End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

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Oma1942
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End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Oma1942 »

http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/asa/arch ... win2k.html
January 27, 2012
For a number of years we've held off on updating our Windows toolchain to a newer version of Visual Studio, and in so doing preserved support for Windows 2000 and Windows XP RTM and SP1. Firefox developers and the 99.6% of our Windows users have paid a price for this support, though. Our developers have not been able to take advantage of new compiler features and have had to struggle to keep valuable optimizations from breaking -- including having had to back out and ultimately delay some important new features like SPDY. Our users have have suffered a slower Firefox than would be possible as both direct and indirect results of moving to a more modern compiler.

So this week, after a few months of discussion and evaluation of the latest Firefox user numbers and the pros and cons of moving our tools forward, I've called for Mozilla to begin the process for ending support on those older Windows version. Next Tuesday or Wednesday, after Firefox 12 moves to Aurora, the Mozilla Release Engineering team will begin upgrading our Windows build systems to Visual Studio 2010. With VS2010, we will no longer be able to build a Firefox that runs on Windows 2000, Windows XP RTM, and Windows Service Pack 1.

It's always a difficult decision to leave some users behind. The number of Firefox users on those OS versions -- less than one half of one percent of our Windows Firefox users, and the benefits to our development process and the hundreds of millions of Firefox users on XP SP2 and above, however, compel us to look forward rather than back.

If you are a Windows 2000 user, Firefox 12, which will be supported until June 5th, will be the final supported Firefox release. After that, your options are limited. Switching to Opera is probably the best path forward.

If you're a Windows XP user still on RTM or Service Pack 1, I strongly urge you to install the free Windows Service Pack updates.

And finally, for Enterprises adopting the ESR, these older Windows versions will be supported for the length of the first ESR of Firefox. That works out to an extra 6 months or so before these Windows versions become unsupported.
For the affected users, you may be interested in reading this link. http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/155384- ... dows-2000/
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patrickjdempsey
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by patrickjdempsey »

I'm planning on switching this machine to ESR 10 soon, which will give me a year of stability. Then what? 2013 is a ways off yet.
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Kevin McFarlane
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Kevin McFarlane »

Patrick, you can always switch to Opera as the piece says. :)
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patrickjdempsey
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by patrickjdempsey »

Would rather go without the internet that suffer through Opera.
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James
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by James »

Image

Or you could still use Firefox 11.0 and 12.0 in meantime and then go to 10.0 esr later.
Oma1942
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Oma1942 »

Mozilla better announce their decision somewhere more openly/officially rather than hidden on a blog. Also well in advance prior to cutting off the users of those OS's.

@patrick - good stuff on choosing ESR to extend the use of Fx on an old OS which won't be supported by Mozilla anymore in a few months. I tried Opera quite a while back and no likey.
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patrickjdempsey
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by patrickjdempsey »

I suspect many people using work machines with Win2000 will be effected. This is something they better make very very clear on the Enterprise promotional channels. I can just imagine some poor guy going through all of the effort to switch everyone over to ESR only to find himself in a situation next year where it doesn't work either.
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Bluefang
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Bluefang »

Oma1942 wrote:Mozilla better announce their decision somewhere more openly/officially rather than hidden on a blog. Also well in advance prior to cutting off the users of those OS's.


There's been a long, ongoing discussion about when and where release announcements should be made. Read this if you want a flavor of the bickering that's been going on for a while.
http://groups.google.com/group/mozilla. ... a039e425e4

But, from what I gather from the duscussion:
* The number of Win2k users is pretty insignificant
* The plan is to do an in-application notification that Win2k is no longer supported (Bug 723158)
There have always been ghosts in the machine... random segments of code that have grouped together to form unexpected protocols. Unanticipated, these free radicals engender questions of free will, creativity, and even the nature of what we might call the soul...
Oma1942
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Oma1942 »

@ Bluefang. Thanks for the links. Read all the comments as well. At least they're planning to do something. Hundreds of thousands being on the old OS's may seem little to Asa compared to the millions of users but it's a lot from the users' point of view, especially to the ones concerned.

@patrick. Excellent point there!
Kevin McFarlane
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Kevin McFarlane »

patrickjdempsey wrote:Would rather go without the internet that suffer through Opera.


LOL. Thought that would get you going. :)

I have Opera installed for historical reasons. I credit it with being the original innovator and it does have some nice features. But it is spoiled by irritating usability quirks. Plus you're more likely to run into pages that don't render properly. Not entirely their fault but the end user has no time for sentimentality. :)
Astrophizz
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Astrophizz »

The funniest part is seeing Asa recommend Opera in any capacity :P
Kevin McFarlane
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Kevin McFarlane »

Well, it will be the only recognised browser left that will support Win 2000 so he had no choice. No harm in recommending a competitor if they supply a solution that you won't. Anyway, Opera is stuck at 2% share or something! :P
Astrophizz
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by Astrophizz »

Yeah Windows 2000 users who want to stay on the forefront of browsers could provide a surge for Opera lol
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patrickjdempsey
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by patrickjdempsey »

Didn't the same thing happen when Firefox stopped supporting Win98 and shortly after Opera stopped supporting it as well?
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lithopsian
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Re: End of Firefox Support for Windows 2000

Post by lithopsian »

Firefox has stopped supporting Windows98? I'm so glad I switched to Linux :)
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