MetaChat - Firefox, WTF?

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30 November 2009

Firefox, WTF? Firefox upgraded itself to 3.5.2 yesterday. Nothing strange about that, but→[More:] it seems to have also installed itself a new Google toolbar and brought along The latest RealPlayer to boot. Now, I like Firefox and I like Google, but, seriously, WTF?! They splattered new icons on my desktop, and I never select desktop icons. Is anyone else getting this? Are they still trustworthy? OK, just ranting now...

post by: DarkForest at: 20:01 | 11 comments

I'm already on 3.5.5 and I didn't see anything like that.

Some programs will try to sneak a toolbar in on you by forcing you to opt out. WinAmp does it for Yahoo, I believe. I wouldn't blame FF.

posted by Joe Beese 30 November | 20:03

I'm already on 3.5.5

Thanks, downloading it now...

There was no opting in or out on my part, it was just one of those automatic updates that FF does (which I want). I just don't think I ever opted to have it drag other things in with it. No real harm done though I really don't care much for RealPlayer.

posted by DarkForest 30 November | 20:11

I switched to chrome a few months back.

posted by Obscure Reference 30 November | 21:13

I keep hoping I'll drum up the nerve to move to chrome, or opera. I have some habits in FF that I couldn't break last time I tried opera. This was pre-Chrome. Also, installing Chrome seems to break an application at work, whether you use Chrome for it or not...so I've avoided it on my work machine.

But, yeah, of late? A weak booooo for Firefox.

posted by richat 30 November | 21:25

I switched to Chrome a few months ago, and lasted about three weeks. I just can't live without ad-block, flash-block and grease-monkey. Trying to read the web with all of the freaking flashy, jumpy, shouty crap gets old really fast. Firefox may be slow and a little crashy but at least it's on my side.

posted by octothorpe 30 November | 21:39

Chrome's dev release has greasemonkey and ad-block. I even used an AskMe on it.

posted by Obscure Reference 30 November | 22:21

I tried to get scripts to work with the dev version of Chrome without any luck. Looks like you had better luck. I'll wait for the prime-time release; I don't like mucking around with pre-release code at home, I have to do that all day at work.

posted by octothorpe 30 November | 22:28

SRWare Iron is Chrome without all the security and privacy issues. I still use Opera most of the time though.

posted by arse_hat 01 December | 02:11

This sounds very wrong, DarkForest. Current version of Firefox is 3.5.5, so I don't see FF installing an older version.

What I would be worried about is that something bad you picked up has tricked you into "updating" to an older FF version that might have security flaws it can exploit. I'd do a really thorough antivirus, etc. check if I were you, and then if you aren't already using NoScript, install it.

posted by taz 01 December | 02:48

You're right, taz, it is odd. A scan's a good idea. I use noscript, but I'll admit that I sometimes enable websites that I don't know well, just to get things to work.

I also have Opera and Chrome on the machine, but I rarely use them.

Thanks.

posted by DarkForest 01 December | 07:14

I switched to Chrome a few months ago, and lasted about three weeks. I just can't live without ad-block, flash-block and grease-monkey.

Me too (except for flashblock). I tried the scripty thing for Chrome but it wouldn't work properly. When it's mainstream, I'd love to have another go.

Yeah, something sounds really screwy with this - I've never seen Firefox try to install add-ons, except a vague memory of Google Toolbar being an opt-out install once.

posted by dg 02 December | 06:44

← I quess this is Pre-AskMe butttttt. || Hoppy Burfday, dhartung! →

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