I thought it was safer and secure and all that?

11 in one go?! That beats its previous record of 10 in one go!

Terrible track record. Hundreds of gaping holes since it launched just a few years ago unlike, say, Safari. By the time it's been around as long as IE, imagine what the figure will be!

Netscape used to be the bane of the Web. Now it's IE but IE is changing. I think in another 5 years Firefox will be the runt of the litter because it'll be bloated and slower than the rest.

@Chronos

Except the awsome bar isn't change for change sake. It's called <em>development</em> (I don't care if tags work or not!) or <em>progress</em>. I've read a few people dismiss it - like the office ribbon - but once you've used it for a little while and understood <em>how</em> to use it (it really isn't that difficult), I'm sure you'll find it awsome! As for the last part; a little bit over zeolous there don't you think?! It's only software! Free for that matter too (I can asure you capitalists DON'T love THAT mindset!) and there are other free alternatives - the beauty of open source! You could always use the browser that came free with whatever version of Windows you use. (If it's 3.1, you're out of luck! By the way Microsoft are going to stop supporting that version soon!)

and @Florence: I bet you both hated the change to the UI in Vista and Office too.

@chronos

"Change for change's sake is not good."

That's what I kept saying.....but Obama got elected anyway.

@Chronos

"don't force your tastes on the rest of us and ridicule us when we make an informed, reasoned and conscious choice. That's what religions do and I think we're all very aware of where that leads."

Ah ... can't think of any religions which "ridicule" others for making an informed, reasoned and conspicuous choice. Care to share an example? Or phrase what you're trying to say more meaningfully?

What has capitalism to do with an open source, free to use browser? Nothing? Ah.

Great points there.

@Florence

I hated the "new and improved" address bar myself when it first came out.

It took a couple of days to get used to it, but now the old style looks crippled.

Change CAN be good

But it's not that good when it breaks stuff that works.

Next you'll be telling I really really need to upgrade XP to Vista too and buy a new computer?

Organisation can be good too. As in address bar for URLs, bookmarks for bookmarks, history to search your browser history.

I've been using Firefox since back in the days when it was still called Phoenix (switched from Opera as i needed SOCKS support). It's obviously improved tremendously since those days, but this particular change is just making the browser unusable for me.

Bugs

@AC: how many security bugs they solve is no indication of how secure or insecure the software is. All software more complicated than "hello, world" has bugs. The important metric is whether they actually resolve the bugs and how long it takes them to do so. I'd rather have software with 100 defects resolved within a few weeks of being reported than software with 10 defects resolved within 6 months of being reported.

@Florence: have you actually files a bug or request for improvement on bugzilla for this? One reason I use Firefox is that they are usually very responsive in addressing defects and the bugzilla system keeps you updated of the progress. Some people (like me) actually like the new address bar but I can understand why some people wouldn't. An option to chose what behaviour you want to use would be great.

ff3 address bar

I have previously installed ff3 and then uninstalled it because of the the address bar behaviour .

I'm still on NT

Sorry, but Firefox 3 will not run on my poor NT box.

Re: Trolls and messiahs

By Anonymous Coward:

"If this isn't a troll, you need to get off the internet."

You only need to get off the Internet if you're using Firefox. Until you've shored it up with patches of course. Then it'll be absolutely bullet proof like folk have said all along.

By Bruno Girin:

"how many security bugs they solve is no indication of how secure or insecure the software is."

Only the true Messiah denies His divinity!

A.L.F

Address-bar Liberation Front

Join now!

Two good reasons for dumping Firefox

Firstly as a Win98 user, come the "great switch off" for corrections of existing faults in the software, I am left out in the cold.

Secondly, the great Firefox intention to out-Phorm Phorm with FF3. Even if they have decided not to collect user web site visit data from Firefox 3 users, that they ever thought of it was enough to make me start thinking about alternatives.

I had believed the FOSS people were proof against Bill Gate's "Constant Upgrade" business model. I think that we can now see it is just spun differently by the PR (Perpetual Rumour) teams. The effects appear to be the same.

The dat the stop updating 2.x is the day I stop using Firefox

At least until they give an option to disable Ff3's bloody awful address bar.

Here we go again

I'm sick of all these updates and seriously considering going back to Internet Explorer.

Are you people quite mad?

... you can use the FF3 Address Bar the same way as you always did, by typing in the first part of the address you want to go to until enough has been typed to narrow it down so that the URL you want is showing in the dropdown, then pick it from the list. As you're typing, other URLs may be shown in the list but they're likely to be related to the one you're typing. Even if they're not, plough on and your result will soon appear. What's the problem?

In addition, the address bar will help you find addresses where the part of the URL you can remember is not at the beginning, or where you can only remember part of the page title, but you don't have to worry your little heads about this.

You people probably don't like predictive texting either, do you? What a reason to abandon a browser: "They added extra functionality! Waaaah!"

You prat!

"I'm sick of all these updates and seriously considering going back to Internet Explorer"

1) would you rather security problems weren't addressed?

2) there are updates to IE pretty much every patch Tuesday

If you're going back to IE may I recommend IE 3.0 which is no longer supported, so you'll be safe from those nasty security patches.