Hi jleslie48, I wasn't replying to you. You've made your point, and I assume you understand your options with the Firefox we have today:

• Allow automatic updates [default on Options/Preferences page]
• Have Firefox notify you of the availability of updates so you can time when to install them [alternate selection on Options/Preferences page]
• Block Firefox from even checking for updates [requires external policy, not recommended for users without another updater]

OK, I'm on firefox 68.whatever and was finally able to turn off all updates and nags. I'm not sure what was the actual things I did to get it to work I just kept hacking at it until the damn thing STFU. here is the result. Firefox works fine and I've had no nags for over a month

1) like stated above in the options set the firefox updates radio button to "check for updatdes but let you choose..." Alas the button to "don't update" isn't there and in a perfect world those that removed that radio button would be tarred and feathered, but that is another story.

2) pull up the local web page "about:config" and search for the word update. in the pics below are arrows to the fields that I'm pretty sure I set/changed to get rid of the nags. of particular note is the "app.update.url" where I changed the url to a garbage website that doesn't exist in an attempt to keep the browser from finding any updates. I'm pretty sure this works really well to keep Firefox from even finding the updates in the first place. I simply appended the words "donotfind" to the actual website url. (see the pic.)

Anyway, this is what my about:config looks like and now my firefox does WHAT I WANT IT TO DO.

jleslie48 said

Get it through your head: the reasonable amount of time is FOREVER. You have no business telling your customer what to do with HIS system. YOU DON'T TAKE IT ON YOUR OWN TO CHANGE SOMEONES COMPUTER AGAINST THEIR WILL. THAT INCLUDES MAKING IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR THEM TO KEEP FROM CHANGING THEIR SYSTEM.

This is a community forum of users helping users. There are no customers per say as Firefox is free to download and use.

Also if you paid attention to the post 4til7 made (and the reply by jscher2000 after) 4til7 is not using a build from mozilla.org but third-party package builds of Firefox from Ubuntu so the updates did Not come from Mozilla.

Also see https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/forum-rules-and-guidelines#w_language-and-conduct

Plus both you and 4til7 should have started your own threads as this is a old thread started by somebody else and will be auto archived in near future. .

James said

This is a community forum of users helping users. There are no customers per say as Firefox is free to download and use. Also if you paid attention to the post 4til7 made (and the reply by jscher2000 after) 4til7 is not using a build from mozilla.org but third-party package builds of Firefox from Ubuntu so the updates did Not come from Mozilla. Also see https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/forum-rules-and-guidelines#w_language-and-conduct Plus both you and 4til7 should have started your own threads as this is a old thread started by somebody else and will be auto archived in near future. .

1) " There are no customers per say as Firefox is free to download and us" Paying has nothing to do with it. you make a product the users are the customers. That is who I am referring to as "customers"

2) " this is a old thread started by somebody else and will be auto archived in near future. ." This is a very current and ACTIVE thread if it is archived that is a mistake made by the people that run this forum.

3)"not using a build from mozilla.org but third-party package builds of Firefox from ..." irrelevant. My posts have to do with programming in general, a comment from one developer to another about when a programmer should override the will of the user (aka, what I would refer to as the customer but you don't like that term)

4) I am quite confident that the developers of mozilla and firefox also pay attention to these forums and rely on its comments to see how future development should go, so reminding them that the software development should never disable a users (customers) decision is something that should be reminded of.

This entire thread was based on someone's decision to take away the users right to not update his browser. The mere fact that this was taken away needs to be addressed and corrected.

I've spent too much time professionally undoing this time of behavior for customers that simply can't stand being told by their software what they can and cannot do especially when options are removed.

The way I turned off mozilla nags and updates was to: create a file policies.json in /usr/lib/firefox/distribution/

policies.json contains: begin quote {

   "policies": {

"DisableAppUpdate": true

   }

} end quote

I have not had one nag from mozilla.

Just in case mozilla gets really stupid I have downloaded the version of firefox that I would run as backups.

I really need to look into making the firefox executable immutable. chattr may be the way to go.

On the Macs I just downgrade back to the mozilla i want to use. Basically, restore from Time Machine. a pain to have to do that but with mozilla being thugs about updates we do what we have to do.

The mozilla developers have lost their way and are now just programming for their own desires and wants. the Idea of "end user" no longer exists for them.

jscher2000 said

Hi 4til7, are you using a build of Firefox from your distribution's repository? You could try switching to Mozilla's build: https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/#product-desktop-release On Windows, that section looks like this:

jscher2000, yes. I'm using one of Ubuntu's _two_ officials distributions (sigh). My experience has been that mixing installs from third parties with distributor packages can turn into a big mess. AND it can't be any worse than the routine I'm going through right now.

In case someone on Ubuntu, hits this thread, Ubuntu has provided a page listing various ways they suggest to install FireFox directly from mozilla:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FirefoxNewVersion

jscher, I was basically agreeing with you. I would _love_ to at least be warned before Firefox updates itself. That would not mean I have the level of control I would like but it would be a vast vast vast improvement over I am going through right now.

The version of Firefox on my machine (the Ubuntu packaged one) doesn't even warn me that it's going to update. It just goes and does it in the background and then effectively locks up. When I restart the browser, I often lose a huge amount of material. The last browser start I went through in Firefox plain forgot half of my open windows (around 20 tabs). Normally I just loose content: whoops... sorry you've used up your three free page views on the DuBois Herald... whoops sorry our site is down... whoops sorry, that search you spent 20 minutes turning based on cross-referencing multiple sources is behind a login screen.

Yes I agree that I should have full control. I would _settle_ for having enough control that my browser doesn't full stop lock up forcing an immediate restart of the browser so I've got a chance to manage the fall-out.

Hi 4til7, I'm with you, I always set all my software to inform me when updates are available so I can time the installation.

Here's what I get on Ubuntu 18.04 (see picture):

https://user-media-prod-cdn.itsre-sumo.mozilla.net/uploads/images/2019-11-08-07-51-59-79df59.png

I did set app.update.auto to false in about:config, but I'm afraid I'll have to wait for the next update to see if it makes any difference.

jpprost said

Here's what I get on Ubuntu 18.04 (see picture): https://user-media-prod-cdn.itsre-sumo.mozilla.net/uploads/images/2019-11-08-07-51-59-79df59.png

Yes, it seems they customize it.

4til7 said

In case someone on Ubuntu, hits this thread, Ubuntu has provided a page listing various ways they suggest to install FireFox directly from mozilla: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FirefoxNewVersion

Thanks! So it looks like the whole problem comes in fact from the Ubuntu packaging, as acknowledged:

The Check For Updates menu entry in Firefox is disabled or hidden in recent versions of Ubuntu. Ubuntu supported updates to Firefox are managed through the package-management system.

Apologies to the Mozilla crowd. Ubuntu is to be blamed on this one...

jpprost said

4til7 said

In case someone on Ubuntu, hits this thread, Ubuntu has provided a page listing various ways they suggest to install FireFox directly from mozilla: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FirefoxNewVersion

Thanks! So it looks like the whole problem comes in fact from the Ubuntu packaging, as acknowledged:

The Check For Updates menu entry in Firefox is disabled or hidden in recent versions of Ubuntu. Ubuntu supported updates to Firefox are managed through the package-management system.

Apologies to the Mozilla crowd. Ubuntu is to be blamed on this one...

Only in the sense that someone has seems to have removed the UI control. The other part of the puzzle is that Firefox is getting updated at very different times than Ubuntu runs its updates. And, it's happening more often than Ubuntu's package manage system is telling me that it is going to update Firefox. It's as if Ubuntu's people have both removed the UI control and repointed the underlieing Firefox update mechanism at an Ubuntu-managed repository.

I haven't researched the Ubuntu build configuration, but if they planned to do updates only through the package manager, my guess would be they previously used this preference --

app.update.enabled => false

-- to completely disable Firefox from auto-updating.

That preference was removed in Firefox 63 about 13 months ago, so I have no idea what their approach has been in recent versions.

Maybe if they were using the Extended Support Release of Firefox 60 until it reached end-of-life, it's a new problem for them in the ESR of Firefox 68 and they haven't adapted to it yet?

Yes, I see what you mean 4til7. But if that's the case then my guess is that it would require them to hack the Firefox source code to overrule the use of all the app.update.url values, which are mozilla.org addresses. Possible of course, but unlikely I'd say.

4til7 said

jpprost said

4til7 said

In case someone on Ubuntu, hits this thread, Ubuntu has provided a page listing various ways they suggest to install FireFox directly from mozilla: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FirefoxNewVersion

Thanks! So it looks like the whole problem comes in fact from the Ubuntu packaging, as acknowledged:

The Check For Updates menu entry in Firefox is disabled or hidden in recent versions of Ubuntu. Ubuntu supported updates to Firefox are managed through the package-management system.

Apologies to the Mozilla crowd. Ubuntu is to be blamed on this one...

Only in the sense that someone has seems to have removed the UI control. The other part of the puzzle is that Firefox is getting updated at very different times than Ubuntu runs its updates. And, it's happening more often than Ubuntu's package manage system is telling me that it is going to update Firefox. It's as if Ubuntu's people have both removed the UI control and repointed the underlieing Firefox update mechanism at an Ubuntu-managed repository.

Third-party builds including those you build yourself or say Firefox packages from your Linux distro has Never been provided Firefox updates from Mozilla as to why no Firefox updates section exists in your Preferences.

Mozilla only sends Firefox updates to builds they built. The Updates section in Firefox was only for the official builds from Mozilla whether for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux. www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/

For technical reasons I need to restrict my updates to running offline. That means that in general I CANNOT update when running Firefox. I NEED to turn off the nag, or get another browser. Please help me turn off the nag. Or suggest another browser (I do not use any addons).

I had posted this in the past. You did leave out an important piece of information: what operating system are you running?

the below works for Linux.

The way I turned off mozilla nags and updates was to: create a file policies.json in /usr/lib/firefox/distribution/

policies.json contains: begin quote {

  "policies": {

"DisableAppUpdate": true

  }

} end quote

restart firefox

I have not had one nag from mozilla.