end users, it's the little things that matter.
I know people who are still on FF 3.6.18 because their favorite weather addon doesn't work in 4.0/5.5 (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/forecastbar-enhanced/), or users who don't want to upgrade past XP because the TCP-IP changes in Vista/7 broke Kerio Personal Firewall (http://www.sunbelt-software.com/ihs/alex/keriopf215.zip), or Mac users who lag behind OS versions because a haxie wasn't ready for prime time (http://unsanity.com/haxies/) and have no plans to upgrade to Lion because key components will go missing (http://forums.appleinsider.com/showthread.php?threadid=119528).
While I understand the reasoning of the major players for updating and refining, isn't it time in the rush to do so, that they stop and consider "What really makes my product appealing to the user?".
Some days it's just not worth
chewing through my restraints.
As a code monkey in training I don't get you, people. From what I can gather if Mozilla had released the same code in the same timeframe but versioned as 4.1 you would apparently not hate it but if they version it as 5.0 then "hurr durr, they suck" - apart from showing just how bloody stupid and retarded plugin compatibility check is, what does this change for you?
"Major number bump bad, minor bump good" - you're all insane!
And god forbid someone just says, "screw this, we're doing only svn/git/whatever without any of this version crap" a la MPlayer then they're even worse, amirite?
If it's "stealing" to view a web site without "viewing" the ads, then it's "stealing" to mute the TV during a commercial, or change the channel, or go to the bathroom. Same for the radio.
I have made no agreement with any web site owners to look at or download any content they may place in their pages. Site owners who make content freely-viewable do so at their own risk, without any guarantees.
Don't let the **AAs co-opt the meaning of "theft". Don't let them brainwash you.
Next thing you know, people will be saying that it's "stealing" to go to a site without CLICKING ads. Good grief. Grow a spine! Stand up to the idiocy!
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
This shortened lifespan for each version release pretty much negated the stable portion of my argument. If I have to put up with rolling releases then I'll do it with Chrome since (1) they've been doing it longer, (2) haven't bit the hand that supported them yet (well at least on the browser), and (3) it works better now on a netbook than firefox. Now if only chrome would render my employer's timecard system correctly...
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
As of chrome 12.0.072, my issues with the timecard system appears to have been resolved. One more nail in firefox's coffin.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
Perhaps it's wishful thinking.. but part of me is hoping that the new release schedule forces Mozilla, and the community, to re-think add-on compatibility reporting; flagging add-ons as 'broken' not by default, but after testing.
Mozilla is now doing exactly that for hosted add-ons and working on an Add-On SDK to reduce future breakage.
Firefox 5 is more like Firefox 4.1 in truth, the only thing this rapid release crap has done is confused everyone with thinking what is actually a minor update is a major break lots of extensions update.
the only real reason to stay with firefox is the add-on's, just like one few the few reasons to stay with windows is the huge software library. They need to fix breaking add-ons, and they need to do it now
I always look at the firefox page on wikipedia as there is good info here regarding the supported releases/chipsets/and other data:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox
Apparently Firefox 3.6.x is still supported. Which doesn't really surprise me given that GNU/Linux distributions are back porting security updates even if Mozilla is not.
Yea... I'm running FF7 nightly with about 45 tabs open, and my memory usage from FF is less than 750mb(note: running Kubuntu 11.04 x86_64).
Sure, on a 1gb laptop, that could be an issue, but you wouldn't be running 46 tabs there, either.
How the hell do you work that into the new versioning system?! The only way would be for the browser itself to "know" that Firefox 5 is basically Firefox 4 and not flag addons written for "4.0+".
Am I supposed to assume that an addon I write against Firefox 4 will work in Firefox 5 and Firefox 6, when the same was certainly not true for Firefox 1 to 2 - and 2 to 3, and 3 to 4? When will they be changing the API again? Am I supposed to be psychic when setting the maxVersion number?
Two things they could do. The one they probably should do right away is to decouple the API versions from the program versions, since those have become meaningless. Heck, even Windows did this when their marketing department got the clout Mozilla's seems to have - developers could still query the real (meaningful) version number even though the box had a year or stupid name on it. They could leave things as they are now for addon developers or they could introduce a new maxAPIVersion check, one time.
If they were feeling energetic, they could teach the browser how to introspect its API changes and make smart decisions. Say, an addon uses foo() and bar() - those did not change since the maxVersion release, so run the addon. Another addon uses foo() and baz() and declares the same maxVersion. The browser knows that baz() changed semantically, so it prevents baz() from running.
I'd probably rather see that approach since it takes the weight off of thousands of developers and puts it onto one or two.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
clusterf*ck!
I welcome Mozilla's speedier development/release cycle, however, I don't welcome their new "every-release-is-a-new-major-version" version numbering system for the very same reasons that many others have commented - it plays havoc with your add-ons.
Again, as many others have commented, most of the FF4 add-ons will just work just fine with FF5 and the "incompatibility" is merely a setting in the add-on's XML manifest saying "this add-on is for FF4 only" (or settings to that effect).
One way around this is to install the "Nightly Tester Tools" add-on and enable the "Force Add-on Compatibility" option within it. It'll magically bring back all of the addons that were disabled when FF5 installed.
Of course, there may well be some add-ons that genuinely aren't very compatible with FF5, and force enabling them may cause stability problems, but you can still them manually disable those add-on's causing problems until a "proper" add-on update is released.
I am still waiting for the whole pile of bugs in 4.0 to be fixed...Reason I never moved to Chrome is the continuing moving of the goalposts...
I'm pretty sure I'll be sticking with the Firefox release I've been using:
http://mistersanity.blogspot.com/2011/06/firefox-why-i-refuse-to-upgrade.html
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Who has actually had any significant issues with the recent upgrades?
I see a lot of people freaking out, but there hasn't been one person in my entire IT (developers, plugin heavy) office that had a problem with the upgrade. We each probably use 5-10 plugins.
And as far as I can tell, each new release has continue to support web standards, so it's not like any properly designed web site is going to fail. Now if you're in the boat of supporting some really old web code or web apps, I can understand that a browser moving to a 'agile/rapid' development cycle could pose some headaches, but that is just yet another good reason to start coding to standards. And coding so that dynamic features fail gracefully if your conditions are meant. Flashy/jquery/fancy stuff should add value to a site, not be necessary for it to function.
but part of me is hoping that the new release schedule forces Mozilla, and the community, to re-think add-on compatibility reporting; flagging add-ons as 'broken' not by default, but after testing.
Or having a separate version number for the API.
As in "running this plugins requires support for API version x.y.z" - if Firefox 5.0 and 6.0 both expose the same API to plugins, they could keep the same API version, instead of forcing the plugins authors or users to yet another increase of the "maxVersion" value.
Also this could be partly automated:
When packaging a plugin for distribution, it should be possible to programmatically scan which API functions are called, and thus assist determining the API version which is required to run it.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
No, seriously, they will be livid.
PS: don't fuck up the pimpzilla theme again
the only real reason to stay with firefox is the add-on's, just like one few the few reasons to stay with windows is the huge software library. They need to fix breaking add-ons, and they need to do it now
Developers! Developers! Developers!
Chrome isn't doing well enough; must kill the rest of the litter (3.6, 4.0).
On Mac OSX 10.5.8 Firefox bookmarks display window sizes have changed making bookmarks nearly unusable. I don't know how to specify these sizes (I expect they're defined somewhere deep in a configuration file) and the default is so bad I reverted to Firefox 4.
What other decent open source browsers are out there for Mac OSX?
Let me ask a question. Does Chrome provide security updates to past versions? No. They release new versions, while phasing out the old ones within 6 weeks of their initial release. Mozilla has switched to a similar release cycle, but instead of 6 weeks, it's 3 months. As for add-ons, there has always been a simple way to disable add-on compatibility checking. Not to mention, that very soon Mozilla will begin automatically testing and marking compatible add-ons that work with the next two future releases of Firefox, eliminating compatibility issues forever.
I really don't understand why people are complaining about the new rapid release schedule. The actual result is that new features are being brought to users much faster than before. Do you remember how long it was between the official releases of 3.6 and 4.0? More than a YEAR. Can you imagine still using the ancient Firefox 3.6 up to this past March? No you can't, because most of us either used the betas of Firefox 4 or switched to Chrome, which---oh, yeah---has a rapid release schedule like the one you're complaining about.
I applaud Mozilla for shaking off old, outdated development practices in order to bring faster, safer, and more feature-filled products to all its users. If you'd like Mozilla to continue supporting old versions of their browser with security updates for years, you're asking them to be Microsoft. You might as well switch to IE.
I just updated to 5.0, all add-ons work fine, like everyone else already noticed this is just a minor release.