I understand what Mozilla is doing with in the Win64 Firefox in regards to only allowing the Flash NPAPI plugin. It starts to make sense if you look at the browser ‘market’ as a whole. Microsoft’s new Edge browser (Windows 10) does not support SilverLight and Java and neither does/will Chrome (Google plans to phase out NPAPI plugins by end of 2015). All of these browsers including the Win64 Firefox do support Flash. Also, remember Flash is integrated (no plugin) into Chrome as Google bribed paid Adobe to build a custom version of Flash directly into Chrome. It is almost painful…
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Mozilla has released the next version of Firefox, with Firefox 40 on August 11, 2015. There are several new features, fixes and changes with this release. See the Release Notes for full details. Users can get the updated version by going to the Help Menu within Firefox and selecting About Firefox, then follow the prompts. Users can also manually download the latest version of Firefox via the getfirefox.com site. The next planned release is Firefox 41 on September 22nd. This release may include the 64-Bit version of Firefox for Windows.
What do the upcoming Firefox 41 (Windows 64-Bit) and Chrome 45 have in common? Neither will support Microsoft Silverlight. However, Netflix will continue to work on Chrome 45, because Netflix on Chrome use HTML5, not Silverlight. The same can not be said for Firefox though, where Netflix still uses Silverlight. Up until Firefox 33 in October 2014, with the introduction of the Open H.264 Video Codec provided by Cisco Systems plugin Firefox did not support HTML5. But, Netflix (being a paid service) uses DRM which was not supported until Firefox 38 in May 2015 when Mozilla added the Primetime Content Decryption Module by Adobe…
Javaun Moradi announced earlier in bug 1181014 (this was the bug about how to ‘market’ the Win64 builds on Mozilla.org): Folks, we’ve decided not to release win64 builds in Fx40. We have many improvements coming in 41 — sandboxing and NPAPI whitelisting, and possibly some other fixes — and it makes sense to hold. I as much as anyone want to see 64 launch, but given the enthusiasm, it’s better to wait for a product that has safety and polish 41 will bring. He also commented in bug 1180792 (enabling Win64 builds on release channel): Our original plan was a quiet soft-launch in 40,…
After posting Firefox Win64 Supports Only Flash I got to thinking I knew I had seen a comment recently in Bugzilla about ‘video changes’ in Firefox for Win64. Looking through the bugs I am following, I found Bug 1181014 which basically was proposal to allow users to download win64 builds from everywhere, not only on the /all/ pages. The /all page referred to here is the Systems & Languages link on the Firefox download/landing page. This link takes the user to page where they can see all the localization builds and supported operating systems of Firefox. The first time I saw…
In a very odd move Mozilla has made a change to the latest Firefox Nightly (Firefox 42) Win64 which only allows the Shockwave Flash NPAPI plugin. Note: the Prime Content Decryption and Open H264 are now standard all will always be supported. While Shockwave Flash is still supported Silverlight is not. Simple enough, just install the plugin and you’re ready to go. Users won’t be able to install Silverlight in the Win64 version of Firefox since it is not allowed. Microsoft’s Silverlight is used by Netflix and Amazon Video along with many other Video on Demand (VOD) sites (especially outside the US). This is a result…
What has seemed like an eternity of flip-flopping about having a Windows 64-Bit (Win64) version of Firefox may very soon come to an end. Earlier this week Bug 1180792 was filed to enable 64-bit windows builds on release channel. In October 2014, Mozilla had started talking about having a Win64 release as early as Firefox 37 for March 2015. Firefox 37 came and went and still no Win64 released. There have been Win64 versions for Firefox 38 and 39, but those never offered outside the Beta channel. So, when will be seeing this Win64 release? There is still some debate about that right…