4 ms·

I don't think it's about money. I feel that Mozilla has made a strategic mistake in switching to a very rapid release schedule. My clients keep saying things li

I don't think it's about money. I feel that Mozilla has made a strategic mistake in switching to a very rapid release schedule. My clients keep saying things like, "Firefox 5? Didn't Firefox 4 just come out like two months ago?" I haven't even bothered with Firefox 5 yet. It's not worth my time to work inside yet another browser. At this rate, I might as well just dump Firefox and work inside Chrome. Mozilla needs to slow the hell down and let Extension developers catch up.

Osmose 15y ago
As far as I know, Chrome releases every 6 weeks as well. If you switch to working with Chrome you'll be working under the same rapid release schedule.
- jonknee 15y ago
  But without knowing any better. Chrome has always updated on its own and there's no reason to know what version of Chrome you're using because it's the latest. I had to check just now, apparently it's 12. FireFox has always had hugely publicized major updates with a long time between them, so there's a disconnect--you're supposed to care about a new FF version.
  - inportb 15y ago
    Firefox updates also result in extension breakage.
    - gonchuki 15y ago
      Chrome updates also result in JavaScript breakage. File/Blob API is an example that, while being experimental and a moving target, happened on the background and broke from one launch of the browser to the other without the dev knowing what the heck was going on. Same breakage happened from Firefox 4 to 5, but at least the end user (the dev in this case) knows that something important happened and might be related to that. This is key.
azakai 15y ago
> I haven't even bothered with Firefox 5 yet. It's not worth my time to work inside yet another browser. At this rate, I might as well just dump Firefox and work inside Chrome. > Mozilla needs to slow the hell down I don't understand. You want to switch from Firefox because of it's rapid releases, to the browser that invented rapid releases? Both Chrome and Firefox release a new major version every 6 weeks, both obsolete the version right before it at that time, etc. If you want a slow-releasing browser, your options are IE and Safari.
- zobzu 15y ago
  thats exactly what google are good at, advertising. they make DEVS believe totally crazy things like what you just mentioned. its scary - but they sure know their thing
shinratdr 15y ago
> I feel that Mozilla has made a strategic mistake in switching to a very rapid release schedule. That wasn't the mistake. The mistake was stealing the technical part from Chrome, and not the part that end users love. Trust me, the only reason Chrome's rapid release schedule hasn't garnered this criticism is because 9/10 users couldn't tell you what the current version of Chrome is, much less what it was when they originally installed it. Google, while adopting rapid release, has simultaneously made version numbers irrelevant to anyone except devs and power users. That was the important part. Updates don't matter and they just happen. Mozilla adopted rapid release but kept publicizing each major version like it was a big deal and giving end users ways to opt out other than turning off updates completely. This is a BAD idea. Rapid release needs to come hand in hand with safer, less drastic, and seamless updates. This will never happen until Mozilla overhauls its extensions system because of how deep & old-world it is and how prone extensions are to break during minor updates. It's unfortunate for the NoScript fanatics, but a rapid release schedule simply does not work if you provide this many hesitations. I still see FF3.6 and FF4 everywhere, yet unless the person doesn't run Chrome very often, Chrome is always at 12.x. If it isn't, it will be next time they launch. It's funny, in a way users who clamour for stuff like NoScript are actually putting average users in more danger for their own personal benefit. If Mozilla was allowed to overhaul FF's extension system, updates could be much more seamless and end users would actually end up with the latest version of the program. Instead, we run the gamut from 1.x to 2.x to 3.x to 4.x to 5.x and everything in between. I'm sure anyone who has worked as a desktop tech has somewhat recently encountered a Firefox 1.x/2.x installation here and there, ever catch a Chrome 1? Chrome 3? Chrome 7? Really, anything except the latest version at the time? Exactly.
- abraham 15y ago
  Firefox versions after v4 update automatically. They show a dialog during restart while they check extension compatibility but everything happens seamlessly. Mozilla also has a script that scans extensions on AMO and auto updates the versions they support if they don't detect any issues. For the majority of extensions they should keep working unless they do wired hacky things or use more advanced extension APIs. Mozilla has also been downplaying the version numbers in recent announcements for Firefox updates. By the end of the year everyone using Firefox will be in the same state of not caring that Chrome users are at. Mozilla has also overhauled the extension system with the introduction of the Add-on SDK. It is still a little rough but it is HTML/JS, doesn't require browser restarts and it has a fresh API for developers to use. Developers just need to switch to it.

Osmose 15y ago

As far as I know, Chrome releases every 6 weeks as well. If you switch to working with Chrome you'll be working under the same rapid release schedule.

jonknee 15y ago
But without knowing any better. Chrome has always updated on its own and there's no reason to know what version of Chrome you're using because it's the latest. I had to check just now, apparently it's 12. FireFox has always had hugely publicized major updates with a long time between them, so there's a disconnect--you're supposed to care about a new FF version.
- inportb 15y ago
  Firefox updates also result in extension breakage.
  - gonchuki 15y ago
    Chrome updates also result in JavaScript breakage. File/Blob API is an example that, while being experimental and a moving target, happened on the background and broke from one launch of the browser to the other without the dev knowing what the heck was going on. Same breakage happened from Firefox 4 to 5, but at least the end user (the dev in this case) knows that something important happened and might be related to that. This is key.

azakai 15y ago

> I haven't even bothered with Firefox 5 yet. It's not worth my time to work inside yet another browser. At this rate, I might as well just dump Firefox and work inside Chrome. > Mozilla needs to slow the hell down I don't understand. You want to switch from Firefox because of it's rapid releases, to the browser that invented rapid releases? Both Chrome and Firefox release a new major version every 6 weeks, both obsolete the version right before it at that time, etc. If you want a slow-releasing browser, your options are IE and Safari.

zobzu 15y ago
thats exactly what google are good at, advertising. they make DEVS believe totally crazy things like what you just mentioned. its scary - but they sure know their thing

shinratdr 15y ago

> I feel that Mozilla has made a strategic mistake in switching to a very rapid release schedule. That wasn't the mistake. The mistake was stealing the technical part from Chrome, and not the part that end users love. Trust me, the only reason Chrome's rapid release schedule hasn't garnered this criticism is because 9/10 users couldn't tell you what the current version of Chrome is, much less what it was when they originally installed it. Google, while adopting rapid release, has simultaneously made version numbers irrelevant to anyone except devs and power users. That was the important part. Updates don't matter and they just happen. Mozilla adopted rapid release but kept publicizing each major version like it was a big deal and giving end users ways to opt out other than turning off updates completely. This is a BAD idea. Rapid release needs to come hand in hand with safer, less drastic, and seamless updates. This will never happen until Mozilla overhauls its extensions system because of how deep & old-world it is and how prone extensions are to break during minor updates. It's unfortunate for the NoScript fanatics, but a rapid release schedule simply does not work if you provide this many hesitations. I still see FF3.6 and FF4 everywhere, yet unless the person doesn't run Chrome very often, Chrome is always at 12.x. If it isn't, it will be next time they launch. It's funny, in a way users who clamour for stuff like NoScript are actually putting average users in more danger for their own personal benefit. If Mozilla was allowed to overhaul FF's extension system, updates could be much more seamless and end users would actually end up with the latest version of the program. Instead, we run the gamut from 1.x to 2.x to 3.x to 4.x to 5.x and everything in between. I'm sure anyone who has worked as a desktop tech has somewhat recently encountered a Firefox 1.x/2.x installation here and there, ever catch a Chrome 1? Chrome 3? Chrome 7? Really, anything except the latest version at the time? Exactly.

abraham 15y ago
Firefox versions after v4 update automatically. They show a dialog during restart while they check extension compatibility but everything happens seamlessly. Mozilla also has a script that scans extensions on AMO and auto updates the versions they support if they don't detect any issues. For the majority of extensions they should keep working unless they do wired hacky things or use more advanced extension APIs. Mozilla has also been downplaying the version numbers in recent announcements for Firefox updates. By the end of the year everyone using Firefox will be in the same state of not caring that Chrome users are at. Mozilla has also overhauled the extension system with the introduction of the Add-on SDK. It is still a little rough but it is HTML/JS, doesn't require browser restarts and it has a fresh API for developers to use. Developers just need to switch to it.