Hi

I am sorry to hear hat you have been having some issues updating. We are working behind the scenes to make a few changes to fix those issues at the moment.

With regards to the bookmarks sidebar, what you are seeing there looks like some of the early content for some of the changes that will being coming to Firefox in a few months time. Watch out for more news about this soon.

Hello, and thank you for your reply. However, I am not sure if it...exactly solves my issues. It does give me some info though, so genuine thanks!

Regarding Question 1: So I take it the lack of being told about an update is a glitch? Like I said, previous versions have let me know when there is an update when I go to Help--> About Firefox.

Regarding your reply to Question 2: So that part was not supposed to be there for Version 55? Regardless, I still would like to know if there is a way to get rid of it, as it seems impractical for my use. I would also like to know why it was there in the first place.

No it is not a glitch. Updates aren't sent to all users immediately, the server is typically "throttled" to send notice on the update to like" 10% of the "pings" that Firefox sends to the update server each time Firefox is launched per day.

Plus, if the Beta testers miss a major fault with the new release there are fewer users having Firefox go "ass-over teakettle" and break with the update. Fewer users affected and then Mozilla can turn off the update and rejigger Firefox with a "chem-spill" build to release a few days later.

The "throttle" is used for "load balancing" too; no point in accepting an update ping from an installed Firefox browser, starting the download only to overload the server and make all users wait way too long for the update to download to the user. The "pipe" is only so big; cram too much data into that "pipe" and the delivery speed slows down for everyone.

We used to see a "slowdown" often on the first day a Firefox update was released (and sometimes even on the 2nd day), but since Mozilla reconfigured their download / update servers 3 or 4 years ago and started the "load balancing" and "throttling" I stopped seeing the "grind to halt" situation with Firefox updates.

number 2 - The sidebar has other uses beyond just bookmarks, thus that "selector" to access other functionality in the sidebar. History and Synced Tabs by default can be displayed there, and some add-ons are using the sidebar now, too. a new feature that available for add-on developers to use I'm sure that "caret" can be hidden via "user" code / Stylish / Stylus, but haven't looked into what might be necessary to hide it just yet.

You can hide this sidebar selector container including the close button with code in userChrome.css.

Add code to the userChrome.css file below the default @namespace line.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/userChrome.css

@namespace url("http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul"); /* only needed once */

#sidebar-switcher-target {display:none!important;}

• create the chrome folder (lowercase) in the <xxxxxxxx>.default profile folder if this folder doesn't exist
• use a plain text editor like Notepad to create a (new) userChrome.css file in the chrome folder (file name is case sensitive)
• paste the code in the userChrome.css file in the editor window
• make sure that the userChrome.css file starts with the default @namespace line
• make sure that you select "All files" and not "Text files" when you save the file via "Save file as" in the text editor as userChrome.css.
  otherwise Windows may add a hidden .txt file extension and you end up with a not working userChrome.css.txt file

@the-edmeister: So I simply haven't gotten the update yet because someone found fault with it, so it hasn't been released to me/others yet? Just fyi, I downgraded back to 54.0.1 (because of the selector on the sidebar), and Help--> about is still telling me that I am up to date.