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Firefox 43 Arrives With 64-bit Version For Windows, Android Tab Audio Indicators (venturebeat.com)

Posted by Soulskill on from the onward-and-upward dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Mozilla today launched Firefox 43 for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. Notable additions to the browser include a 64-bit version for Windows (finally!), a new strict blocklist for the browser's tracking protection feature, and tab audio indicators on Android. "There is, however, a bit of a caveat. Firefox 64-bit for Windows has limited support for plugins. Certain sites that require plugins and work in Firefox 32-bit might not work in this 64-bit version. But Mozilla doesn’t see this as a big problem, and says it is by design. After all, the company plans to drop support for NPAPI plugins in Firefox by the end of the year (though it will keep Flash around). Mozilla has just over two weeks to deliver on that promise." Here are the changelogs: desktop and Android.

13 of 188 comments (clear)

  1. By Design by rudy_wayne · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But Mozilla doesnâ(TM)t see this as a big problem, and says it is by design.

    Yes, the shittyness of Firefox is by design.

    1. Re:By Design by BitZtream · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Netscape has never been able to actually pay attention to what the users of its browser want. The new netscape, which you kids know as mozilla, is behaving 100% EXACTLY like the old Netscape ...

      Firefox stopped being the best browser right about the time ie6 was deprecated. Yes, IE sucks, but FF sucks more actually.

      This is all simply an extension of their inability to write a browser.

      Not that they don't have some talented developers, they do ... but they just let them do whatever they want and have no focus on actually delivering something users want, so they keep coming up with all these retarded silly side projects and all these retarded bloated 'features' in firefox ... its only taken them 15 years to realize doing everything in XPCOM and JavaScript was a fucking stupid idea.

      --
      Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
    2. Re:By Design by bhcompy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Unfortunately, it's the browser with the best implementation of NoScript. Thus, it is indispensable.

    3. Re:By Design by MightyYar · · Score: 4, Insightful

      For me it is "Tree Style Tabs". Unfortunately, Mozilla plans to phase out the current extension framework in favor of something more along the lines of what Chrome does - so we'll both be screwed shortly. But in the meantime, Firefox's killer feature is its extensions.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    4. Re:By Design by Darinbob · · Score: 5, Insightful

      What's wrong with acting exactly like how the older product worked? Newer is not better. A web browser is simple, it doesn't need biweekly changes to its UI. the old Netscape was just fine. Web browser as an application platform is the dumb idea. DRM in browsers is a dumb idea.

      If firefox goes away then there is literally nothing left. A browser must support adblock and noscript, as well as general purpose plugins.

    5. Re:By Design by rudy_wayne · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Firefox suffers from the syndrome known as "Bikeshedding".

      They long ago abandoned what should be their core focus -- fix bugs, improve performance and implement new standards as needed (CSS 3, HTML 5) -- and have focused instead on endless tinkering, completely destroying the UI and a parade of useless new "features".

    6. Re:By Design by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm all for fixing the security problems. Moving stuff around on the UI has nothing to do with security.

  2. So... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Which about:config preferences do I have to mess with to disable all the unwanted "features" in this version?

    1. Re:So... by rsmith-mac · · Score: 4, Insightful

      browser.urlbar.unifiedcomplete to false will remove the worthless "Search For..." entry from the autocomplete dropdown when typing in the URL bar.

      Thank you! That was driving me insane.

  3. Re:Time to upgrade by jlv · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I won't use Chrome again until there is a reliable way to prevent extensions from auto-updating. I got tired of finding out "surprise!" that something that worked yesterday is no longer around because the extension has gone "pay".

  4. Re:Time to upgrade by Darinbob · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Chrome has all the disadvantages of Firefox, but from Google. Rapid fire unnecessary updates unrelated to security, dropping of support for plugins, development oriented towards developers rather than users, frequent kissing of advertising butts, etc.

  5. Re:Time to upgrade by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Every time you go to a google site (google, gmail, etc), it "calls home". And it leaves plenty of traces. Of course, it's not forcing people to do that. But it encourages.

    But yes, it also calls home by itself by insidiously installing google Keystone at the first opportunity.

  6. Firefox 43.... by Excelcia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The version number almost says it all. How can you get excited about a new Firefox release with any feature, when it's just another rapid release. It could have true hard AI and no one would notice any more. It would get lost in the staggeringly mediocre array of non-features nobody wants, forced UI changes, broken addons, and developers that decide they know more about what people want than the users do.

    Firefox adopted Google's rapid release cycle on a project that it was neither technically nor culturally suited for. One has to actually admire their dogged persistence to holding course in the face of what is an almost a completely unified chorus of "WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE?!?!?".

    I recommend Palemoon. A fork of the previous Firefox LTR, it has refused to add features unless they make sense, is compatible with most addons, and has its own growing body of its own addon developers that are quite loyal to the project for the simple reason that the project remains loyal to them. That's not to say that it's a static browser. Just one that took the best of what Firefox was and decided to continue in the direction of sensible goals and not alienating its user base.