Re: Firefox Software Update

[Matt Venzke]

On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 20:29:36 +1100, Kai Howells <kai@rocketcat.info> wrote:
> It appears that there is a problem with the Firefox Software Update, at
> least in Firefox 1.0 on Windows and Mac OS X.

"We're still working on some with the application update
infrastructure and the installer so for the first few days, we'll only
be offering the release via full download at the website and then
turning on the automatic update system hopefully sometime next week."

Quoted from Asa's blog at:
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/archives/007609.html

Of course, that was posted on the 23rd, so I have no idea when they'll
turn it on exactly. You'll have to ask them directly.

- Matt

[Beau Henderson]

I've only had skin / addons updated via that method. I don't think its
meant to actually update firefox between releases, though I have seen
minor firefox updates in the 0.9.3 days if im not mistaken. Perhaps
its just not ripe enough to go primetime ? Either way, I think its
still suggested to uninstall firefox before installing any new
version. It would be nice if there was some official notice that
version upgrades are not supported through the firefox update option
especially for those less than comfortable with a computer. We don't
want those people switching back to .. whats it called now do we.

Anyways, im not sure this will get much attention here from the FF devs.


On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 20:29:36 +1100, Kai Howells <kai@rocketcat.info> wrote:
> It appears that there is a problem with the Firefox Software Update, at
> least in Firefox 1.0 on Windows and Mac OS X.
>
> In Preferences -> Advanced -> Software Update there are checkboxes to
> Periodically check for updates to Firefox and My Extensions. It doesn't
> appear that this feature works at all. I've not been notified via this
> method that Firefox 1.0.1 has been released, even manually hitting the
> Check Now button (that takes a minute or so to do it's thing over a
> cable internet connection) happily reports back to me that there are no
> available updates.
>
> Now, there are a couple of bugs, listed as critical in bugzilla, that
> confirm that I'm not alone with these problems, however they don't
> appear to be assigned to anyone at this stage. I believe that this
> issue deserves more attention than it's currently getting as security
> is one of the stated design goals of the project and with no working
> auto-update feature we're potentially being put in a worse position
> than with other vendor's alternatives that at least have monthly
> updates.
>
> Regards,
> Kai Howells
>
>


--
Beau Henderson
http://www.iminteractive.net

[Kurt Seifried]

> It appears that there is a problem with the Firefox Software Update, at
> least in Firefox 1.0 on Windows and Mac OS X.

Someone from Mozilla Org has stated that the automated updates will not be
enabled for sometime since they do not have the infrastructure to support it
yet. Try to remember, Firefox went from <1 million to >10 million installs
in a few months. The amount of infrastructure needed to support even a
fraction of those users updating automatically is significant. You can
upgrade manually (i.e. download and install it from www.getfirefox.com which
directs to the appropriate URL on the mozilla.org website). Or you can wait
for them to enable the 1.0.1 automated update.

http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/archives/007609.html

"We're still working on some with the application update infrastructure and
the installer so for the first few days, we'll only be offering the release
via full download at the website and then turning on the automatic update
system hopefully sometime next week."

In future it sounds like they will have automatic updates enabled as they
come out, which isn't to bad. Try to remember folks, this is FREE (as in
beer and speech) software supported by.. well... not the majority of end
users (i.e. Microsoft gets paid for each copy of IE, through Windows sales,
Firefox does not).

As for bugs in bugzilla, it's OpenSource, you can take a look and fix them,
or pay a developer so they have more time to code fixes for a piece of
software you depend upon (but are not willing to support in any manner).

Kurt Seifried, kurt@seifried.org
A15B BEE5 B391 B9AD B0EF
AEB0 AD63 0B4E AD56 E574
http://seifried.org/security/

[Rainer Duffner]

Kurt Seifried wrote:

>> It appears that there is a problem with the Firefox Software Update,
>> at least in Firefox 1.0 on Windows and Mac OS X.
>
>
> Someone from Mozilla Org has stated that the automated updates will
> not be enabled for sometime since they do not have the infrastructure
> to support it yet. Try to remember, Firefox went from <1 million to
> >10 million installs in a few months. The amount of infrastructure
> needed to support even a fraction of those users updating
> automatically is significant.


That's why one would think they'd want to offer binary diffs or some
other way to "update" it without downloading the whole thing again (and
again after the next bugfix).


1e10*sizeof(binary diff) << 1e10x8MB - hopefully ;-)



cheers,
Rainer

--
================================================== =
~ Rainer Duffner - rainer@ultra-secure.de ~
~ Freising - Munich - Germany ~
~ Unix - Linux - BSD - OpenSource - Security ~
~ http://www.ultra-secure.de/~rainer/pubkey.pgp ~
================================================== =

[Stan Bubrouski]

Michael Hampton wrote:
> I can confirm that this problem also exists in Firefox 1.0.1 on Linux,
> where there simply is no preference UI at all for Software Update, and
> no apparent way to check for updates. In addition, I found by

This is wohfully innacurate:

Tools -> Options -> Advanced [under Software Update]-> Check Updates

Updates all extentions and Forefox itself when updates are available.

Firefox releases appear to be held back at the moment, probably because
the updates site is being revamped. As far as I can tell it all
actually works as designed.

> right-clicking an extension, an Update option appears in the menu, but
> it does nothing.
>

This works fine for me. What version of Firefox are you using... this
worked for me in 1.0 and still works in 1.0.1 When I press teh update
button in extension manager or right click on one of them a window opens
telling if it found any updates or not...

-sb

[Gilles DEMARTY]

The update process have been activated this day. A reminder went to my
computer, saying that the mozilla firefox 1.0.1 is availiable and that
my version has to be updated.

It downloaded the entire installation file with the correct language
subset (fr_FR) and executed it.

sincerely.

GD