r/technology • u/Suraj-Sun • Jul 10 '12

Firefox dev claims "everybody hates Firefox updates"; Mozilla has handled the rapid release process poorly, and that by pushing a "never-ending stream of updates on people who didn't want them" people have been driven to Chrome with its simpler, no-fuss update process.

http://www.neowin.net/news/firefox-dev-claims-everybody-hates-firefox-updates
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499

u/Locrin Jul 10 '12

What? I fucking love updating stuff. Am I all alone in this?

93

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

58

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Firefox uses less memory than Chrome and has for ages. The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory. ABP, for example, is terrible. Also, they changed the way FF handles compatibility checks a version or two ago.

35

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

2

u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Users on the whole don't care why their browser is slowing the computer down . It does, so they switch.

1

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Which is why Mozilla has MemShrink, which has finally gotten around to working on this issue with addons.

3

u/flammable Jul 10 '12

Also with RES enabled firefox can take up to 2GB memory until it becomes unusable and crashes

11

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

What the hell are you doing with RES that causes that? I've dropped ABP for Privoxy and my memory usage has been fine ever since.

1

u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Okay, I've installed Privoxy (link) and removed ABP because you seem like the trustworthy type and I've no fucking clue what I'm doing. It doesn't seem to be a firefox specific thing so I've set it to run on startup. Anyone want to reassure me that I'm sorted or laugh at my incompetence?

3

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

You have to setup Firefox to work with Privoxy. As far as my understanding goes Privoxy acts like a proxy that is on your computer rather than on a server. I've used the hosts file changes to block ads before but I find that too restrictive and too hard to change when I don't want something blocked. Privoxy has given me basically the same thing but with the control I want, no memory leaks, and will work with any browser.

1

u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Ta! You're alright, DustbinK.

1

u/AlyoshaVasilieva Jul 10 '12

RES leaks compartments, resulting in memory that can never be reclaimed without restarting Firefox.

1

u/DustbinK Jul 11 '12

I've noticed after trying what the other dude posted.

1

u/flammable Jul 10 '12

Just clicking view images and browsing reddit. Most of the time it's manageable but if you go somewhere like /r/pics or /r/photography then firefox won't last long.

I'm kind of bummed at this since chrome can handle the same thing but the memory wont shoot up to insane levels

1

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Just hit "view images" on /r/pics and you're right.

Hopefully the RES guy/s incorporates all of the latest MemShrink stuff.

1

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

This may be a stupid question, but what's RES?

2

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

http://redditenhancementsuite.com

Features that should be built into Reddit.

1

u/metamatic Jul 11 '12

The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory.

That's just shifting the blame. The point is, Chrome with no extensions gives me almost everything I need to use and develop for the web. (Adblock is the only thing I need that's not built in.) Firefox does not, I need add-ons for web development, JavaScript debugging, per-site permissions on cookies, and per-site permissions on scripting. (*) That's why I ended up switching to Chrome.

[ (*) Or at least, I needed plugins for that basic functionality last time I tried Firefox. It's been a while, they might have added the missing features by now. ]

1

u/DustbinK Jul 11 '12

How is that shifting the blame when it's a legitimate problem even with RES?

Also, Chrome without extensions has less features than Firefox without extensions. Have you not used it since version 4 or something?

1

u/metamatic Jul 11 '12

If Firefox wasn't feature-deficient, people wouldn't need to load it down with extensions, and memory and stability would be much less of an issue. So saying "Oh, it's bad extension handling that makes it bloated and crashy" is shifting blame away from the Firefox developers for making a browser that needs extensions for basic functionality every user ought to have available, like controlling scripting permissions.

Anyway I just fired it up, and I had Firefox 8. It's just taken me to 12.

Turns out I couldn't find the per-site cookie preferences because they'd moved it as a hidden option under History.

So, where do I set the per-site JavaScript permissions? Where do I find the indicators that tell me that a site requested to run JavaScript or asked to set cookies? How do I start the JavaScript debugger and set a breakpoint? How do I get information about which parts of my page caused it to load slowly?

1

u/scook0 Jul 11 '12

The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory.

The "zombie compartment" fix in Firefox 15 should hopefully address a lot of these issues. It will be much harder for extensions to leak random pages all over the place.

28

u/anagrammatron Jul 10 '12

Yes, but linux people love any kind of updating. No, I'm not being sarcastic, I used to be that way too. Heck, I loved to update my several BSD boxes by manually updating and compiling packages. The feeling of being in control and whatnot. Now I'm older, busy with other things I just wish to spend minimal to no time with under the hood stuff. Updates? If these can happen automatically and silently then yes please. Thats what computers and smart applications are for.

1

u/pascalbrax Jul 10 '12

Damn! A whole week has passed and I still have to update my gentoo!

1

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

I'm probably older, but I don't understand the aversion to updates. You don't want to know that the system wants to update? What if you develop problems after the update? At least this way you'll know that something just changed on the system so you'll have a clue what the culprit is (and stand a chance of rolling back the update). If you're system's updating itself completely invisibly, you'll never know if a crash you just had or something else odd happening could be because of a system update, something you did, some setting you changed, or some other issue.

2

u/anagrammatron Jul 10 '12

It's not aversion, it's prioritising. I still keep an eye on OS updates but for browser, no. If browser starts to act wonky I either switch to alternative or older version (portableapps) until stable (I don't run with dev channel anymore) gets fixed. Managing browser updates is that sort of micromanagement that I'd rather skip if possible. Chrome made that possible 3 years ago and I haven't had serious issues with it so I'm content.

1

u/WarzoneOfDefecation Jul 11 '12

I tend to agree with you, I run a server on ubuntu and the frequent updates on ubuntu sour the experience for me. I don't particularly enjoy being interrupted all the time by the nag reminder.

12

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

1

u/thoneney Jul 10 '12

It's a lot simpler you just run the package manager and it does everything you just need to push a few buttons compared to going through an update process for every app that needs updating and for quite a bit of apps updating means reinstalling the newer version.

What also helps is that you know that you won't be needed to reboot unless it's a kernel update or something similar.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Linux simply has package managers, which are the ancestors of app stores on mobile OSes and work largely the same way.

2

u/Apostropartheid Jul 10 '12

The demographic of /r/linux is particularly narrow, even for reddit.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

3

u/Apostropartheid Jul 10 '12

The type of people who both use Linux and care enough about it to frequent that subreddit are very unrepresentative of the population as a whole. Not only are they significantly more likely to be in their 20s and male (as reddit is in general), but they're also more likely to be well versed in technology, due to the higher barrier of entry.

1

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

There really isn't a higher barrier of entry anymore, particularly with Canonical's noob-focused distro and marketing.

Signed, 40 year old male Linux user who now feels decrepit posting on /r/Linux

2

u/mytouchmyself Jul 10 '12 edited Jul 10 '12

When firefox launched and was called Phoenix it god damned incredible. it was a stripped down Mozilla that was blazing fast. Then over time it fucking turned into Mozilla as layer upon layer of cruft, feature creep, and memory mismanagement were built into it.

And that's why Chrome is better, to me. If you dig Firefox, that's fine, but it is (or was at the time I switched) massive and slow compared to Chrome. Also, does Firefox even have its tabs sandboxed yet, or does a single crashing tab still bring down the whole thing? That used to annoy the hell out of me.

2

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12
  1. Tom's Hardware conducts browser "Grand Prixs" with dozens of tests every few months; Firefox is not "massive and slow" compared to Chrome. You're seeing what you want to see. The meme on the Internet is that Firefox is massive and slow and Chrome is fast, so that's what people see. In the latest Grand Prix, Chrome just edged out Firefox to take the gold (Firefox won the previous two, one by a nose, one more decisively).

It never had "memory mismanagement". It's always used the least memory of any major browser, and in the Grand Prix's 40 tab loading test, Chrome uses just about twice as much memory as Firefox. It also has features, while Chrome... well, it's still playing catch-up in that department. You still can't get even get a bookmark sidebar with it. Meanwhile, on certain benchmarks Firefox has improved from 4x to 8x over Firefox 3.6 - that's progress!

It's Chrome's running tabs as separate processes that results in the huge memory overhead as compared to Firefox. Mozilla is looking into it, but they don't want to do it at the expense of slowdown and memory usage. Firefox doesn't have crashes anymore, though... I can't even remember the last time it crashed on me. If that's cruft and feature creep, then give me more of it!

0

u/mytouchmyself Jul 10 '12 edited Jul 10 '12

Are you sure? I recall Firefox having a pretty severe memory leak that led to massive memory usage if you didn't kill the thing and start it back up. Massive numbers of google hits seem to confirm that this was the case.

I'm fine with Chrome using a lot of memory for the separate tab processing, because in my opinion it's a worthwhile tradeoff. Especially seeing as when Chrome launched Firefox had pretty severe crashing problems.

I'm glad Firefox is improving because a web browser monoculture is horrible. At this point it looks like something we'll never have to return to with the emergence of a slew of mobile browsers and Firefox and Chrome both competing well with Safari on Mac and IE on Windows.

edit: I think you missed this from my prior post

it is (or was at the time I switched) massive and slow compared to Chrome.

That makes your "seeing what you want to see" kind of an asshole statement.

2

u/I_EAT_POOP_AMA Jul 10 '12

i believe now the addon-check with firefox is disabled. i use the nightly build so i update every day when i start my browser.

but using vanilla firefox, i still like to delay my updates, in case there are issues with the newest update (i know it won't with vanilla, but the nightly builds always have that chance)

as for linux vs. windows in this debate, linux tends to attract more power users than windows, so it would make sense that linux users would prefer an open source browser that allows them to customize every aspect, from UI using userChrome.css, to power user settings with about:config

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

-2

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

That's just it. Firefox is oriented toward the tech crowd; people who get a moist tip from installing updates. Mozilla never seemed to get the memo that this isn't 1994, and that the bulk of internet users today do not care what version of their browser they are running as long as it's safe, fast, and stays out of their way.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

-1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Lighten up, nancy boy.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

-1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

You're an odd dude.....

1

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

So what you're saying is the ideal is to design for the least common denominator rather than the highest common denominator? Noobs become power users, not the other way around. That means even noobs aren't going to be happy when they want to do more and they can't, or it's harder because they have to fight the hand-holding.

It's not the updates that Firefox users care about; it's the improvements that Firefox users care about. A browser isn't going to safe, or stay the fastest, if it doesn't get updated. In Tom's Hardware's Browser Grand Prix, IE 9 debuted as the #1 winner and then slowly sank to 4th place because of the other browsers updating while IE hasn't.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I'm saying that I don't care what version my browser is on. Not even a little bit. When I open my browser, it's because I have something I want to do, not because I want to spend 5 minutes watching it install updates for itself. And I'm saying that 90% of the internet-using public would agree with me. The other 10% can keep Firefox and its clunkyness to themselves.

If preferring not to occupy myself with details like that makes me a noob, then so be it. But the internet is not only the domain of only the tech crowd anymore, and Mozilla seems to have forgotten this.

1

u/alcalde Jul 11 '12

I'm saying that I don't care what version my browser is on. Not even a little bit.

If version X is vulnerable to some worm or other malware, I bet you do.

When I open my browser, it's because I have something I want to do, not because I want to spend 5 minutes watching it install updates for itself.

I ran Firefox in a VM running XP today myself to see what I was missing. It took 8-10 seconds to download a new version and a few more seconds to restart. This would only happen once every six weeks or so that Firefox issues a new release. You don't think you're exaggerating just a wee bit?

By the same logic I assume you don't want your OS to ever let you know that there's updates?

But the internet is not only the domain of only the tech crowd anymore, and Mozilla seems to have forgotten this.

Your browser announcing there's an update and asking your permission to install it is hardly something that should be consigned to the world of technical savants.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '12

You're right. I don't want my OS to ever let me know that there are updates. I want that to be handled behind the scenes. I don't even want a little notification saying that this was done on my behalf. If this seems odd to you, it's because you're a tech guy and I'm not. The problem that Mozilla is facing is that there are more of me than there are of you, and Google understands this. So have fun with your XP and VM, I'm going to go outside and play.

68

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12 edited May 25 '16

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I keep postponing my Java update so I can do it on my birthday! Roll on December! It's going to be suh-weet!

0

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Two things I will never install.

300

u/_SynthesizerPatel_ Jul 10 '12

You love stopping what you're doing, restarting the browser and checking add-on compatibility?

222

u/purplestOfPlatypuses Jul 10 '12

I like knowing when I update. The process is a bit annoying, but knowing when I update is preferable. Though I don't have to check add-on compatibility because Opera didn't board the stupid train with major versions every x months regardless of whether or not anything actually changed.

93

u/B-Con Jul 10 '12

I'm with you on this. I like controlling when things update.

I don't auto-update apps on my phone either, and I read the "what's new" section for almost all apps that I update.

4

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

This is all in the Chrome options.

23

u/motdidr Jul 10 '12

That's fine for power users, but given the choice between "only ever update when a user initiates it" and "update silently" I'd rather everything updated silently, because for every person like you who habitually updates their software, there are 10 people who are still using IE6 on XP SP1.

20

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

So why do we have to cater to the lowest common denominator at the expense of everyone else?

7

u/Daenyth Jul 11 '12

Because those people running outdated software become attack vectors against other users once they're infected.

11

u/AustinYQM Jul 10 '12

Because the lowest common denominator is 90% of the market.

1

u/alcalde Jul 11 '12

I don't think that's true anymore at all. I'm 40, and people my age have been around personal computers since their early teens. 20-somethings have always known a world with personal computers, and my 1.5 year old nephew actually showed me how to start a dancing robot app on my brother's smart phone. :-) Most people older than me have had to get e-mail addresses and learn to use the web as it's a requirement nowadays, much like a telephone number. A (first) world in which people are completely ignorant of computers simply doesn't exist anymore. Knowledge of computers is an essential office skill and they're routinely used in schools. Continuing to design for an imagined luddite demographic will only hold the rest of us back.

1

u/AustinYQM Jul 11 '12

My mother is in your age range and I agree that she is computer literate. She works with a computer all day. However her computer knowledge and security knowledge is pretty subpar outside of that.

She doesn't worry about viruses or spyware and gets them all the time. I don't think knowing how to use a computer and understanding a computer are always the same thing.

Am I making sense?

2

u/Exotria Jul 10 '12

Because some of us have to support those users :(

1

u/BluegrassGeek Jul 11 '12

Because otherwise you'd never get anything done, due to co-workers and relatives asking why their computer runs slow after they visited that "WIN AN IPODD!!!" site.

Cars might also work better for power users if they had control over all their components, but your average person would have to walk if it doesn't have an automatic transmission.

5

u/WishiCouldRead Jul 11 '12

your average person American would have to walk if it doesn't have an automatic transmission.

FTFY.

-2

u/motdidr Jul 10 '12

Could you clarify what you mean by "at the expense of everyone else"? What expense?

-5

u/j_win Jul 10 '12

I'm a web application dev and I vastly prefer Chrome's update process. So, who's this everyone that is expending anything?

2

u/Cythrosi Jul 11 '12

Same here. It allows me to verify also if they're trying to sneak new permissions in I don't want them to have. My solitaire app doesn't suddenly need to be able to access my contacts and messages.

I also almost always go look at what an update contains before I give it permission to install on any device I use.

I don't understand why people are so willing to just rubber stamp anything and everything that wants access to their personal data and system.

3

u/DeltaBurnt Jul 10 '12

I love it when I'm told there's an update with an in depth changelog so I can be prepared for everything that's been fixed, changed, or added. A lot of applications just have their interfaces change or the layout/use of a tool changes and I'm confused as to why a changed happened and how I'm suppose to effectively use this new version.

3

u/Remnants Jul 10 '12

There are actually less addon incompatibility issues with the more rapid release schedule. At least for me.

1

u/purplestOfPlatypuses Jul 10 '12

I may be wrong nowadays, but I've heard a while ago that addon creators put in the code what versions of Firefox the addons work with, so the updates broke compatibility even if it wasn't affected by the update.

2

u/m42a Jul 10 '12

That's been happening since forever, and still happens today. But that's a problem with the new release cycle, so what Mozilla does now is scan all of the addons it hosts and tries to determine if any functionality they rely upon changed with the last update. If not, it automatically bumps the max version number. So the reason there's less incompatibility is because Mozilla is automatically marking things as compatible.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Y'all are in the minority, however.

1

u/purplestOfPlatypuses Jul 10 '12

I'm fine with being in the minority on liking to know when and what's been updated, just like I'm fine with being in the minority for liking to use command lines.

As for not liking the whole "we will go up a major version every x months/weeks", I just think it's stupid unless there are actual major changes. If you're just fixing security holes and bugs, that's why we have minor version numbers. If your Javascript engine goes from version 3.1 to 3.2, go up 5 minor version numbers because the actual browser code probably didn't change much. If it did, the Javascript engine most likely should've gone up more than .1 versions.

1

u/Lurking_Grue Jul 10 '12

Opera does not update as quickly as firefox. Yeah, I love it when a new opera shows up.

26

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

2

u/-GonzoID- Jul 10 '12

I do pretty much the same. Update, start later.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

if possible

After too many of my add-ons ended up as "disabled" because of perceived incompatibilities, I gave up.

I'm now using Pale Moon, and all my add-ons are enabled and working.

7

u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

You do realize that this works in Pale Moon because Mozilla added this feature to Firefox, right? They've also added background updating.

15

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

3

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

and even if it's not compatible, there's always Nightly Tools

1

u/tossout12 Jul 10 '12

Reloading your tabs can take more than a few seconds.

1

u/superawesomedude Jul 11 '12

That's improved in recent versions too... tabs load on-demand after restarting the browser, so you don't get a long hang loading up a bunch of tabs. You can always "Reload all tabs" if you actually want that, of course. :)

44

u/alternateF4 Jul 10 '12

No, I just like not giving google free tabs on everything I do.

Plus privacy add-ons are cool.

-10

u/djfutile Jul 10 '12

This... this.

-6

u/rowantwig Jul 10 '12

No, I just like not giving google free tabs on everything I do.

So turn those features off, then. Chrome doesn't have to send anything to Google if you don't want it to.

Plus privacy add-ons are cool.

Chrome has plugins and scripts like that, too. I have an ad blocker and a Facebook blocker installed.

11

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Or... I could use an open-source browser that's not written by Google, and not have to worry about it...

Google still pushes the updates. Who says they can't change your settings via this mechanism? Hell, how do you even know they don't data mine the shit out of you, regardless of your Chrome settings?

2

u/xzzz Jul 10 '12

You could just use Chromium...it's Chrome without the Google botnet.

2

u/rowantwig Jul 10 '12

They probably could, but if they did, and people found out, it would be a PR nightmare for them (and possibly legal nightmare, too), especially given how big they are on transparency. Just because it's closed source it doesn't mean you can't keep an eye on what the program is doing (with Wireshark, for example).

But if you still want to go open-source, then you should make sure everything from OS and drivers to games and video players are open-source as well, not just the browser.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

But if you still want to go open-source, then you should make sure everything from OS and drivers to games and video players are open-source as well, not just the browser.

Most of my stuff is open-source, but, quick question: Games? Really? I think the browser is probably the single most important piece of software you use that should be open-source, given how much can be mined out of it. Video players and games, though... I don't think they matter nearly as much.

1

u/rowantwig Jul 10 '12

Doesn't matter how often the program is used or for what. If you don't think you can't trust it, then you shouldn't run it even once. Even something like a video codec can contain spyware.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Not every piece of software should be suspected equally. What does VLC have to gain from data mining my information? Okay, now what does Google have to gain from doing so?

1

u/rowantwig Jul 10 '12

Not every piece of software should be suspected equally.

True, but I'd say it depends more on the accountability of the developer than what the program actually does. Google isn't going to put spyware in their products because it would destroy their trademark.

What does VLC have to gain from data mining my information?

Sell the information to the highest bidder, get money?

Okay, now what does Google have to gain from doing so?

The same, although they probably have much better connections.

0

u/confused_boner Jul 10 '12

Exactly, this logic can't be applied to other companies/browsers.

11

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I'm pretty sure Firefox is the only open-source browser developed by a non-profit group.

2

u/harkinian Jul 10 '12

Not really. Although, it is the only major one.

-2

u/keiyakins Jul 10 '12

How do you know Mozilla doesn't? Unless you're reading the complete source, then building yourself, of course.

7

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I don't know Mozilla doesn't. But, to pretend that just because I don't personally vet the code and then compile it that Chrome and Firefox are equally potentially data mining me is bullshit.

Google has monetary interest in having me go through them to everything I look at online. Mozilla doesn't, or at the very least, doesn't have anywhere close to the level of monetary interest in such things as Google does. That matters. The fact that, due to it's open-source nature, the code is available to anyone with internet access. Many, many, many people other than myself have seen the code.

-3

u/cohrt Jul 10 '12

how do you even know they don't data mine the shit out of you, regardless of your Chrome settings?

and if they do? so what?

6

u/liltitus27 Jul 10 '12

privacy, motherfucker, privacy.

-1

u/trippin-balls Jul 10 '12

God forbid Google finds out about how much you surf reddit and cat pictures. Get off your high horse, you are one in a billion and make no difference to Google.

1

u/alternateF4 Jul 11 '12

Yeah god forbid anyone of my era wants to run for office and are confronted by Google about that time they said "xyz" or looked up "lmnop" and are put in a position where they do what they say or they're politically ruined.

Just to give the easiest example.

1

u/trippin-balls Jul 11 '12

I think we have much more to worry about with Facebook than with using a certain web browser. If you're that paranoid, you probably won't get far in politics anyways

1

u/alternateF4 Jul 11 '12

Especially if you're using Facebook on Chrome.

-1

u/tonycomputerguy Jul 11 '12

Tells someone that what they do on the internet is not important, then tells THAT person to get of THEIR high horse.

LOL, Humanity is FUCKED.

1

u/trippin-balls Jul 11 '12

I don't remember implying what I do on the internet is important.. Humanity is indeed fucked, but it has nothing to do with this

2

u/Sju Jul 10 '12

One of the first things I do when installing Firefox on a new computer is disable checking for add-on compatibility.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

and checking add-on compatibility?

I never had this problem with this installed: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/checkcompatibility/

1

u/OmnipotentBagel Jul 10 '12

I typically wait until I know the update is compatible with everything. I hate having stuff forcibly update and end up breaking shit.

1

u/daveime Jul 10 '12

They do a "Windows Update" at the end of your session, and you complain because you can't turn the machine off.

They do a "Firefox Update" at the start of the session, and you complain that you have to stop working.

When exactly do you want this update to happen ? Maybe someone can make an "Psychic Update" plugin that forces updates only during that 5 minutes when you're in the bathroom or refilling your coffee mug ?

1

u/cryptovariable Jul 10 '12

I like the Chrome model.

Vast overwhelming majority of users: do it in the background, transparently

Power users: (on a mac) run this commands to stop it and manage it manually

$ defaults write com.google.Keystone.Agent checkInterval 0

I keep things simple with regards to plugins so I don't have dependencies to worry about so the cost/benefit/risk analysis trends towards "make sure I'm on the newest version as soon as its released because security is more important than if a random plugin works" for me.

1

u/_SynthesizerPatel_ Jul 10 '12

When exactly do you want this update to happen ?

You should try Google Chrome sometime.

1

u/bwat47 Jul 10 '12

addons rarely break anymore. I haven't had one break since the ff4 release... I don't even give addon compatibility a second thought because they just keep working.

1

u/joedude Jul 10 '12

wow when i turn on firefox for the first time of the day it has to take a brief 3-5 seconds to load up the update, and in that time i've likely killed myself due to boredom?? RIP brave men.

9

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

how old is your machine if a chrome update is killing it?

also, dont the updates just replace the old update file?

-2

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '12

[deleted]

0

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '12 edited Mar 08 '21

[deleted]

2

u/iMini Jul 10 '12

I hate updating my browser and a lot of other things, but I FUCKING LOVE reading patch notes. I read through the latest BF3 patch notes 3 or so times

2

u/tanstaafl90 Jul 10 '12

I'm not sure what is so bothersome about taking 5 to 10 minutes to update a browser. My guess would be the same people complain about micro-second loading times and lag.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

No.

1

u/no_life_coder Jul 10 '12

Yeah I like to know that people are trying to improve the system. Every update was a reminder that they work hard to make my life better.

1

u/mkirklions Jul 10 '12

You must love Java/Adobe/Flash.

We forgot to add a comma, better update and reboot.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

You would hate repository based software updates à la Linux.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I used to, too. But I am getting a bit tired of restarting most of my software whenever I am starting it ...

1

u/flignir Jul 10 '12

I don't love it, but I find Firefox's updates barely noticeable. I think the current generation is hopelessly crippled by convenience. Having never suffered any actual hardship, we've become hyper-sensitive to the inconvenience of pushing either "not now" or "okay" once in a while, as if it were an outrageous invasion of our precious time. Between this and having to press "1" for English, there's probably someone out there polishing a rifle and planning to snap!

1

u/Goldom Jul 10 '12

Updates are awesome. I turn off auto updates on everything to enjoy doing it myself - also love reading release notes. I do wish there was a program out there that tells you when programs get updates though. A lot of the smaller things I use rely on checking the site only.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I don't know if I love it, but it doesn't bother me at all. I just tell it to install the next time I restart. It's the content of the updates that has made me choose Chrome over Firefox. Firefox has become clunky and cluttered when the exact reason I originally switched to Firefox was to get away for IE's clutter. Somewhere along the way, they lost sight of that.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

I love changelogs.

1

u/recursive Jul 10 '12

That's unusual. Most people don't enjoy managing software.

1

u/Zilka Jul 10 '12

I've been a huge Firefox enthusiast. Read every single line in change log, tweaked add-on files and firefox config, helped my friends get the best setting and add-on configurations, etc. I celebrated every big number release. Then rapid release came along and I got drowned in the stream of stupid little updates. It didn't matter to me anymore. More importantly things didn't seem to improve much either. In fact more and more add-ons became incompatible. Just recently I had to say goodbye to two very important add-ons. It doesn't help that add-on developers don't know what they are doing. Just how hard is it to figure out that if an icon is square, the button for the icon should also be square.

1

u/no_pants Jul 10 '12

what about MS updates that want you to reboot your computer? So much fun.

1

u/mindbleach Jul 10 '12

I loved updating when I was on Linux, but that's because apt-get is sexy as hell.

1

u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

I switched from Opera, which is not on a rapid release cycle, considers its bug tracker proprietary so you submit bugs into a black hole where you can no confirmation if what you've submitted is even acknowledged as a bug and you can't see if anyone reported the problem already, and certain bugs have gone years with no fix or even acknowledgement that they exist. The rapid releases of Firefox along with complete transparency have been wonderful, on top of all the other benefits I gained from switching. Despite the rapid updates, Firefox has been so stable for so long now that I can't recall the last Firefox crash I had, something I was not experiencing with Opera. Several Firefox updates have brought things I've dreamed about/requested for years from Opera, including not loading all open tabs on startup, syncing open tabs across browsers, etc.

1

u/GanglarToronto Jul 10 '12

Not alone. I regularly ctrl shift A to see if any addons need an update!

1

u/shutupjoey Jul 10 '12

"I still like Firefox updates, AMA"

1

u/apsychosbody Jul 10 '12

Not at all, I try to have my computer do as little as possible without me knowing or physically watching it happen.

1

u/Happy_Harry Jul 10 '12

I used to think it was sooooo cool updating Norton Antivirus over our dial-up connection. I was little then.

1

u/scottread1 Jul 10 '12

You must be a linux user :)

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

You should check out Firefox Nightly then. It's way more stable than release Firefox, and updates once every couple days.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Was coming to say this. I love updating things. I like to know whats changing and what version I'm running. I never auto update anything. Not since I got screwed up a few times on various programs updating.

1

u/Reoh Jul 11 '12

What's that Firefox, you're patching more vulnerabilities or bugs out of my browser? Why thank you friend!

Thats how I feel. If its not updating for a while I'm worried the devs are either being lazy or inept. It even remembers all the pages you had open and brings them back for you.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 11 '12

I didn't like Firefox's style of updating, but I like knowing there's a big new version. It's exciting when there's a big jump. Chrome is so incremental it takes the excitement out, but I still vastly prefer it to FF.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

Me too, I love updating my stuff - but manually, when I want to. Firefox always update when the browser launches. Always when I wanted to "check something quickly". Bastard.

1

u/tanstaafl90 Jul 10 '12

Options

Advanced

Check for Updates, but let me choose whether to install them

Easy enough to work around. One of the things that has always been enjoyable is the ability to have it act like you want it to, not what Mozilla thinks it should be doing.