SOLVED End of Firefox might be coming for some of us

[c627627]

Well it's 9% still on ESR 52 it appears.
But 7% for some reason are on Firefox 45 generation, I often wondered why they did not come up to 52 ESR since it has current security patches and as far as I know old Extensions still work on 52 ESR.

It turns out under 70% of Firefox users are on Quantum now.
More than 30% are using pre-Qantum versions of Firefox. That is a lot more than I thought it would be. I thought that 9/10 would be using Quantum by now since we are on Firefox 61 and Quantum switch was on 57.


Why do you think so many people have not upgraded if not for various Add-ons and Extensions? If things worked on Quantum, why wouldn't we upgrade then?

 

[petteyg359]

Well it's 9% still on ESR 52 it appears.
But 7% for some reason are on Firefox 45 generation, I often wondered why they did not come up to 52 ESR since it has current security patches and as far as I know old Extensions still work on 52 ESR.

It turns out under 70% of Firefox users are on Quantum now.
More than 30% are using pre-Qantum versions of Firefox. That is a lot more than I thought it would be. I thought that 9/10 would be using Quantum by now since we are on Firefox 61 and Quantum switch was on 57.


Why do you think so many people have not upgraded if not for various Add-ons and Extensions? If things worked on Quantum, why wouldn't we upgrade then?

• I work at a business that allows people to install Firefox ESR, but only via SCCM. They usually take months to a year to actually update the image when there are new releases. Assuming other businesses are similar, this could account for many thousands of users.
• I suspect some of those still on 52 are because they're still on XP. No respect for the wannabe-botnet-victim crowd of idiots.
• People with ancient Linux system rescue discs that are distorting stats when the browser phones home but isn't actually a long term install, and is just used while restoring a system.
• Anybody stuck with an Android 3.x phone (almost like the XP crowd, but at least they can blame their service provider) is limited to 45 (47 for those lucky Android 2.3 users). *

 

[Alaric]

Why do you think so many people have not upgraded if not for various Add-ons and Extensions? If things worked on Quantum, why wouldn't we upgrade then?

^This
I dropped FF when an add on I use stopped working. I have Windows 7, 8.1, and 10 machines around here. One of the W7 rigs uses pre Quantum FF for exactly the reason I got rid of it on the others. We probably account for a helluva lot more users than "ancient Linux system rescue discs".

 

[c627627]

• I work at a business that allows people to install Firefox ESR... They usually take months to a year to actually update the image when there are new releases. Assuming other businesses are similar, this could account for many thousands of users.
• I suspect some of those still on 52 are because they're still on XP. No respect for the wannabe-botnet-victim crowd of idiots.
• People with ancient Linux system rescue discs that are distorting stats when the browser phones home but isn't actually a long term install, and is just used while restoring a system.
• Anybody stuck with an Android 3.x phone (almost like the XP crowd, but at least they can blame their service provider) is limited to 45 (47 for those lucky Android 2.3 users). *

1. Fx 45 is more than two years old, so your time frame of 'months to a year' has long passed, this is by choice of businesses, I don't know why they don't upgrade to the latest 52.9. I suspected software compatibility but what widely used extensions can run on 45 but not 52?
2. Windows XP security updates are available with a simple three second registry edit. Windows XP is being security patched right now and will continue to be patched going well into the year 2019. Official Microsoft 2018 security patches for Windows XP + Firewall + Antivirus for certain users is okay. But like you said, even they can use 52, why use 45?
3. Your theory that Linux and Android can largely account for more than 30% of Firefox users not using Quantum is a new one. I did not come across that theory on Mozillazine forums. Some of their Administrators, let alone experienced users are noy on Firefox Quantum because they also do not want to let go of their Extensions.

Either way we are just speculating. My post about how to keep using old extensions is available and useful to people who want to do so by choice.
It would be nothing short of a disaster for me, to not be able to use my existing browser extensions. I am taking this until Fx 52.9 no longer functions, which should not be for many years now.


People are sometimes set in their ways. Spectre and Meltdown made Microsoft change certain core Operating System elements in ALL Microsoft operating systems. Windows 7 onward.
This made old programs for which people paid hundreds of $ no longer function because their activation mechanism depended on the very core OS elements Microsoft changed.
This means those programs cannot work on any system with Microsoft Windows Update patch made in 2018.

I'm posting for informational purposes. If you see all those machines out there that are updated until December 2017 but not after that - that's why.
They chose to permanently withdraw from Microsoft Updates in order to use the software they paid for, which can only function on machines which were not updated in 2018 or later.

I own a few of such machines for Blu-ray watching. Paid customers of Arcsoft TotalMedia Theatre for example can only use their Blu-ray software on media center machines which do not have 2018 Windows Updates.
So it's either pony up money to the horrible PowerDVD bloatware or keep using Arcsoft and rely solely on Firewall and Antivirus to intercept takeover attempts.
Some people chose the latter and no longer update Windows.

I have also given up that any data on my computer is safe.
Backups on portable 8TB External Hard Drives permanently disconnected from the internet is the *only* data that I count on keeping. Anything connected to the internet can disappear in a flash.
Might as well just do frequent backups and customize my computer the way I want it to be.

But you are ultimately correct! Not everyone has that luxury and they should listen to you and only use the latest hardware and software. I agree with you on that for others. But for me, the info in this thread is the way to go forward.

 

[petteyg359]

1. Fx 45 is more than two years old, so your time frame of 'months to a year' has long passed, this is by choice of businesses, I don't know why they don't upgrade to the latest 52.9. I suspected software compatibility but what widely used extensions can run on 45 but not 52?

45.9 ESR was released in April 2017. That's not more than two years. The most recent 52 ESR isn't even six months old.

2. Windows XP security updates are available with a simple three second registry edit. Windows XP is being security patched right now and will continue to be patched going well into the year 2019. Official Microsoft 2018 security patches for Windows XP + Firewall + Antivirus for certain users is okay. But like you said, even they can use 52, why use 45?

Irrelevant. Why are you fixating on "there are people using 45"? If they're still on 45, it's obviously got f#!$%-all to do with Quantum.

3. Your theory that Linux and Android can largely account for more than 30% of Firefox users not using Quantum is a new one. I did not come across that theory on Mozillazine forums. Some of their Administrators, let alone experienced users are noy on Firefox Quantum because they also do not want to let go of their Extensions.

I never even implied Android accounts for 30%, let alone claimed such. YOUR OWN POST above claims 7% are on 45. When did that inflate to 30%?

This made old programs for which people paid hundreds of $ no longer function because their activation mechanism depended on the very core OS elements Microsoft changed.

You're complaining that software that was discontinued in 2014 stopped working 4 years later... If you want to complain about this one, complain about DRM existing at all. Screw the paying customer when it breaks, but pirates can always get around it. Also, some quick Googling suggests this is related to nVidia drivers interacting with the Windows updates, and that AMD cards still run it just fine.

You've gone way past "the sky is falling!" here.

 

[c627627]

Well I am not sure what your big picture point is.
I said you are correct for most people and that this is a specific niche thing and was posted on a forum known for explaining to people how to tweak hardware and software.

But I can continue talking to you first of all by telling you that I personally disproved people who started a rumor that it was nVidia drivers interacting with Microsoft and that is 100% not the case.
Microsoft made core changes to the kernel of ALL operating systems which in turn made it permanently impossible to activate certain software which for some reason, relied exclusively on that to activate.

This specific issue cannot be bypassed by pirates. It affects everyone who uses those programs, legitimate paid users as well as pirates. Nobody can use Arcsoft's Blu-ray players if they apply any Microsoft patch made in 2018 or later.

The entire point being that should anyone want to use it, they still can - on machines with December 2017 or earlier Windows Update.
And should anyone want to use any of the old Extensions - they still can.
That's what this thread is about.

It's not for everyone, just for people who choose to do so... There is nothing more or less to it.