LWN: Comments on "Firefox 17 released"

Tab Reordering

tjc — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 22:45:14 +0000

Problem solved. The bug489729 (Disable detach and tear off tab) 1.7 add-on will disable tab reordering on Firefox 17. I disabled the add-on, and tab reordering is working again, but I'm back to accidentally tearing off tabs now and then. One step forward, one step back.

Tab Reordering

tjc — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 17:31:33 +0000

The Linux version is the same. This is probably something that can re-enabled in about:config.

Firefox 17 released

cpeterso — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 05:20:18 +0000

If you toggle the about:config pref app.update.silent, then Firefox will download updates but it won't pop up the annoying "Restart Now/Later" dialog. The next time you restart Firefox, it will be updated.

app.update.silent

cpeterso — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 05:19:17 +0000

Windows users automatically get silent updates from Firefox's updater background service.

Firefox 17 released

jabby — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 23:07:58 +0000

Known Issues:

"For some users, scrolling in the main GMail window will be slower than usual"

Unacceptable!! Rawr!! :oP

It breaks Tab Mix Plus

xose — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 18:09:10 +0000

Get latest "pre" from: http://tmp.garyr.net/dev-builds/

Tab Reordering

tjc — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 17:34:38 +0000

Tab reordering seems to be broken, at least on the OS X version.

Firefox 17 released

Lou57 — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 15:02:08 +0000

The ESR program updates roughly on par with Firefox. I deploy ESR at work and the standard release at home. This is by design. I am glad for the bug and security fixes.

http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/organizations/faq/

So the frequency isn't really any different, but I have some level of confidence that I am not going to have to go through the re-education process for all my users by staying on ESR. It looks like what it is for a longer period. The constant updates are essentially identical.

Firefox 17 released

ovitters — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 10:10:52 +0000

I also use Firefox under Microsoft Windows. After seeing this LWN story I noticed that Firefox was already at version 17.

Why do you get annoyed by this?

Firefox 17 released

bernie — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 07:53:33 +0000

If you don't want rapid updates you can try Firefox ESR, which updates roughly annually. Firefox 10 ESR was the first; Firefox 17 ESR is the second such release.

Firefox 17 released

dlang — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 07:44:47 +0000

taking a quick look in about:config (and doing no other research), it appears that there are probably several ways to disable the update

likely keys include

app.update.enabled

app.update.interval

app.update.mode (would need to look at the code to find what values other than '1' do)

app.update.url (if it's looking the wrong place for an upgrade, it won't find anything to upgrade to. you could even point this at a system you manage so that you get the benefits of auto-updating at the client, but on your schedule)

I would expect that a google search, or a search of the mozilla forums/lists would give you more concrete answers.

Personally, I run the Aurora version everywhere. It tries to update daily and I just ignore the suggestion until I feel like doing so.

Firefox 17 released

louie — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 02:37:34 +0000

You forgot the most important, which is that people need security fixes. People who are running old browsers are, like unvaccinated children, disease vectors who are threats not just to themselves but to others.

Firefox 17 released

ewen — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 01:54:03 +0000

For values of "ignore these releases" which are equal to "click remind me again later" every day, for each frequently released auto-prompting bit of software.

You're right that people want bugfixes, decreased memory usage, etc. But they may or may not want the assortment of other changes that come bundled with them, plus potentially being forced to debug "$FOO changed, so now $BAR doesn't work with it any longer" type interactions on a regular basis. (The ESR style model, plus a rolling release, is arguably the solution to these two use cases. But at least for Mozilla the ESR version seems to be a "please don't run this version" release.)

Ewen

Firefox 17 released

dlang — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 00:55:40 +0000

people want bugfixes

people want new features

people want changes that decrease memory useage (arguably bugfixes, but only arguably)

If you don't want any of this stuff, you don't need to upgrade and can just ignore these releases

Firefox 17 released

gdt — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 00:23:46 +0000

Users of Firefox Mobile on Android 4.2 hae been hanging out for this release as the previous version continually crashed. So not a "pointless update" for Nexus 7 users.

Firefox 17 released

Kit — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 22:41:41 +0000

How so? Hasn't release early, release often been long since considered to be good practice? If you want a release with a longer support period, you might want to opt for the ESR releases.

Firefox 17 released

puffin — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 22:30:32 +0000

How can we get them to stop this overactive annoying release schedule stupidity? It's a horrible 21st century plague and blight to have this incessant drip feed of minor and pointless updates to Firefox and most/all apps in general it seems. Fair enough, and good, if you're on a beta/testing/etc update stream, but this is past ridiculous now for "Released" software. This is not productive, or user friendly.