Firefox Extension Guru’s Blog

Just a quick addendum to the earlier post: New AMO Launched. Basil Hashem who is part of the AMO Team added a comment in reference to the inability to install incompatible add-ons:

Try visiting the “Advanced Details” section and take a look at the Complete Version History link - it includes all available versions and doesn’t do the smart detection so that testers, developers and others can download any version of an add-on (for whatever OS platform and edition of Firefox) you want without the hassle.

Here is an example:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addons/versions/1865

Now I can understand the justification for keeping this section collapsed by default, since everyday Firefox users really won’t have a need to go here. There is also a link to the add-on Developer’s Home Page in this section as well.

Back in February I took a look at the preview for the soon-to-be released Addons.Mozilla.Org (AMO). Some of the things that were pointed out in this review included:

• New visual refresh/redesign is a nice new clean look, but at the same time the site seems cluttered with so much information.
• The site automatically defaults to add-ons for English-US Firefox. Other applications can be selected from the top-right.
• The search box is very prominently displayed on top, but still sucks. As pointed out in the review, you can not filter for add-on type (extension, theme, plug-in, etc.)
• The actual add-on page is broken into five sections:
  1. Brief Description
     
  2. More Images
  3. Long Description
  4. Reviews
  5. Advanced Options (which is still collapsed by default).
• Sandbox/experimental add-ons in the search and category results

There was one of other thing that I had (or in this case hadn’t) noticed was information about add-on computability (works with Firefox: 1.5 – 2.0.0.* or Thunderbird: 1.5 – 2.0.0.*). As it turns out this is part of ‘new and improved’ design. AMO now detects which version of Firefox/Thunderbird you are using (via the general.useragent.extra.firefox setting in about:config) and will NOT allow you to even download add-ons that are not compatible with your version of Firefox/Thunderbird. Below are two buttons you could be presented with depending on the compatibility of the add-on:

While it is a nice feature for every-day Firefox users preventing them from downloading an incompatible add-on, it is a pain for us testers. There is no way to over-ride this feature other than to modify the general.useragent.extra.firefox setting in about:config to trick AMO that you are using a compatible version of Firefox. I suspect Mozilla is going to be hearing a lot about this from testers as we move closer to the final Firefox 3 release in the next couple months. The complaints could start rolling in next week when Beta 5 is released and developers haven’t bumped the add-ons ‘max version’ to Beta 5 yet. This is going to have a major impact on how I handle my migration to Firefox 3 Beta 5 when it comes out. I was thinking about creating a fresh profile and then going thru and re-installing my add-ons (currently 25) and ‘forcing’ them to work with the Nightly Tester Tools. Now I may end up having to either use the same profile (which I rather not as once I load it into Firefox 3, I may not be able to use it again in Firefox 2) or go in and tweak the general.useragent.extra.firefox setting back to BonEcho/2.0.0.14pre (or whatever the latest version of BonEcho is at that time).

So prior, I had two design/feature gripes (’other applications should be a drop-down’ and no add-on type filtering in search) with the newly redesigned AMO. With this new release I will add the ‘incompatible add-on download blocker’ as another gripe.

News Source: CyberNet News

The latest Get A Mac ad, Bad Vista reviews is a very misleading. The ad calls the banners ads about Vista which appear at the top “reviews”. Sadly, this is entirely untrue:

• The “review” from PC Magazine: ‘It’s Time for a Vista Do-Over’ is actually the tile of the article. The article doesn’t really say that there is anything wrong with Vista, more that Microsoft needs to more work into their next operating system.
• The”review” from C|Net: ‘Vista…one of the biggest blunders in technology’, was from an op-ed on why Microsoft should dump the OS completely.

News Source: CyberNet News

Another website based Get a Mac Ad.

Usually, it is the application performing the Illegal Operation. However if you were to install Safari on your windows PC, you would be performing the Illegal Operation. According the Safari License Agreement (below) you are allowed to, “…install one copy of the Apple Software on a single Apple-labeled computer…”

I know many consumers never bother to read the End User License Agreement (EULA) when they install software, but apparently Apple hasn’t bothered to read their own EULA for Safari. Looks like they are recycling the old EULA from when Safari was Mac only application when they pushed it out to Windows last year. Either that, it is a trick by Apple to get everyone to switch over to Macs or risk being sued. That would be an interesting Get A Mac campaign.

News Source: CyberNet News

Back on December 8th, 2006, Firefox 3 Alpha 1 was released. Over the next nearly year and half, Places have been added, removed, then added, then removed and finally put back into the builds. Now comes word that the final release could come as early as June 2008. Percy from Mozilla Links writes:

Mozilla VP of Engineering, Mike Schroepfer, has confirmed that the final release of Firefox 3, currently in Beta 4 stage, is expected for June, a full quarter later than the latest estimate and some nine months past the original.

Looking back at the Mozilla Ships Alpha Release of Firefox 3.0 post, the first thing you will notice was the sub-headline:

June is really not all that unrealistic given Beta 5 is suppose to the be the last of the Betas and released early in April. This would give Mozilla almost 3 months (should they release at the very end of June) to go through the (2 or 3) release candidates builds and then ship the final Firefox 3 product. On a side note as I did with Firefox 2 Beta 2 (the least Beta build), I will start using Firefox 3, Beta 5 as my primary browser once it is release.

I had kind of thought Mozilla was being overly optimistic with their targeted Match 27th release date for Firefox 3 Beta 5. I realize the Beta 5 release was suppose to fix a few remaining blockers that couldn’t be fixed in time for the Beta 4 release. However, the aggressive Beta 5 schedule would have had the release a little over two weeks after the Beta 4 release. That just seemed too soon and uncharacteristic of typical Firefox release pattern (with the exception of the Firefox 2.0.0.11 release at the end of November 2007). I suspected Mozilla was not going to hit the March 27th release date when there was no mention of a ‘release’ in this week’s Weekly Update meeting.

Instead of being released today, Beta 5 has just been declared code complete. The Build Team has started generating the Firefox 3 Beta 5 Release Candidate builds. The next phase is for the Quality Assurance Team to start testing. This Friday, March 28th will allow users to test the Release Candidate builds, not the final build of Firefox 3 Beta 5. For those of you interested in participating you can get information and sign up at Quality.Mozilla.Org (QMO). Depending on how the test day goes, Beta 5 could be released as early as next week.

Firefox 3 Beta 5

• Code freeze: March 18
• Builds start: March 27
• QA starts: March 28
• Release to beta channel: ?
• Final Release: Week of March 31st?

News Source: Mozilla Developers News