Firefox 55 breaks complete themes

[DevilSlayerDante]

Since updating to v55.0, I've been experiencing bugs in all complete themes I've tried. I used BlackFox blue version for a long time, and then the tabs and address bar stopped hiding in fullscreen mode after updating to Firefox v55. Other complete themes are missing elements, such as colors or graphics aren't appearing on tabs, window frames, etc., as well. If it were just a few select themes that were affected, I'd say it's up to those developers to update their themes. But it's more than just a few complete themes, and the time it takes for these kinds of issues to be addressed is appalling these days.

If it's not broken...for the love of god, don't friggin' fix it.

[malliz]

What planet have you been floating on? This change was announced months ago
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1222546

[Mark12547]

I don't consider Bugzilla the best place for an official announcement, so I would rather point to a Blog:

Mozilla Add-ons Blog: The Road to Firefox 57 – Compatibility Milestones from February 16, 2017.

That blog made it clear that "Legacy Extensions" includes "Complete Themes", but 57 will be WebExtensions Only. That means "Complete Themes" as we know them won't work in 57 or later.

I would think that "Complete Themes" would still allowed through 56, but it would be up to the authors of the complete themes to update them to be compatible with Firefox as each new version of Firefox is released.

For 57, though, Complete Themes will no longer load. Apparently Mozilla is working on an alternative, but I haven't seen any announcement about just what that will be.

But if a Complete Theme has issues before 57, wouldn't that be the Theme developer's responsibility to support it?

The Bug that malliz pointed to did not point to a specific release, but that Bug did have comments about Complete Themes often breaking on a new Firefox release, especially as new features are added; and in the race to 57 there have been more and more changes, especially since Firefox 53, so it doesn't surprise me that themes, and extensions that are sensitive to the internals of Firefox (such as session managers and extensions that radically change the UI) need more maintenance.

[Happy112]

I feel the need to stand up for DevilSlayerDante :

I don't think that you can expect the average user to read Mozilla blogs and bug reports, and I think it's quite understandable that the OP gets frustrated over this .......

[L.A.R. Grizzly]

I feel the need to stand up for DevilSlayerDante :

I don't think that you can expect the average user to read Mozilla blogs and bug reports, and I think it's quite understandable that the OP gets frustrated over this .......

Ditto! Just wait till November! I've already got my popcorn ready...

[mightyglydd]

Funny how after every update Mozilla are able to pop up a tab telling us how they are saviors of the web..but NOTHING alerting users of what's about out to happen, there should have been an alert option to change to the ESR before the 55 update,

[TheVisitor]

Funny how after every update Mozilla are able to pop up a tab telling us how they are saviors of the web..but NOTHING alerting users of what's about out to happen, there should have been an alert option to change to the ESR before the 55 update,

The Captain of the Titanic didn't tell the passengers that it was sinking, the band played on....

[Happy112]

As we can't expect users to read Mozilla blogs, bug reports and KB articles :
I think it would be nice if every Firefox user would get a banner (one that can't be blocked) saying that changes are imminent.
But then again : some users might find that annoying and start to complain ......

[RobertJ]

If it were just a few select themes that were affected, I'd say it's up to those developers to update their themes. But it's more than just a few complete themes, and the time it takes for these kinds of issues to be addressed is appalling these days.

In reality most theme/extension developers wait until the last minute. They rarely test against beta's (which would give them six weeks to make changes) much less Nighties (which would give them twelve weeks to make changes). Even now with FF57 only seven weeks away many extension developers are procrastinating.

With regard to

I don't think that you can expect the average user to read Mozilla blogs and bug reports, and I think it's quite understandable that the OP gets frustrated over this .......

Quite true; however, theme and extension developers should know what is coming and make changes so "OP's don't get frustrated". However, theme and extension developers over many years seem to wait until the add-on is broken.

.

[mightyglydd]

Even now with FF57 only seven weeks away many are procrastinating.

Hmm what am I missing here, nothing to "procrastinate" about, FULL themes will be totally killed in Fx 57, this is hardly news, end of an era, end of discussion.

FYI: https://home.kairo.at/blog/2017-08/cele ... t_theme_re

[RobertJ]

Even now with FF57 only seven weeks away many are procrastinating.

Hmm what am I missing here, nothing to "procrastinate" about, FULL themes will be totally killed in Fx 57, this is hardly news, end of an era, end of discussion.

FYI: https://home.kairo.at/blog/2017-08/cele ... t_theme_re

Should have been more clear; was referring to extension developers.

.

[Happy112]

@ RobertJ :

Just got a Private Message from Admin :
They sent my last post to the Add-ons Manager via email (fingers crossed ... )

I sent a PM back saying that I'm kind of hoping for such a banner, warning about imminent changes that come with updates etc. as well.

[RobertJ]

.
Good luck.

.

[Frank Lion]

But if a Complete Theme has issues before 57, wouldn't that be the Theme developer's responsibility to support it?

Show me the lifetime contract that the theme author signed.

[Mark12547]

But if a Complete Theme has issues before 57, wouldn't that be the Theme developer's responsibility to support it?

Show me the lifetime contract that the theme author signed.

If this is the theme, https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefo ... ue/?src=ss then the support site link leads to the site with this page: http://www.zigboom.com/firefox-themes.html with the statement,

Compatible with latest Firefox Builds, Windows, Linux & OSX.

That statement shows an intent to support the theme so that is where one would give feedback about the issues encountered with the theme. If the authors have changed their mind about supporting the theme, it would be nice if the authors' web site reflected that.

It's not Mozilla's responsibility to update the themes.

The plan is to come up with a replacement for complete themes, not as comprehensive, rather somewhere between lightweight themes and complete themes, but the replacement is intended to be more stable across releases, and then it would be Mozilla's job to maintain the Firefox APIs that the replacement for complete themes would interact with. I haven't stumbled across just what that would be, but then I am not a developer so I don't normally peruse the various developer docs to pass the time.