Isn't the development cycle a bit too fast. 4 major versions in a single year.
Both Firefox and Chrome are hoping to catch Emacs before 2014.
I just spilled coffee all over myself
Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
41–50 of 115 posts
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
But why have they chosen to version their software like this, in contrast to every other browser? They could have gone with even numbered point releases.
As per the last paragraph of this post: http://blog.chromium.org/2010/07/release-early-release-often... "Please don’t read too much into the pace of version number changes - they just mean we are moving through release cycles and we are geared up to get fresher releases into your hands!"
Thanks, but that actually addresses how they will be moving the whole version numbers up even faster than before, not how they've chosen to use whole version numbers to represent fairly minor milestones, in contrast to established practices.
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#43Sounds like the main story is that they're redefining what a major version number means a la Chrome. Chrome's numbers are not in the same scale as FF and IE too, of course. Users can't tell the difference between Chrome 6 and 7 like one can distinguish FF 2 and 3, or IE 6 and 7. I wonder, though, if Google was just trying to catch IE in version number with Chrome and once it's at 10, they'll stop increasing it so rap…
Chrome is a pretty spankin' good browser, but it's version number system has bugged me, like theyre only doing it to seem like they make advances quicker than other browser vendors.
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chrome auto-updates and generally always looks the same. I can't imagine why anyone -- users or developers -- would care what version number it's up to.
My theory is that they wanted to avoid PHB types saying 'Internet Explorer is at version 9 - this new Google browser, only version 3? Is it ready for the enterprise?'.
That's why Microsoft called the new Xbox "Xbox360" instead of Xbox2, because it will _seem_ a less powerful machine in front of a PlayStation3
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#45It looks like Windows 7 64-bit will be officially supported with FF5, too. You're kidding, right? Do they REALLY not support the fastest growing OS version + platform combo? OEMs are finally paying attention to 64-bit computing, and Windows 7 has been replacing Vista like wildfire.... and FF is still two releases away from official Windows 7 64-bit support? EDIT: Oops. Seems stupid Aol/Weblogs/Switched/DowloadSquad (…
Firefox is far from becoming "more and more irrelevant". Just because you've switched to an alternate browser doesn't mean the rest of the world has. Chrome may be incrementally gaining some share, but it's mostly at the expense of IE. Firefox has almost 25% of the market, while Chrome is 5%.
Chrome currently has 16.5 percent global usage share, IE has 45 percent. FF's share remains stable at 31 percent. Chrome gained ten percent points in the last year, while IE lost ten percent points. At its current growth rate, Chrome will pass FF in 15 months.
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
From my first hand experience in FPS gaming in non-amateur settings the vast majority of average users will not be able to notice a (say) 50 ms difference in UI responsiveness. I covered that when talking about network latency in my previous post. Of course this is just my experience, scientific findings may very well dispute my ignorance.
Correction, the vast majority of users will not be able to explain that they feel a responsiveness issue, but they do indeed feel it. Less hardcore gamers will often just blame other things -- loose controls, or ignored button presses, or what not. I see it pretty regularly in playtests and such. Anyway, it's not something someone can simply say "Hey, this app took longer than 50ms to respond!" It's more of a gut fee…
"Correction, the vast majority of users will not be able to explain that they feel a responsiveness issue, but they do indeed feel it."
That sits well with me. Upvoted! It is true that "clunkiness" is a valid complain, but i've always attributed it to a combination of all latency-inducing factors.
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#47Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#48To be able to support this, they're going to need to do some major overhaul of how add-on versioning works. As a Add-On developer ( https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/font-finder/ ), I shudder at the thought of 10,000 different addons needing to keep having their support version incremented w/ each upcoming release.
You're right. But they have been making a simultaneous push toward the Jetpack addons (as opposed to the traditional extensions), which are apparently less of a hassle to deal with in terms of versioning and compatibility.
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chrome auto-updates and generally always looks the same. I can't imagine why anyone -- users or developers -- would care what version number it's up to.
My theory is that they wanted to avoid PHB types saying 'Internet Explorer is at version 9 - this new Google browser, only version 3? Is it ready for the enterprise?'.
There's that, but it probably fits better into their development model.
If they're continually adding features and not breaking backwards compatibility on a "fixed" timeline, then the major version jumps that Firefox, IE do etc. seem more pointless than anything.
If I've got this application that we're continually developing on and we're using a 2 month lifecycle for development ... at what point does it make sense to jump a major version? Never? What's the point of it then?
It's the fact that we've become accustomed to major versions representing periods of time.
Version numbers should be representative. If it was the case that they used the minor number to represent their two month cycles, then they'd be at 1.11. What's the point of the 1 in that scenario? It's redundant.
The major version increments fit in better with their development lifecycle, so why not use it?
Re: Firefox 4, 5, 6 and 7 to be released before the end of 2011
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chrome auto-updates and generally always looks the same. I can't imagine why anyone -- users or developers -- would care what version number it's up to.
My theory is that they wanted to avoid PHB types saying 'Internet Explorer is at version 9 - this new Google browser, only version 3? Is it ready for the enterprise?'.
I guess, but I don't even know what version number of Chrome I'm currently running, and I like to think I'm more tech savvy than the average PHB.