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Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#401

Post by sydney6 »

furgooswft13 wrote: post #372
sydney6 wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you been able to restore your search providers? Really a kick in the nuts, this one..

Nope. Maybe I should restart Nightly again but...I just added Google back, and it was not as easy as I'd expect. The Firefox "add search engines" page is a mess and straight Google search was like 3 pages down. Also I found another dark theme that is somewhat similar to what I had (but not official Mozilla) and installed that. All the default ones are still disabled.

Thanks.. Same here on every machine.. The hotfix update has been installed and add-on functionality is indeed recovered, but still i only have "amazon.com" as a pre-installed search provider and have been unable to restore them to their default settings without creating a completely new profile. Besides, i would be rather hesitant to install search providers from that list, imho.

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#402

Post by icebraining »

username223 wrote: post #228
andrewshadura wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s bad about telemetry?

It's just another database collecting unknown information about me ("anonymized" in some way that may be reversible), stored for an unknown length of time, and enabled by default. Just ask. Plenty of people will beta test software for a $20 gift certificate, or even for free, but they should be given a choice.

Mozilla does ask.

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#404

Post by toyg »

rosser wrote: post #357
usecontainers wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So that's pretty unfair. 1) They state they are working on a fix for normal, release channel users who don't want to run studies 2) they tell you to temporarily run studies to get the fix within up to 6 six hours (could be faster; set expectation) 3) You can explicitly install nightly or 66.4 before it's pushed if you want a fix now Yes, it's unfortunate, I'd expect them to meet it head on, push a tested fix in a tim…

I'm not sure I care how unfair the characterization is. I heavily use container tabs — ahem, 'usecontainers — and all of my open container tabs disappeared at once , with no indication of why or what to do about it, when this happened. I lost an absurd amount of work and state because of that. I only knew what caused it by inference, because I'd just previously read The Fine Article (which, btw, gave no indication th…

> I lost an absurd amount of work and state

EDIT: after installing the fixed XPI, I have to sadly report that all data has gone. All my carefully-managed containerized life was wiped clean. Heads should roll.

Complete shambles. And the worst thing is, I suspect it's all a plot to have more people opt-in to the shitty telemetry. Otherwise, why not push an update through the usual channels? Had it been a security-related fix, would have they used "studies"? I bet not.

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#405

Post by colejohnson66 »

isoskeles wrote: post #356
tilolebo wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious, do you switch at every fuck up? Then it's only a matter of time until you come back to Firefox, or maybe you'll end up making your own web browser?

No, just this one because it took me more than 5 minutes to not find a working fix, and this was such a massive fuck-up that I don't feel like sticking around. I appreciate the condescension of both your comment and the person I initially replied to, but I honestly see your comments as saying, in more words, "Fuck the user." And that's fine, but why don't you just say it? Go ahead and type it, I want you to type what…

No, we’re not flagging you for your use of swear words; we’re flagging you for your lack of construction to the conversation. You clearly are not interested in having a conversation

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#406

Post by rosser »

staticassertion wrote: post #399
rosser wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use container tabs extensively. Today, more than half of my open tabs disappeared in an instant , and were not even an option to re-open until either I waited around ("up to six hours...") or manually installed the workaround. All of my in-progress work in any of those tabs? Gone. That absolutely qualifies as crippled usability. The mere fact of such a thing being possible is a usability defect. On what basis do I…

This is absurdly overdramatic. One issue with a feature in decades and you're stating that you've lost all trust in the browser. https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=952287 Chrome has bugs too. Firefox will continue to have bugs. All software will continue to have bugs. I'm so sorry that you lost some tabs in your browser but shit really does happen and acting like this is some violation due to overz…

I did not say "all trust". Please don't presume to inflate my explicitly stated position — especially while also minimizing the impact this incident had on me, and others. I did not merely "lose some tabs"; those, I could just re-open. I lost work. That data, effort, and time are gone.

If you think this clownshoery hasn't cost Firefox any trust, then you're being as naïve as you accuse me of being "absurdly overdramatic" and "inane".

Bugs are a thing, totally conceded. Sloppy certificate management is, too, but it's an entirely other class of thing. Deliberately conflating them is at least as disingenuous a debating tactic as pointing at Chrome, which is utterly irrelevant to this incident. That's straight-up "whataboutism".

Full stop, this was foreseeable. This was preventable.

EDIT: Phrasing.

EDIT 2: I won't respond further to the same kind of tone.

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#407

Post by zimmund »

nullc wrote: post #373

I wonder if there is someone out there in the middle of the ocean with a browser extension based communication and navagation system which is dead in the water? It sounds to me that the real headline here is that every copy of firefox out there was timebombed and we only noticed because someone forgot to elongate the fuse.

The browser itself continued working fine. Are you aware of any life-depending extension? Leaving this particular issue aside, your hypothetical "browser extension for people in the middle of the ocean" was doomed from its inception if it was designed to run as a browser extension (though it opens the door for an interesting discussion about similar scenarios that are happenning, like pilots relying on ipads)

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#408

Post by toyg »

floatingatoll wrote: post #283
overgard wrote: post #96

I know Firefox isn't being malicious, but ugh, this seems like the worst possible PR move for this, optics wise. "Hey so uh, we accidentally broke your browser, so you need to opt-in to becoming a guinney pig. But don't worry! You probably were already opted in anyway and just didn't realize it! Also it might take six hours to work."

They only point out the opt-in instructions for the few people that voluntarily opt out of Shield studies and wish to get the fix sooner. Most Firefox users have that checkbox enabled by default, and so most Firefox users received the fix within 0-6 hours of the blog post's publication. HN readers often take special care to prevent Mozilla from updating Firefox, but that in no way represents the wider population of e…

This has nothing to do with "studies" and should be pushed as a general fix. There is just no excuse. What if this had been a security incident?

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#409

Post by toyg »

human20190310 wrote: post #197
floatingatoll wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, we are all quite advanced enough to footgun ourselves with abandon :) For everyone else, the fix is magically healing their browser without any intervention at all, and some of my high-skilled tech friends haven’t even noticed yet because they’re weekending and this all resolved itself before they realized it. Never underestimate the burden that being an “expert” places on your future time spend.

That hadn't occurred to me, but the fact that this is occurring on a weekend probably mitigates the impact to organizations that operate Monday-through-Friday. Sucks for the Mozillans who are scrambling right now though. Hope they get a long weekend to compensate.

> Sucks for the Mozillans who are scrambling right now though.

I have little sympathy for people who ruined my own life - they push a fix and get feet up, while I'm left to reconfigure all my addons and containers for days.

Re: Update Regarding Add-Ons in Firefox

#410

Post by floatingatoll »

toyg wrote: post #408
floatingatoll wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They only point out the opt-in instructions for the few people that voluntarily opt out of Shield studies and wish to get the fix sooner. Most Firefox users have that checkbox enabled by default, and so most Firefox users received the fix within 0-6 hours of the blog post's publication. HN readers often take special care to prevent Mozilla from updating Firefox, but that in no way represents the wider population of e…

This has nothing to do with "studies" and should be pushed as a general fix. There is just no excuse. What if this had been a security incident?

Then it seems it’s a good thing they had a system in place that could deliver the quick fix in less than a day, on a Friday evening, when shipping a normal fix could have — is — taking longer to ship than that quick fix did.
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