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Firefox says it is "up to date" when it definitely isn't

  • 3 replies
  • 11 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by James

pscrews
pscrews
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I installed Firefox a couple of years ago in my home directory, and updated it (via the automatic update mechanism) a few times since then. However, for quite some time now the auto update has not been working.

Currently, if the about screen is to be believed, it is at version 16.0.2. If the update history is to be believed, it was last updated November 1 last year. When I click on "Check for Updates" in the about screen, it says "Firefox is up to date". This is clearly false.

Obviously I can update it by hand now that I know the auto-update is broken. However, it is IMHO extremely dangerous and irresponsible for Mozilla to provide an auto-update feature that does not work consistently. If, for some reason, it's no longer *possible* for the auto-update system to work (e.g. stuff has changed so much since 16.0.2 that you really have to reinstall from scratch, or if something else is preventing it from updating), then it should *tell* me so rather than saying "Firefox is up to date". A false sense of security is worse than useless.

I installed Firefox a couple of years ago in my home directory, and updated it (via the automatic update mechanism) a few times since then. However, for quite some time now the auto update has not been working. Currently, if the about screen is to be believed, it is at version 16.0.2. If the update history is to be believed, it was last updated November 1 last year. When I click on "Check for Updates" in the about screen, it says "Firefox is up to date". This is clearly false. Obviously I can update it by hand now that I know the auto-update is broken. However, it is IMHO extremely dangerous and irresponsible for Mozilla to provide an auto-update feature that does not work consistently. If, for some reason, it's no longer *possible* for the auto-update system to work (e.g. stuff has changed so much since 16.0.2 that you really have to reinstall from scratch, or if something else is preventing it from updating), then it should *tell* me so rather than saying "Firefox is up to date". A false sense of security is worse than useless.

All Replies (3)

kobe
kobe
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You can try a clean reinstall, and make sure the Firefox directory has the correct permissions.

Also see: Firefox says it's just updated every time it starts - how to fix and Install Firefox on Linux

cor-el
cor-el
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  • Top 10 Contributor
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Make sure that you meet the System Requirements (GTK+ and GLib) for the current Firefox version.

James
James
  • Top 25 Contributor
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Even though you installed it in home area I wonder if there is a read/write permissions issue for Firefox folder. You should get the complete.mar update since the oldest the partial updates is for 22.0

Also here is where you can get Firefox 24.0 for 64-bit Linux. Just pick your language folder and then download the firefox-24.0.tar.bz2. http://download.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/24.0/linux-x86_64/

Modified by James