back to article Mozilla gives passive-aggressive missive to pre-Firefox 3.6 hold-outs

Mozilla has begun shepherding Firefox fans through the browser door marked 3.6, in a move to encourage users to upgrade to the open source outfit's latest surfing tool. As of yesterday, Mozilla claimed that Firefox 3.6 had been downloaded by over 100 million people since it landed in January this year. That milestone was …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.

Page:

  1. Moonshine Mick
    Unhappy

    Disappearing Posts - 2nd try

    Since upgrading to 3.6 some weeks I've been experiencing a weird - intermittent - problem with data-entry and posts to certain websites.

    What happens: I'll fill in my data (happened today on PayPal - very worrying), hit 'submit', and the entry boxes will clear, but the message/data has not been sent. I've now lost so many longish posts that I do a save (when I remember) before submitting. If I have saved first, the post will generally go OK at second try. Of course, when - as with PayPal - the data is in multiple boxes you're stuffed and have to enter everything again.

    BTW, I'm on a Macbook. Mac OSX 10.4.11.

    Anyone else experiencing this? If so, any advice?

    As it happens this post also vanished first time.

  2. Andrew Moore
    Boffin

    All-In-One-Guestures...

    I did this quick hack:

    1. Go to %appdata%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\YOUR DEFAULT PROFILE\extensions\{8b86149f-01fb-4842-9dd8-4d7eb02fd055}

    2. Edit the install.rdf file there (any text editor will do or XML editor if you want to be fancy).

    3. Find the maxVersion element. It is currently set to 3.5- Change this to 4.0

    And viola. The only thing I've noticed is the mouse "trails" have disappeared but I'll live with that until the update is posted.

  3. Jeff Deacon

    WHat happened to Mozilla selling users browsing habits?

    Early in the development of Firefox 3, they announced that they would be selling their users' browsing habits to Giggle (who fund much of Mozilla anyway), in much the same way as if you had installed a Giggle Toolbar. Never did hear if they had backed away from that, so never bothered to change to version 3. Actually 2.0.0.20 works very nicely thank you! I just hope all the exploits are aimed at the new glitzy features that only exist in version 3.

    1. Patrick Finch

      @ Jeff Deacon

      (N.B. I work for Mozilla)

      I do not think Mozilla announced any such thing. I believe that there was a discussion in 2008 about the potential value of an opt-in programme to collect and share publically data on browsing, as it was considered this might have a number of beneficial uses for research, policy etc. Mozilla was / is probably one of very few organisations capable of delivering this data that would not seek to use it for competitive advantage.

      I do not believe that at any stage the idea was to sell users' habits to anyone (and I am not sure Google really need to buy usage data from anyone!), and as far as I am aware, this project was not funded, and Mozilla does not collect data about browser usage.

      I am delighted that you like Firefox 2 so much, but I tend to think that 3.6 is an improvement and I would recommend upgrading.

  4. Stevie

    Bah!

    These dickwads are bombarding me with pop-up (one so far) urging me to download the latest and greatest.

    1) Our corporate browser is IE, so they should be grateful I'm even using their stupid browser. Did I see any mention of thanks, or of a cheque in the mail in their offensive spam? No I did not, just the implication I was a nitwit for not racing to install the new version with all my might.

    2) Our firewall won't let me download their stupid upgrade (or anything with a zip or exe extension), so why bug me with these idiotic messages? Surely they could run a simple test with the updater nagware, then shut the damn thing down in perpetuity since it will never work? Between firefox and adobe reader I am fed up with exhortations to try just one more time.

    3) Linux etc! Mac etc! Windows etc! Kindle, rubbish! iPad, democracy in action! Etc! More Etc!

    1. mangobrain
      FAIL

      That's nice.

      Yes, Stevie, of course they'll pay you to use their browser. Oh, and don't worry about your organisation's "firewall" - if you do decide to take the upgrade, it'll be delivered directly into your hands on a silver platter. I'm sure you'll be fully reimbursed for the time it took you to close all one of the pop-ups they displayed to you, and if you try hard enough, you might even get some compensation for the intense emotional trauma it has clearly caused you. Have you tried contacting your personal injury lawyer?

    2. junkmaninohio

      Don't download

      You'll regret it...all I got was a looping pop up that won't die saying upgrade failed....it won't go away...

  5. Keith Doyle
    Thumb Down

    Already gave up on FF

    Some time ago I dumped FF for another browser. I don't quite understand why an open source project has acquired the same bad habit that the closed source products do-- an incessant need to upgrade. Fix bugs, yes, but the feeping creaturism I can do without. The reason I went to FF in the first place, is it was supposed to be so much leaner and meaner than Mozilla/Netscape (which I had already dumped). Not anymore it's not, time to move on...

  6. DavidK

    <title/>

    Pisses me off that no Linux distro keeps up to date with this. Even Windows does better in that regard.

    1. mangobrain
      Boffin

      Simple

      You install it through your distribution's package manager, and you get the latest version they consider stable - presumably having tested it with as much of the rest of the distribution as is feasible, and applied any distro-specific customisations. Typically one such customisation is to turn off the update checker, because after all, you've opted to have the package managed for you. This is, after all, the raison d'être of a "package manager".

      Or, you uninstall the distro's packaged version and download it yourself directly from Mozilla, staying as bleeding-edge as you like. However, if it breaks, you get to keep both pieces.

  7. junkmaninohio

    pop up window saying "upgrade failed"

    tried to upgrade and all I get now is a looping pop up window telling me "upgrade failed"...can't get rid of it...this system is garbage and it's time I switched to something else.

  8. amehaye

    How to always run the latest version on Ubuntu

    https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu-mozilla-daily/+archive/ppa

  9. This post has been deleted by its author

    1. Kamal Hashmi

      Re: I like Chrome → #

      You like chrome because it upgrades itself without telling you?

      And you don't like it for not just growing and growing in its use of memory?

      Are you the anti-me from the other Earth on the opposite side of the sun?

  10. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Don't ship buggy stuff then

    If you want to annoy people about updating, don't ship a browser that crashes everytime you try to print! (Current problem with FF 3.6 on MacOS X)

Page:

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like