Firefox 1.5 released

November 29, 2005 3:51 PM

The wait is over : Firefox 1.5 is out, to be found on the brand spanking new mozilla.com.
posted by XiBe (88 comments total)

Wow
posted by Steve_at_Linnwood at 3:55 PM on November 29, 2005

I think I pooped.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 3:57 PM on November 29, 2005

Meh.
posted by panoptican at 4:08 PM on November 29, 2005

Someone already clued me into this extension. It allows you to see all your tabbed windows at once.
posted by trbrts at 4:08 PM on November 29, 2005

Oh, for the love of god.
posted by interrobang at 4:08 PM on November 29, 2005

This is like christmas. And hannukah, too. Woooo. Yay.

Unwrapping a stuffit archive -- oh me oh my the excitement is building by the minute. Woohoo. Wow.

*sulks off in stocking feet, twirling index finger slowly skyward*
posted by zpousman at 4:09 PM on November 29, 2005

So... how about an update to MetaFilthy so it works with 1.5? I've become quite reliant on it.
posted by zsazsa at 4:09 PM on November 29, 2005

Wow. For the first time, my Abe Vigoda status extension is saying something other than "unknown." This is better than Christmas!
posted by brundlefly at 4:10 PM on November 29, 2005

eeeew! who pooped?
posted by stirfry at 4:13 PM on November 29, 2005

Hell, if the new version chops out the sneaky pop-unders (yeah, I'm looking at you Medialink or whatever the hell your name is) then I'm all for it. Everyone should use FireFox even though my totally non-valid sample of blog surfers shows that some 70-odd percent still use some IE flavor. But the FireFox numbers are always climbing so there's hope.
posted by fenriq at 4:14 PM on November 29, 2005

Hey, neat, this mozilla.com thing sends .dmg files as text/plain! Way to configure that mime.types, guys! Clearly, you are the web software distribution experts!
posted by majick at 4:16 PM on November 29, 2005

The wait is over, Lynx 2.8.5 is available. It gave me instant diarrhea.
posted by panoptican at 4:16 PM on November 29, 2005

Anyone else having problems running Firefox after installing the new version? I'll open it and it will briefly show in the Task Manager before disappearing. I installed twice with fresh download files.
posted by sian at 4:17 PM on November 29, 2005

*explodes in shower of feces*
posted by 40 Watt at 4:18 PM on November 29, 2005

Finally, tab reordering is back.
posted by keswick at 4:19 PM on November 29, 2005

Hey, neat, this mozilla.com thing sends .dmg files as text/plain!

Ha... doesn't download with Safari. They need a disclaimer that reads: To download Mozilla Firefox you need to have Mozilla Firefox installed.
posted by Robot Johnny at 4:20 PM on November 29, 2005

Anyone else getting a big blank bar at the bottom of the Mac 1.5?
posted by jscalzi at 4:23 PM on November 29, 2005

I'm waiting until 1.6 to even consider switching from Safari so I can enjoy Cocoa/Emacs/readline keybindings instead of suffering the heartbreak of what I'm assuming is either Windows-centric or Linux-GUIs-trying-to-be-like-Windows-centric UI programming.

Bugzilla seems to be a regular battleground for people arguing that simple keybinding consistency with the host operating system will somehow diminish Firefox's celebration of specialness.

Meh.

And also "Poop!"
posted by mph at 4:24 PM on November 29, 2005

Oh come on, since when did incremental releases of software become "best of the web"? Are you people even trying anymore?
posted by nightchrome at 4:24 PM on November 29, 2005

Someone already clued me into this extension. It allows you to see all your tabbed windows at once.

I think ytmnd.com just pooped.
posted by Smart Dalek at 4:25 PM on November 29, 2005

Sweet. I've been running 1.5 since alpha 1 and it's been fairly buggy all the way up to the RC3 version I currently have. I hope they ironed everything out.
posted by mathowie at 4:26 PM on November 29, 2005

Thanks for reminding me...

Opera 8.51 came out on November 22. That makes it almost 4 times better than Firefox 1.5.

I keed the Firefox users.
posted by jaronson at 4:28 PM on November 29, 2005

RC3 is the released version.
posted by holloway at 4:30 PM on November 29, 2005

Runs fine for me on OSX, YMMV but it already seems a lot happier than the 1.0x my powerbook came with. I don't think it's a good Post though, sorry.
posted by freebird at 4:30 PM on November 29, 2005

From Slashdot:

where to get Firefox - by mykmelez (Score: 5, Informative) Thread
Please do *NOT* download it from ftp.mozilla.org. Please instead use our redirector, which has a lot more bandwidth:

Windows: http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-1.5&o s=win&lang=en-US
Mac OS X: http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-1.5&o s=osx&lang=en-US
Linux: http://download.mozilla.org/?product=firefox-1.5&o s=linux&lang=en-US

Or, if you need a different language, get it from releases.mozilla.org, which doesn’t have as much bandwidth as the redirector but still has *much* more than ftp.mozilla.org:

http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefo x/releases/1.5/
posted by VulcanMike at 4:30 PM on November 29, 2005

I use Mozilla - prefer the whole "suite" thing. I suppose it's a sign of something that now I am getting to websites that confidently tell me that I am using an "unsupported" browser, but proudly tell me that Firefox is supported.

Whatever.
posted by meehawl at 4:31 PM on November 29, 2005

Drag and drop reordering for browser tabs.

Huzzah! (now they just need to update SessionSaver so it works with 1.5)
posted by Gary at 4:39 PM on November 29, 2005

nightchrome: It's not so incremental... The Firefox 1.0.x series hasn't had their rendering engine changed for two years, and this release is when they've finally caught up to using what's in Mozilla 1.6+. Two years dude!

Also the Mozilla Suite is no longer being developed and now the development is focused on Firefox / Thunderbird / Sunbird / Nvu, which is a pity, because I never did get around to submitting my Mozilla splash screens.

I've got some testing to do in my forum software... it does XUL widgets for some things and I guess this might break things.
posted by holloway at 4:40 PM on November 29, 2005

"poop" has reached critical mass. I must revert it twice a day on Wikipedia (noticed it about a month ago). Now it's pooping up on MeFi.
posted by stbalbach at 4:40 PM on November 29, 2005

What does Google's website look like with Firefox?
posted by Rothko at 4:43 PM on November 29, 2005

I shat my pants too! Oh wait, Firefox has a new browser? Unnnghhh. I just came!
posted by jefbla at 4:45 PM on November 29, 2005

Now waiting for greasemonkey and others to update - RIP is awesome!
posted by tzelig at 4:46 PM on November 29, 2005

Aggh! PDF links launch in the browser window. How do I get it to launch in Acrobat? This notwithstanding unchecking "Display PDFs in Browser" in the Acrobat preferences.
posted by Saucy Intruder at 4:49 PM on November 29, 2005

I don't see any reason to update. Is it just me?
posted by mrgrimm at 4:52 PM on November 29, 2005

Ok, I take what I said back about image macros. Reading people's boredom through such played out onomatopoeia as Unnnnngh makes me thirst for Quonsar's elephant pissing gif.

Thirsty.
posted by holloway at 4:55 PM on November 29, 2005

i'm getting some weirdness with autocomplete addressing using gmail on a mac os x10.4///
posted by spyke23 at 4:57 PM on November 29, 2005

Drats, greasemonkey and downloadthemall aren't up to date yet- two of my favorite extensions! :(

However, the interface seems zippier, more responsive, and I LOVE this viamatic foXpose extension! And tab re-ordering... sweet jeebus!
posted by hincandenza at 5:04 PM on November 29, 2005

*explodes in shower of feces*

Thanks, 40 Watt; I haven't laughed so hard in years!
posted by ZenMasterThis at 5:15 PM on November 29, 2005

Love the tab reordering, but: Still no way to skip between tabs with the keyboard, a la Safari's shift-apple-cursor?
posted by docgonzo at 5:17 PM on November 29, 2005

docgonzo: CTRL + pageup / pagedown
posted by holloway at 5:19 PM on November 29, 2005

holloway, even so this is metafilter not freshmeat. What place do software update news releases have here? Honestly...
posted by nightchrome at 5:26 PM on November 29, 2005

Look, Dad, it's so big, bright, and shiny. Can I have one? Please? I want one now! Buy it for me! Now! Now! Now!

Ahem. Been using Firebird Firefox nightly builds for as long as I can remember. Just because the release is official it doesn't mean the features have dramatically changed or anything. And you know it's not that hard to be on the bleeding edge either. Wow.
posted by sjvilla79 at 5:31 PM on November 29, 2005

And this shouldn't be a FPP IMO.
posted by sjvilla79 at 5:32 PM on November 29, 2005

People, what are you whining about? Every dead or missing blond chick, every crappy theory about crappy TV-shows gets airplay, and you would omit something that actually has some effect on people's lives?
posted by signal at 5:35 PM on November 29, 2005

Bollocks to this - 1.05 won't run my extensions and Greasemonkey, plus it won't let me run the previous version, nor roll back with system restore, nor does re-installing 1.07 give me back my extensions. A warning to you all.
posted by A189Nut at 5:36 PM on November 29, 2005

Hmm, makes computer go faster...
posted by scheptech at 5:37 PM on November 29, 2005

I'll open it and it will briefly show in the Task Manager before disappearing. I installed twice with fresh download files.

sian, if you're on Mac, you have to copy it over to your applications folder and not start it from the disk image (that's what it sounds like is happening).
posted by amberglow at 5:40 PM on November 29, 2005

Oh, i just went thru the new prefs to see if what i wanted (and had before) was still set, and the automatic download of updates was set--check yours, everyone.
posted by amberglow at 5:45 PM on November 29, 2005

amberglow: XP here :)
posted by sian at 5:52 PM on November 29, 2005

Here's something which goes with what I said earlier.

If you're using Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 3, congratulations: you have Firefox 1.5. The English (US) version of Firefox 1.5 is just Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 3 with a renamed installer. Thanks for helping to test the release candidate. You can verify that you have Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 3 (rather than an older release candidate) by selecting "About Mozilla Firefox" from the "Help" menu; you should see something ending with "Gecko/20051111 Firefox/1.5".

Via Jesse Ruderman.
posted by sjvilla79 at 5:53 PM on November 29, 2005

So it's still not as good as Opera?
posted by gyc at 5:55 PM on November 29, 2005

Saucy Intruder writes "Aggh! PDF links launch in the browser window. How do I get it to launch in Acrobat? This notwithstanding unchecking 'Display PDFs in Browser' in the Acrobat preferences."

Either Tools/Dowloads/View and Edit Actions or get the PDF Download Extension, that let's you choose what to do each time you click on a PDF link.

jaronson writes "Opera 8.51 came out on November 22. That makes it almost 4 times better than Firefox 1.5.
"I keed the Firefox users."

Wouldn't it be "almost 6 times better" or has Opera developed a new kind Math too?
posted by nkyad at 6:01 PM on November 29, 2005

Is it my imagination, or did the web developer extension, which was already badass, just become badderass?
posted by bingo at 6:05 PM on November 29, 2005

Anything in particular, bingo?
posted by brundlefly at 6:15 PM on November 29, 2005

brundlefly: The three buttons that appear just under the search box? I don't remember those being there. At least not all three of them. And some of the other options seem different, like the types of validation and outlining. But maybe I just didn't notice them before.
posted by bingo at 6:20 PM on November 29, 2005

gyc writes 'So it's still not as good as Opera?'

Right, Opera's metafilthy extension is way better than Firefox's. Same goes for its Adblock, and its del.icio.us extensions blow firefox's out the window.
posted by signal at 6:21 PM on November 29, 2005

What does Google's website look like with Firefox?

Two large Apples, one big Thing, and it says: "Just Google it".
posted by mr.marx at 6:25 PM on November 29, 2005

now they just need to update SessionSaver so it works with 1.5

It's called SessionSaver .2, and it's already been out for a while. Just as a manual download instead of auto-Mozilla Update. (Though now it's there now.)
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 6:36 PM on November 29, 2005

I tried downloading this in Safari, and yeah, it came out all gobbledegooked. I had already deleted my old Firefox so I had to navigate Mozilla's FTP server to download. This is broken!
posted by Sfving at 6:41 PM on November 29, 2005

I now have to click twice in the URL bar to select the whole thing. Boo.
posted by interrobang at 6:58 PM on November 29, 2005

interrobang, that's weird; clicking once selects it here on my Windows computer. I usually hit Ctrl/Command-L these days, though.
posted by zsazsa at 7:00 PM on November 29, 2005

Maybe it's a Mac thing, zsazsa.

Hey, that command-L thing works! Thanks!
posted by interrobang at 7:01 PM on November 29, 2005

Have they fucking fixed the shitty Auto-Update feature in this release so I don't have to download and reinstall the entire fucking piece of goddamned software? Because I don't see a motherfucking green "Updates are available" arrow in my fatherfucking browser.

//angry
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 7:08 PM on November 29, 2005

interrobang: and command-k selects the search bar....
posted by brundlefly at 7:12 PM on November 29, 2005

Oh no -- I just downloaded & installed the new thing and it tells me only now that the old Mozilla calendar I was using is "incompatible." Quick, someone tell me how I can access all the data I had for my whole freaking life in that calendar!!!
posted by youarejustalittleant at 7:12 PM on November 29, 2005

wow. since i switched to firefox 1.0.7 on linux the one thing that has consistently annoyed me has been having to manually highlight the location. two clicks does the trick, as well as control-L! thanks interrobang and zsazsa!
posted by quonsar at 8:10 PM on November 29, 2005

Nightly Tester Tools extension will fix your incompatibility pains. Use it to force compatibility with old extensions, use it to install "non-compatible" extensions. I've been using it since 1.5 Beta 1, have Metafilthy for example running happily in my current install.

C_D: Updates are now incremental. Hooray - no more total reinstall, it finds and replaces just the bits that need it, automatically. 1.5 should be the last update you'll need to do a full install with.
posted by caution live frogs at 8:23 PM on November 29, 2005

Oops. Link for the extension I mentioned: Nightly Tester Tools
posted by caution live frogs at 8:24 PM on November 29, 2005

Okok, I still don't think it's postworthy BUT in classic metafilter style, the comments have made it useful: Option-L and Ctl-PgUp/PgDn are the shortcuts I've been wanting for a long long time. So thanks, whoever pointed those out!

Now I've got to finally finish setting up Firefox on this new machine - I hate having a seperate search window! I want as little crap up there as possible, and that's what finally won me over from Mozilla, for the most part. Oh and I need my Wikipedia keyword search, and my bookmarklets...so much to do, and only two more nights of NaNoWriMo to procrastinate with!
posted by freebird at 8:45 PM on November 29, 2005

Hmmmm, just downloaded the new Opera browser and unnnfffff.. . . F11 Projectile Pooping . . . Grrnnnffff . . .
posted by mk1gti at 8:54 PM on November 29, 2005

Hey is anyone else noticing the cool two-finger Fwd/Back trick on newer powerbooks not working? I still get up/down, but no side to side action. :(
posted by freebird at 8:59 PM on November 29, 2005

freebird writes "I still get up/down, but no side to side action"
*blink*

I'm glad the 'command' became 'control'... I was wondering what i was missing.
posted by peacay at 9:42 PM on November 29, 2005

Well, it seems much faster than 1.07, but it broke MeFi: I set my preferences to a serif font, but now all the text on this site renders as arial regardless of any changes I make in the preference settings.
posted by twsf at 10:20 PM on November 29, 2005

It's called SessionSaver .2, and it's already been out for a while. Just as a manual download instead of auto-Mozilla Update. (Though now it's there now.)

Thanks. That's actually the one I had installed already, but you need to do a quick hack (read the comment by Brian) to get old extensions to work in the new browser. In a nutshell, you right click to download the xpi file, rename it to zip, edit the .rdf file in there so the max version is something big (1.8 works), rename it to xpi, and run it in fire fox.

Not the easiest thing in the world, but I'd miss it and resizeable text areas too much if they weren't there.
posted by Gary at 10:58 PM on November 29, 2005

Gary writes "In a nutshell, you right click to download the xpi file, rename it to zip, edit the .rdf file in there so the max version is something big (1.8 works), rename it to xpi, and run it in fire fox."

That works most of the time, but it assumes the old extension actually works under the new browser (ie, does not use any feature that changed).
posted by nkyad at 3:52 AM on November 30, 2005

Why oh why does updating Firefox always have to reset my search plugins?
posted by Orange Goblin at 4:15 AM on November 30, 2005

You know, I've tried every single release, and I'm finally -- finally, and god knows I've tried -- a convert. The feel has always been subtly wrong, for me, and I didn't like some indefinable thing about the way the renderer rendered HTML. Looked somehow... loose... to me.

But this new version has finally got me off Maxthon, which uses the IE renderer. 1.5 is faster, better looking, and the extension architecture rocks.

Welcome me to the tribe.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 4:21 AM on November 30, 2005

...and Matt's new design looks half-decent, too!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 4:21 AM on November 30, 2005

AdBlock for v 1.5
posted by crunchland at 7:08 AM on November 30, 2005

Thanks, caution live frogs. Losing Metafilthy was the one thing delaying me from upgrading, and Nightly Tester Tools allowed me the best of both worlds.
posted by bugbread at 7:23 AM on November 30, 2005

MetaVersionTracker
posted by holycola at 9:28 AM on November 30, 2005

Now that I've downloaded FF 1.5, how do I find out when there are updates to my favorite themes and extensions? I liked Abstract PC in 1.07 and I had to keep futzing with Chatzilla to finally make it download a newer version last night that was compatible with FF 1.5. I hate when I plunge into bleeding edge stuff and regret it later!
posted by Lynsey at 10:23 AM on November 30, 2005

Anyone tuning in this late in the thread, there's a fix for the OS X/emacs/readline keybindings thing over on ask MeFi that'll work until such time as 1.6 just adopts the correct bindings.
posted by mph at 12:05 PM on November 30, 2005

Ugh. I wish I had not updated. Scrollbars vanished, I can not get them back. I can not get into the options menu, it simply will not work. Actually quite a few things are not working. *becomes enraged, smashes kittens*
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 4:15 PM on November 30, 2005

same here - lost most of my extensions, which i wish i knew wouldn't work after the install. *eats live puppies covered in caramel*
posted by moonbird at 7:23 PM on November 30, 2005

A trick for those of you (like me) that lost a lot of extensions...that is, ones that dont think they can work in 1.5...

1. At the location bar, enter: about:config. This will show you a list of Firefox internal preferences.
2. Right-click on the list, select New > String
3. Enter “app.extensions.version” (without quotes) for the preference name.
4. Then, enter “1.0” (without quotes) as the value for app.extensions.version.
5. Restart Firefox 1.5, then enable those disabled Firefox extensions.
6. Restart Firefox 1.5 again to active the extensions. Done.

Indeed they can work...I actually changed the string value to "1.4.1" which seems to please some of the newer extensions...some refused to work with 1.0

[via]
posted by gren at 1:19 PM on December 1, 2005

Also, its always a good idea to backup your Profile directory, as well as your bookmarks before any upgrade. I backup bookmarks every week, profile dir once a month (of before an update).
posted by gren at 1:20 PM on December 1, 2005

its always a good idea to backup your Profile directory

Using MozBackup, right? Doing it by hand is a pain in the arse.
posted by meehawl at 4:15 PM on December 1, 2005