Alexander Sack (asac)'s software site - Comments

David Castañeda: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (David Castañeda) — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 18:17:08 +0100

I know this is a technical subject…

But when doing this, did you ever consider the final normal user??

A relative (who I recently convince of moving to Ubuntu) has to call me because HIS browser has disappeared. For the health of the Ubuntu ecosystem this kind of things should me more carefully considered.

Alex: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Alex) — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 15:35:10 +0100

Interestingly, in Windows the 64-bit version of Firefox is branded “Shiretoko,” but it is an unofficial, not-supported-by-Mozilla application. It is updated frequently, alongside the official 32-bit releases of Firefox, but add-ons and 32-bit plugins (such as Adobe Flash Player) won’t work. Link associations (opening links from within emails, documents, etc.) also fall apart. The plus side is that the performance on a 64-bit machine excels.

Seegal Galguntijak: FAQ - Where can I get firefox 3.5 for Ubuntu?

nospam@example.com (Seegal Galguntijak) — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 22:05:16 +0100

Much more important is: How can one get SeaMonkey _2_ for Ubuntu? I know, there are crude methods like Ubuntuzilla, but it should be easily installable from the Ubuntu repositorys with apt. At least, I desperately hope it will be when Lucid is released! (I know, it couldn’t be in Karmic since it was released after Karmic’s freeze, which made me skip Karmic, but in Lucid – especially as an LTS version – it is an absolute must-have!)
Thanks!
sg

Brad Aisa: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Brad Aisa) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 09:04:28 +0200

The Linux/Unbuntu upgrade model is completely whacked! We have to wait for an entire new OS release to get the latest version of stuff, even stuff that will be very old and stale by that time? But I don’t want to upgrade my OS often, that always leads to issues (ex. driver modules stop working, VMWare stops working, etc. etc.). I am running XP on another computer here and virtually all software for Windows works on it, and I can upgrade to the latest version of anything at any time.

I am so sick of Linux that when my current project for school is finished I will probably swear off it forever.

DaveGK: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (DaveGK) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 20:49:13 +0200

I must say I am unpleasantly surprised by this attitude. The “user is an idiot, we know best” approach is exactly why I left Windows/Microsoft …
As far as the branding – I had a stable and proper Firefox 3.5.2 version, with absolutely no problem, until it was completely messed up by your update. Now, when I try to go to one of the online banking sites, I get a message that this browser is not supported, and have to go through a few more clicks to override this warning. This is insane! Are you trying to scare users away?

Bill: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Bill) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:20:43 +0200

I don’t really care that it’s called Shiretoko (although I agree with everyone here who says that it’s moronic), but I do care that it presents its User Agent as something different from a normal install of Firefox 3.5. Because of this it breaks on many websites where it should actually work fine. Huge mistake!

Side-note: I went to www.firefox.com and was able to install the real/properly branded Firefox 3.5 from there. However, I notice that the version from firefox.com does not have smooth fonts like the Shiretoko version. Any ideas why?

To the developers: I appreciate that you are trying to make things “esay/consistent” to the end user, but if you are preventing the user from easily upgrading to a new (non-beta!) version of the most popular browser out there, then you have failed completely at your task. If your solution is to upgrade to the next version of the OS, then you have failed completely at your task. As others have mentioned, this is a no-brainer on any other OS. Sorry.

Sigh: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Sigh) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 17:01:30 +0200

Firefox 3.5 is a stable release, and Ubuntu provides no way to install it without hosing the system. In any other OS, it’s trivial to upgrade to the latest stable version, but not in Ubuntu. Firefox is certainly my most-used app, and I’m sure I’m not alone in that. This is a major usability fail. Preventing users from installing the latest versions of software for 6 months does not make a “stable user experience”. It makes a crappy user experience.

Using “firefox-3.0” for the executable and “Shiretoko” for the menus confuses people. Websites say they aren’t compatible with my browser. Clicking a link in any program other than Shiretoko opens the link in Firefox 3.0, not 3.5. AptURL links and other desktop integration features don’t work. Middle-clicking a link constantly gives an error telling me I pasted something that is not a link. Ubiquity is broken because it tries to load commands from both ~/.mozilla/firefox and ~/.mozilla/firefox-3.5. etc etc etc

I wonder if Google’s Chrome OS will finally get things right. I’d happily abandon Ubuntu if there were a better alternative available.

paran: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (paran) — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 02:14:02 +0200

I don’t see any comment here that suggest automatically upgrading
jaunty users to firefox-3.5.

This is about users of a stable Ubuntu release, that find a package
named firefox-3.5 in their package manager, and installs it. Should
they not expect a normal firefox 3.5?

There is absolutely nothing in the package description that suggest
that they are installing a development version. The package is not
named shiretoko-3.5. So the Shiretoko “branding” is very confusing,
for no good reason at all. The shiretoko user-agent will even break
some websites that work fine with the official one.

Telling people to upgrade to Karmic, an alpha release, to get a good
firefox-3.5 is just stupid.

SoundStrange2Me: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (SoundStrange2Me) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:01:02 +0200

Post # 6 is right on the money! If you hold back users from updating then you are certainly not leading edge, user friendly…

“We will decide what is best for you!” but hey all my friends using windows get to use private browsing mode for all their porn, opps, I means private stuff…

I think this show how out of touch Linux is with the main stream. I run it on a variety of computer and discourage most people who ask about it from using it if they are not technically savvy as I do not want to become their computer support.

Yarko: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Yarko) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 16:03:38 +0200

Maybe then that is the confusion – for other platforms (e.g. Fedora-10, Windows) Firefox 3.5 is the “normal” upgrade; so when I ask if I want to use 3.5 in my ubuntu, I assume the same is true there. It is not clear why this is “tech saavy” option on jaunty, and “normal Firefox upgrade” elsewhere in the universe.

Perhaps this is at the core of the problem.

asac: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (asac) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 14:39:07 +0200

Please do not mix things up. Users that installed ubuntu jaunty, get a really stable user experience. Our promise is to not get upgrade them automatically to new major upstream versions. So everyone except those tech savy folks that really want it now will stay with firefox-3.0 until they upgrade to karmic. Once they upgrade to karmic they will get firefox 3.5 using the proper firefox branding.

If its so important for you to get the official branding, just upgrade to karmic. The stability is probably similar to what you would get in a distro where you get always upgraded to the latest major versions. Try it and then decide if thats the stability you want. If it feels to you lik it might be unstable, then you are in fact someone who wants the stable user experience approach as we deliver it in ubuntu.

Once you understand that and understand why we dont upgrade users to new major upstream versions in a stable ubuntu release, you will understand why your complains and concerns about us not being user friendly are way off.

We are so user friendly because we do not update users to the next major versions of any major desktop component. That’s what distribution upgrades are for. When karmic gets out, users can upgrade to it and get a great and stabilized user experience for a properly branded firefox 3.5.

Thx for listening!

Eymey: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Eymey) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 01:29:50 +0200

I totally agree, this is insane!

Just while I thought Ubuntu would REALLY be user-friendly, they come up with this! I can see anybody’s confusion when they think they upgrade to firefox 3.5. I think most of the people I recommended Ubuntu to will swiftly migrate back to windows

Timo: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (Timo) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 08:26:36 +0200

The naming is a real issue and Ubuntu mozilla-team is not really focusing on end user usability side at all! Usability, where is it???

Hey, Ubuntu slogan “Linux for human beings”: Try to follow it rather than specifying code namings for stable Firefox. Give me one good reason why “Shiretoko” is better naming than “Firefox 3.5”? I can’t find any…

ghanaGeek: FAQ - Why is my firefox 3.5 still called Shiretoko?

nospam@example.com (ghanaGeek) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 01:01:41 +0200

This is why linux can’t go mainstream, its simply not end-user oriented. How can a bunch of developers come up with such a ludicrous conclusion and call Ubuntu “linux for human beings” it should read “linux for Human geeks”!

Risto: What is this "Multisearch" thing in my Firefox about?

nospam@example.com (Risto) — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 22:21:54 +0200

Oh, there is at least one good feature in this multisearch plugin: You can disable it!

It really totally ruins the otherwise awesome Firefox experience I have so much used to. Best thing in Firefox is its absolutely perfect address bar which integrates nicely with Google (calculator/converter, “feeling lucky”, auto-completion,image search etc. and of cource all in Finnish too).

Otherwise, I have been really pleased with Karmic Koala. This thing works perfectly with Intel graphics thanks to KMS. Single most annoying thing among previous Linux distributions was slooow resume from suspend. Now it’s quite instant.

So please, remove this “feature” completely, and if you want to gather user experiences or do usability testing, please inform us and ask permissions. Thank you!