
Firefox 5 slips out ahead of schedule, gets official June 21st - shawndumas
http://www.engadget.com/2011/06/18/firefox-5-slips-out-ahead-of-schedule-gets-official-june-21st/
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gkoberger
I'm not sure what the article means by "ahead of schedule". The release date
was set months ago, and new versions are always released a few days early via
the Mozilla FTP servers.

Firefox 5 isn't a huge release, and there won't be nearly as much fanfare as
there was with 4. The point of Firefox 5 is to switch over to the "train"
model. The train leaves four times a year, no matter what-- and if a feature
doesn't make the train, it has to catch the next train. There is no waiting
for a feature.

Incrementing by one each release (rather than 4.1, etc) may seem like Mozilla
is making a big deal out of nothing, for the sake of publicity. However, it
just means that all releases are equal. There will never be a huge 3.6 => 4
style release ever again, and eventually people will lose track of what
Firefox version they have (much like how people have lost track of Chrome
versions).

tl;dr: While it has a few cool new features, Firefox 5 is more to get Mozilla
in the release-often groove.

~~~
ender7
1\. Are they moving to a seamless upgrade system like Chrome?

2\. If not, will it be auto-update or opt-in update?

3\. Are plugin writers going to have to update their plugins every time
there's a new release?

~~~
mbrubeck
1\. Upgrades will be downloaded in the background and installed automatically
by default. It's not yet as seamless as Chrome, though it's moving that
direction. (For example, a while after the upgrade is downloaded, current
versions of Firefox will prompt you to restart, with a dialog which is a bit
more intrusive than the tiny "Christmas tree" toolbar icon that Chrome uses.)

2\. Updates will be automatic by default. They'll be installed without
prompting, unless users disable auto-updating. This is important because, just
like Chrome, the updates will include security fixes.

3\. Add-ons hosted on addons.mozilla.org will be automatically updated:
[http://blog.mozilla.com/addons/2011/04/19/add-on-
compatibili...](http://blog.mozilla.com/addons/2011/04/19/add-on-
compatibility-rapid-releases/)

Lots more details in the links at <http://mozilla.github.com/process-
releases/> and <https://wiki.mozilla.org/RapidRelease>

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patrickod
I can understand why Mozilla feel threatened by Chrome's growth but why the
use of major version numbers for what could have very easily been 4.1 ?

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Meai
Marketing reasons, tech blogs don't write about minor version increments.

~~~
wvenable
Sadly, there isn't much to write about because there isn't anything new here.
As far as I can tell, tech blogs don't write about Chrome versions anymore --
I don't even know what number they are up to.

~~~
mark_story
12 is the current release, and 13 should be ready soon. One thing chrome has
done really well is smooth and seamless upgrades, this helps them move things
forward and people don't notice the version numbers crawl up.

~~~
Osiris
The dev channel is already up to 14.

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nagnatron
I feel like everyone saying how we'll have Firefox 346 is missing the point.

The point is really to set up something like a rolling release system where
you don't really care which version you are running. The only thing you choose
according to your risk appetite is how stable your channel of updates is.

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walrus
Maybe they'll end up with something like Processing's[1] versioning scheme,
where there are fairly regular numbered releases (e.g., release 0115) and some
are granted a special status (e.g., release 0196 = version 1.5.1). I suppose
it's really just another 'layer' of versioning: VCS commit -> release number
-> version number instead of VCS commit -> version number.

[1] <http://processing.org>

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georgefox
Is this the direct link?

ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/5.0/

~~~
experimental
I believe you should use the http link to lessen the strain on the server.

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georgefox
Thanks, but I couldn't seem to find anything through the HTTP links.

<http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/5.0/> ("We aren't
quite finished qualifying Firefox 5 yet. You should check out the latest
Beta.")

[http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/5.0/...](http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/5.0/win32/en-
US/Firefox%20Setup%205.0.exe) (404)

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AndyNemmity
Really cheapens the numbering of versions. We're going to have Firefox 1243053
soon.

~~~
nowarninglabel
Uh, no, not really. They are shipping 4 versions a year, so if they keep the
current pace, we in fact won't see version 1243053 until the year 312774

Granted I hope we have transcended browsers by that point.

<https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/Roadmap>

~~~
meric
It's almost 9 releases per year (every 6 weeks). So by year 2015 we will be
looking at Firefox 30. Makes the Firefox 4 look kind of obsolete...

~~~
Blarat
I sure hope that we have enough advances in 4 years to make todays browsers
obsolete...

