I use at present Mint with KDE, which is splendid until I can get back to the better Opensuse ( with KDE ), and does everything well.
Mostly I save images a lot, and Firefox despite the relentless dumbification, still has the extension culture, and unlike every other non-Mozilla browser, uses the superior KDE Save Dialog ( Gnome - GKT is not so configurable ) which means one can mark an endless vertical row of preset folders for quick access. Yesterday I found these are considered ‘Bookmarks’.
If possible I would rarely update Firefox, 12 was about the last good one, but if one doesn’t one is plagued with the Update Zombies, whining and bitching, however on Friday I updated to 46. Apart from a new tactile feel to the cursor, it kind of glided/slided: the intractable problem was the change to the Save Dialog. Now, it was difficult to select any folder within 30 seconds, but worse the preset folders, now listed as ‘Bookmarks’ were picked up by the cursor and slid about. I would advise holding off on 46 if you save anything.
Reverting on Mint was a separate adventure, since Mozilla, as Queen of the Update Zombies, really, really doesn’t want to facilitate any using of old versions, and none of the Mint software managers offered any anyway. On the better Opensuse Yast makes that sort of thing easy.
Eventually after backing up profiles and a lot of messing I installed a Mint 64-bit Deb of Firefox 45, which first came up as 46 with no add-ons attached, which meant session manager was lost, which meant the past sessions were unavailable. I opened the profile manager with a terminal, made a new profile and set it as default, then copied the contents of the old profile into the new one. All is as it was.
Apart from the inescapable fact of the better Opensuse, German Engineering at it’s finest; beware, beware Firefox 46 if you save images.
I really don’t understand anything you said, but that’s my problem, not yours.
But I was intrigued by the concept of an “Update Zombie” so I googled it and all I got was page after page of video games. Can you explain what that is?
Well this is only of use to those running Linux ( unless the same problem occurs also on Windows, in which case my sympathies ); but **Update Zombies **are those people and firms who howl and scream the skies will turn to treacle and hail frogs *, Satan will unleash the fires of Hell, and the Internet will collapse from an overload of malware unless you instantly and always immediately update every last application to the latest version.
Kinda makes one feel like running Internet Explorer 1.5 just to fuck with them.
- Already glazed for the adventurous epicure.
Firefox does not natively support KDE dialogs. From what I can tell, OpenSuse actually creates a package on top that gives KDE support, and the patch from that is often ported to other Linuxes.
While the OpenSuse package seems to be fine, I note that there are apparently problems with the patch lately on other OSes. I didn’t find anything for Kubuntu/Mint, but I did find that Arch linux is having problems with the patch.
If you’re going back to OpenSuse, you may just want to wait until then to try Firefox 46 again.
If you are stuck on 45, and are worried about security, you can install Firefox 45 ESR from the official Firefox website. Seeing as you don’t like to upgrade, this might be the solution for you–it will stick with Firefox 45 until Firefox 52 comes out. It will still offer point upgrades, but nothing that should break.
I would recommend that over just using old versions of Firefox, personally.
Thanks. I shan’t go back to Opensuse until I buy a new disk or a new computer; since I have little room left on an the externals and no point in fixing something that works well. I don’t care that much about security, but the nagging gets weary…
Interesting about the KDE Dialogs: I have no objection to makers not supporting Linux ( or any other OS ), that’s their decision; but if one does make an application for Linux the maker might as well get the details right off their own bat. What’s really the essence is that all these feeble companies can’t divorce security updates from UI/UX changes, and dementedly insist on conformity for all regarding the most unimportant customization. *
- I prefer Tabs on Bottom; Mozilla altered this to Tabs on Top in 2010 and took away the ability to flip this preference. So one uses a third party extension to get it back — as with so many things Mozilla took away to attain Chromehood — and there is not the minutest particle of a reason anyone should ever care how someone else views their browser, let alone enforce it.
This is a good time to mention http://www.oldversion.com/
They have a LOT of programs. If you want to roll back to a previous version, they probably have it.