Articles by ElGuru

New Flash Update adds Bloatware

Just updated my plugins on my main machine as advised in our post yesterday. When I ran the Adobe Flash Installer,I was asked about how to install updates then when it went to install I noticed it was also installing McAfee Security Scan Plus. I canceled the install (which also deletes the installer file) and went back into Firefox and re-downloaded the installer. Upon running again the first screen was the prompt about how to install updates and then clicking next (or was it continue) takes me to the installation. While it is not unusual for these plugins to come with bloatware,…

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Remove New Tab Home Page

With Firefox 13, Mozilla has changed the behaviour of new tabs as we had mentioned last month. Now when opening a new tab, a list of recently visited sites are displayed including thumbnails of said sites. There has been a lot of demand for that feature by Firefox users as Chrome has had it for long time and I think Opera does as well. To turn it off (permanently) and go back to a blank page follow these directions: 1) Type in “about:config” (without the quotes) in the browser address bar and then press enter. 2) Click on the warning “I’ll…

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Firefox 13 Smooth Scrolling Issues

Mozilla made some changes to the algorithm used for Smooth Scrolling in Firefox 13. Much like the ‘Hardware Acceleration’ feature introduced a while back, some users are going to find that it does not work well on their machines. To turn off ‘Smooth Scrolling’ go to Firefox Button > Options > Advanced. Uncheck the box in the Browsing Section for Smooth Scrolling and click OK.

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Firefox 13 Released

Mozilla has released Firefox 13 on June 5th, 2012. Several UI changes in this update and more information can be found here and in the Release Notes. This release does not support Windows 2000 or Windows XP SP1 (or older) due to the move to MSVC 2010 compiler for the builds. Users can update via Help > About Firefox or can manually download and install the new version of Firefox via getfirefox.com site. Firefox 14 will be the next release in six weeks (July 17th).

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Thunderbird Release Update: June 2, 2012

Just Released None Coming Soon June 5th Thunderbird ESR 10.0.5 Thunderbird 13 Thunderbird 14 Beta (14.0b1)* Thunderbird 15 Earlybird (15.0a2)* Future Releases July 17th Thunderbird ESR 10.0.6 Thunderbird 14 Thunderbird 15 Beta (15.0b1)* Thunderbird 16 Earlybird (16.0a2)* * As part of the new Rapid Release Schedule,dates listed for Earlybird and Beta builds reflect when the code merge is set to begin. The actual release to that particular channel may vary by several days. See the Wiki for more details.

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Firefox Release Update: June 2, 2012

Just Released N/A Coming Soon June 5th Firefox ESR 10.0.5 Firefox 13.0 Firefox for Android 10.0.5 Firefox 10.0.5 ESR Firefox 14 Beta (14.0b1)* Firefox 15 Aurora (15.0a2)* Future Releases July 17th Firefox 14.0 Firefox for Android 10.0.6 Firefox 10.0.6 ESR Firefox 15 Beta (15.0b1)* Firefox 16 Aurora (16.0a2)* * As part of the new Rapid Release Schedule,dates listed for Aurora and Beta builds reflect when the code merge is set to begin. The actual release to that particular channel may vary by several days. See the Wiki for more details.

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Legacy Windows Support Ending

The upcoming Firefox 13 release slated for Tuesday, June 5th will no longer support Windows 2000, or Windows XP SP1. The end of support is due to Mozilla shifting to MSVC++ 2010 to compile the Firefox builds. Support for Windows 2000 and XP SP1 will continue with Firefox 10.0.x ESR builds until Firefox 17 ESR is released in November 2012.

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HomeTab Landing in Firefox 13

Mozilla is set to land the new HomeTab UI for Firefox 13 due out on June 5th, 2012. This feature was originally planned for Firefox 5. but has undergone major changes (and name changes). Unlike the similar feature in Google Chrome there will only be one page (Chrome allows you to scroll between two ‘pages’). This feature is NOT currently in Firefox 13 Beta, but should be landing in the an upcoming weekly Beta update. Below is what the current mock-up looks like and might change slightly before this is released to the wild in Firefox 13: Source: Tom’s Hardware

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Tabs in Thunderbird not the same as in Firefox

I really don’t pay that much attention to the tab behavior in Thunderbird. In fact, I don’t really use tabs much I just have my mail in one tab and Lightning.Calendar in another. A user in the forum recently reported an on going issue they have been having with using tabs for RSS feeds in Thunderbird. Besides the content loading slowly, each time they switched away from the tab and then back, they would “lose their place”. At first I thought this was just an issue related to using Thunderbird to handle RSS feeds, something that I never done with…

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Mozilla Introduces Thunderbird ‘Up For Grabs’ Program

Mozilla announced on Monday (May 7th) they are looking for freelance help with their wishlist of features they would like to the Thunderbird roadmap. The idea is really simple: there are plenty of features we would love to add to the Thunderbird roadmap but we badly lack the resources to complete them. So we decided to put them in an open repository, up for anyone to grab one and get it developed. In doing so, you will be working closely with the core Thunderbird team members who will support and guide you all along the way. For more information and…

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