extensions are critical in Firefox

Created by Scott Crevier (St. Norbert College) on December 6, 2005

Mozilla released its version 1.5 of Firefox last week. And like thousands of techies everywhere, my first thought was, "will it work with all of my extensions?" The greatest functional feature of Firefox is the ability of 3rd party programmers to write extensions which add handy features to the browser. This arrangement allows me to pick and choose only those "gadgets" which are important to me. I like having that control.

The disadvantage to this arrangement is that 3rd party programmers are just that. They are not involved in Mozilla's R&D processes like the Firefox programmers are. So, while many extension authors use beta copies of the browser to make their their products are compatible, others must simply wait until they have time or until the release comes out of beta.

The worst problem that I have with Firefox is that my Bookmarks Toolbar disappears ALL THE TIME. I am constantly resizing my browser window just to get the toolbar to come back. And since I use this toolbar all day, it's a very annoying bug. (This is actually a known bug that was reported back in October 2004 in version 1.0RC1.) However, that said, if a new version of Firefox comes out that contains a fix, I would not upgrade unless all of my extensions work in the new release.

I use 16 extensions. Sure, I could probably do without a few of those. But I use them all, some very often, some having reached the status of "critical" for me. So, to keep my work computer clean, I installed Firefox 1.5 at home over the weekend to see which extensions make the cut. The following extensions do not work with Firefox v1.5: LoremIpsum Content Generator, Copy Plain Text, About site, SessionSaver .2, and Bookmarks Synchronizer. I consider the latter two critical, so I can't upgrade Firefox at work yet. But I'll keep checking.

I consider it a flaw that I have to upgrade Firefox just to see what extensions will work with the new release. A great enhancement to the browser would be a feature that runs through my installed extensions and shows me which ones are compatible with the next release BEFORE I upgrade. Then my decision to upgrade is an informed one. Maybe someone should write an "Extension Tester" extension. But then who would test the Extension Tester. Hmmm.

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		extensions are critical in Firefox Created by Scott Crevier (St. Norbert College) on December 6, 2005 Mozilla released its version 1.5 of Firefox last week. And like thousands of techies everywhere, my first thought was, "will it work with all of my extensions?" The greatest functional feature of Firefox is the ability of 3rd party programmers to write extensions which add handy features to the browser. This arrangement allows me to pick and choose only those "gadgets" which are important to me. I like having that control. The disadvantage to this arrangement is that 3rd party programmers are just that. They are not involved in Mozilla's R&D processes like the Firefox programmers are. So, while many extension authors use beta copies of the browser to make their their products are compatible, others must simply wait until they have time or until the release comes out of beta. The worst problem that I have with Firefox is that my Bookmarks Toolbar disappears ALL THE TIME. I am constantly resizing my browser window just to get the toolbar to come back. And since I use this toolbar all day, it's a very annoying bug. (This is actually a known bug that was reported back in October 2004 in version 1.0RC1.) However, that said, if a new version of Firefox comes out that contains a fix, I would not upgrade unless all of my extensions work in the new release. I use 16 extensions. Sure, I could probably do without a few of those. But I use them all, some very often, some having reached the status of "critical" for me. So, to keep my work computer clean, I installed Firefox 1.5 at home over the weekend to see which extensions make the cut. The following extensions do not work with Firefox v1.5: LoremIpsum Content Generator, Copy Plain Text, About site, SessionSaver .2, and Bookmarks Synchronizer. I consider the latter two critical, so I can't upgrade Firefox at work yet. But I'll keep checking. I consider it a flaw that I have to upgrade Firefox just to see what extensions will work with the new release. A great enhancement to the browser would be a feature that runs through my installed extensions and shows me which ones are compatible with the next release BEFORE I upgrade. Then my decision to upgrade is an informed one. Maybe someone should write an "Extension Tester" extension. But then who would test the Extension Tester. Hmmm. extensions \| firefox \| web browser Scott's blog Login or register to post comments 3112 reads
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