Firefox users beware! Stealth upgrade cycle going on!

[djf]

I have a machine I use rarely with an image of XP that WAS running Firefox 13.whateva...

I booted it earlier, hit the FF icon, and it upgraded to 14.01

I immediately turned off auto updates, and now will have to go into the archives to reinstall 13

If you need older versions of software and browsers, a good site is Oldapps.

http://www.oldapps.com/

[1_Rain_Drop]

what’s wrong with version 14?

[Red_Devil 232]

What?

[Uncle Ike]

” what’s wrong with version 14? “

Nothing, that I can see so far - and I’ve been streaming Hulu.com on it pretty steady all day...

In fact, this seems to have cleared up a problem that FF13 was having with the newest version of Flash Player...

Time will tell, I guess.... ;)

[max americana]

FF does that from time to time. Mozilla, unlike Google Chrome or IE is non-profit so I don’t have a beef with them. I just dowloaded thru torrent season 1 of Walking Dead in 1080 resolution and there is no problem..

Er, i mean, ummm, my neighbor’s kid gave me a copy of Walking Dead season 1. Yeah, that’s it (cough)

[RingerSIX]

The latest public version of FireFox is 14.0.1.

[Chode]

it's been going on for awhile... i was running 3.6x and a few weeks ago and got force fed 12, then the next day i got force fed 13

i got force fed 14 this morning

[null and void]

And it’s running just fine on my machine.

[I cannot think of a name]

“I immediately turned off auto updates”

What the heck is ‘auto updates’?

(No software stays on my machine for even 2 minutes if auto updates can’t be disabled!)

[ctdonath2]

Frequent unannounced automatic updates are becoming the norm for software.

[null and void]

Force fed?

Change your preferences.

[djf]

Firefox under Tools>Options>Advanced has a field you can check for “don’t do automatic updates”

[philman_36]

The auto update implementation was announced some time ago.
(maybe 2-3 months ago)

[Calvin Locke]

For one thing, they didn't keep all my "preferences", and I had to go looking for the things I set so long ago to change them back.

I've had what I think is a memory error pop up on occasion when closing FF.

[CedarDave]

Turn off auto update but keep the update notification so you can install at your convenience.

FF has this great idea that they need to put out a new version every 4 to 6 weeks or so. Plays havac with add-ons, especially the older ones which require manual tweaking of the "install.rdf" files to make them work.

I finally bit the bullet last week and upgraded from version 3 which had its last security upgrade in late April. Of course my screen buttons arrangement was completely scrambled; I got most of them back the way I wanted but still working on a few. Also, a whole bunch of add-ons were made "incompatible" with version 13. Then version 14 came out a few days later. Grrr...

At the end I found an add-on that makes older add-ons compatible with new versions:
Disable Add-on Compatibility Checks 1.3: "Reinstates the extensions check Compatibility preference without respect to the current application version." Of course, you have to be careful when "forcing" older apps to work with newer versions; most work o.k. but sometimes, though rarely, the results may be unexpected.

Oh, one more thing, because new versions of FF don't have a "status bar" at the bottom, some favorite FR apps won't work (such as "Word Count Plus") even with the compatibility check disabled. Activating the "Add-on bar" solves that problem.

[Chode]

before it went from 3.6x to 12 it always said there was an upgrade available and i always told it NO... then one day i came home from work, turned on the machine and it did the upgrade without asking

updates are one thing, like going from 3.61 to 3.62 etc, going from 3.6x to 12 was a revision not an update same as going from 12 to 13 and 13 to 14

12 did some things i didn't like but am getting used to after tweeking it some, that said, i haven't seen any major issues from 13 or 14

[CedarDave]

For one thing, they didn't keep all my "preferences", and I had to go looking for the things I set so long ago to change them back.

That for sure. Their "sleek look" hid a bunch of stuff. The address bar disappeared, along with a bunch of convenience buttons, tabs were on top, etc. Got quite a few back with view>toolbars>customize but was a real pain in the a**.

[TomGuy]

I tried FF13, but it would not load a certain add-on, so I had to revert to FF12.

Recent Adobe Flash Player upgrades (ver 11 series) have played havoc with FF. I finally got Flash 10 to work with FF12.

Mozilla’s rapid release creates more problems than it resolves. I will be glad when they finish that insanity.

I noticed FF14 jumped to FF14.01 nearly as soon as FF14 was released.

[CedarDave]

Two FR apps I can't do without are bbxtra and Word Count Plus. The first lets you enter html codes with a click (like bold, underline, italic, strikeout plus images and urls.

The second counts words to keep you from running afoul of FR's general excerpt posting rules (maximum 300 words or 1/3 total article words, whichever is less).

[Rebelbase]

This happened to a co-worker today. Screwed up a bunch of his add-ons.

[Revel]

The layout to the newer versions suck in a major way. My brother got stuck with a version that has no Address bar and no button in the upper left to get to any options. You can’t even type in a web site or turn on any tool bars. If you people like it then why not just USE IE as that is what newer versions of Firefox want to emulate. Fire fox is now a browser for dummies.

[Chode]

cool... thx

[uncommonsense]

Thanks for the http://www.oldapps.com link! Much of the new software destabilizes integrated systems – like Media Center running on XP.

I honestly don't know how the average person keeps their computer functioning safely anymore. I get frustrated with the lack of functional quality and…

I'm a computer nerd that dates back to punch cards and green screens, then 300 baud acoustic phone couplers, teletypes, dial up bulletin boards, LANS, OO, the Web, ASP, SAAS, cloud, blah blah, and so on…

[Psycho_Bunny]

I think it’s you. FF14 didn’t turn on FF Auto Updating on any of my 3 machines.

[CedarDave]

The layout to the newer versions suck in a major way. My brother got stuck with a version that has no Address bar and no button in the upper left to get to any options. You can’t even type in a web site or turn on any tool bars.

If he has a brown "Firefox" tab at top left, click options>Menu Bar. That will bring up the menu bar so you can turn on the tool bars. The Bookmarks toolbar is the same as the old Address bar - you can type in addresses or click a bookmark and it puts the address in. Try customizing using the view>toolbars>customize option. That's how I got most of my old buttons back where they were.

[Bullish]

what’s wrong with version 14?

If you have to ask..... Well....

[DManA]

Computers are cheap.

Keep one for important information AND NEVER CONNECT IT TO THE INTERNET

And keep another for crursing. If it gets infected re-image it.

No one needs a virus protection.

[CedarDave]

PING for your tech list

[Revel]

“If he has a brown “Firefox” tab at top left”

I know what you are talking about. I have seen it before. It is not even there in this case.

[davisfh]

Thanks for the info. I’m running Windows 2000 Professional on an older machine and I am constantly being bugged to upgrade my operating system to accommodate a newer version of Firefox. I have no intention of doing that.

[CedarDave]

Try function key F11 which will toggle between showing a full screen and toolbars. If that doesn't work, I'd suggest reinstalling.

[trebb]

If you had autoupdates on, it isn’t a “stealth” update.

[ShadowAce]

[ShadowAce]

[GOPJ]

Thanks for the ping.

[GOPJ]

If you need older versions of software and browsers, a good site is Oldapps.

That's good to know - my machine upgraded and now I can't see any videos...

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

You running Windows?

[Chode]

XP

[nutmeg]

I use the Mozilla Firefox browser. I must have my preferences set to do automatic updates, because I got the FF 14 update. Since that update, my computer freezes up while using FF. My pointer/cursor turns into a spinning light blue doughnut-shaped thing, and everything freezes up. I usually have to shut the computer down and start over again using IE, which I don't like, but at least it's working fine for me.

I have a new PC as of Sept. 2011, extra RAM, running Windows 7. Haven't had any problems with Windows 7 so far.

Anyone else having this or a similar problem? I'd appreciate any help... I'm not a computer geek, obviously. Thanks in advance!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Befor 14, somewhere they seemed to have change the bookmarks toolbar....at least on he Linux distros I am trying out,....don’t like that at all!

[CedarDave]

Three suggestions:

1. If Firefox will boot up at all, go to this link (or you can open it in IE):

http://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/troubleshoot-firefox-issues-using-safe-mode?s=start+in+safe+mode&r=1&as=s

Read it and disable any add-ons/extensions you have and see if it will work. If it does, you will have to find and disable the offending extension (my problem was with either Adblock Plus or No Script - I didn’t bother to check as it was for a one-time view web page and I used IE).

2. If you have a home page (mine is FR), you might want to have it start with a blank page until you figure out the problem (Tools>Options>General>Startup - blank page).

3. Once you get it running again, go to Tools>Options>Advanced>Update and check the second box (check for updates, but let me decide to install them).

Good luck!

[uncommonsense]

I hate to say this but sometimes the best fix is uninstalling and reinstalling. I'm using a little Blackberry so sorry for typos and I can't link to one of my fav free tools - CCleaner. [Don't download from Cnet - they want you to install their download tracker.]

1) Download and install ccleaner

2) Use the program uninstaller to delete FF

3) Run ccleaner to delete temp files and fix registry errors (have it back up your registry first)

4) Reboot

5) Maybe run ccleaner again just to make sure garbage gets cleaned up (optional)

6) Run the utility to create a Restore Point (sorry, wish I had the link - it's under System Properties I think)

7) Reinstall FF

Using these steps usually fixes pesky problems. Having worked in the industry since before DOS 1.3, I've seen a growing laziness, lack of skill depth, and cost cutting (outsourcing) that's killing quality and stability.

[Walmartian]

AVG has a virus loose. Its called AVG Secure Search. I mistakenly downloaded it trying to download FF. search it. People are pissed off with AVG

[paul544]

I have this same issue. What happens is that when you do install an update, FF changes your preference to Automatically update. I have, several times, had to change this back.

I swore that if it happens again I’m going back to Opera. Since IE isn’t and option and Chrome has its own issues.

[djf]

I pitched AVG a while back. It is, like so much free software (HEY! It’s open source, ain’t that great? /sarcasm/) turned into bloatware.

Using Malwarebytes now and if that bloats up, I cough up the change to get Bitdefender.

[nutmeg]

Thanks. If I uninstall Firefox 14, will I lose my bookmarks on my FF browser? (I have hundreds of them)

Sorry if this is a stupid question... ;-)

[nutmeg]

Thank you... I’ll give that a try ASAP.