El Guru Tech Blog

Your Firefox User Agent or build ID contains a lot of information about your browser as well as your operating system. Here is break down on what is in your User Agent: Mozilla/MozVer (Platform; Security; SubPlatform; Language; rv:Revision[; Extension]*) Gecko/GeckVer [Product/ProdVer] Mozilla/MozVer ~ All Firefox build IDs start with Mozilla/5.0. Simply put this means the browser meets the standards to be Netscape 5 compatible. This was the first Mozilla based (never released) version of Netscape. Platform ~ This is the operating system (but not the version). Possible values include: Windows Macintosh X11 (Linux) Security ~ This is the encryption strength…

Warning: This extension should only be used if you are using/testing nightly builds and/or betas. Note: This extension is not hosted on Mozilla’s Firefox Add-Ons, but I have deemed this extension and its source as trustworthy. At some point I downloaded a milestone version of Gran Paradiso (Firefox 3.0a1) which caused me to no longer get the Minefield nightly builds. I really didn’t want to go digging through the Mozilla FTP, download and install the nightly, so I thought I could go into about:config and change the app.update.channel setting to nightly. Of course this seemed too easy, change the setting…

Jesse Ruderman, a contributor for Firefox security topics, released an article providing security tips for a Firefox users. His recommendations include: Set Firefox to automatically install updates. Keep plugins such as Flash, QuickTime, Adobe Reader and Shockwave up to date. Only download and install software (including extensions) from trustworthy sources. Double check the location bar to ensure you are where you are supposed to be. Specially when you are at sites where sensitive data is exchanged like financial sites. Use anti-virus software The full article provides more details on these recommendations as well as some very useful tips for avoiding…

Yesterday I posted about some neat Holiday Fx Wallpapers. Here is another which is Firefox 2 themed from Spread Firefox. (Click image below for full size in a new tab). This wallpaper was created by Jamey who has also created some Firefox 2 Holiday Banners. News Sources: Mozilla Links & Spread Firefox

I have learned there will be a Fx 1.5.0.10 & 2.0.0.2 coming out at the end of January. Don’t now much more other than the January 31st release date. I know the 2.0.0.2 build was suppose to contain a more comprehensive fix for the Password Manager Vulnerability issues. I am glad to see Mozilla is going to one more release on the 1.5.0.X branch, especially if this release is a fix to the password manager vulnerability issues. News Source: Mozilla Wiki

See links below for non-holiday Fx/TBird wallpapers by Sonickydon New Firefox 2 Holiday Wallpapers — Click Here I realize we are less than 4 days from Christmas but if you need a Firefox themed wallpaper check these out. They were originally created by Sonickydon which has created some really neat, groovy, cool and well done Firefox & Thunderbird themed wallpapers (see links at the end of this post) and were modified by Spread Firefox’s Ken Saunders (click image to open full size in new tab): Sonickydon Wallpaper Links: Firefox Wallpaper Gallery Thunderbird Wallpaper Gallery News Sources: Mozilla Links & Spread…

Note: If you have not done so already read the previous post: Update: Firefox Password Manager Vulnerability. Now, I did some testing in Firefox 1.5.0.9 as well as 3.0a1 and the results were well surprising: Firefox 1.5.0.9 ~ Same vulnerability exists but doing the tweak in the about:config as described in the previous post fixes this. Firefox 3.0a1 ~ Same vulnerability exists as well. However there is no about:config entry for signon.prefillForms. So I decided I would add the entry to about:config and perform the test. The results were not good, Firefox 3.0a1 failed the test. Actually, I am not…

With Firefox 2.0.0.1 being released yesterday, many folks have been asking has this fixed the the Firefox Password Manager Vulnerability. The short answer is NO. However, there is a simple fix via an about:config tweak that will protect you until this is fixed in the 2.0.0.2 release next month. In order to get 2.0.0.1 with all its fixes out in a timely manner this fix was pushed back to the next release. Before you do this tweak take a look at this demonstration site, it will show you exactly how the vulnerability works. Be sure to visit the site again…

I had mentioned earlier that Mozilla had not updated the getfirefox.com page with the latest builds. Well, I just checked a few minutes ago and Mozilla has finally updated getfirefox.com with Firefox 1.5.0.9 and 2.0.0.1 builds. I tried the auto-update earlier but it was not working on my 1.5.0.8 (or was it 1.5.0.7) build. This may have been caused by an issue on my end as I don’t think the 1.5.0.8 build ever installed correctly. I had just gone ahead and manually download and installed 1.5.0.9 over whatever build I had previously in that folder. News Source: CyberNet.