SeaMonkey 2.33 - A List of Problems is Needed

R.N. Folsom · Post by **R.N. Folsom** » March 22nd, 2015, 1:50 pm

Given the large numbers of SeaMonkey 2.33 complaints that have posted here, on important issues such as that Compose Mail and HTML Composer don't work (those titles are from my laptop's Start Menu, a bit different from the usual labels), a List of All 2.33 Problems is needed, ideally with each listed item including a link to a fix.

And I haven't seen anything here announcing SeaMonkey's 2.33 improvements. Are there any improvements, compared to version 2.32?

While I am waiting, I think that I will continue using SeaMonkey 2.32, on my laptop and also on my wife's laptop. Both use 64-bit Windows7 sp1.

R.N. (Roger) Folsom

barbaz · Post by **barbaz** » March 22nd, 2015, 2:10 pm

The most notable improvement is the security fixes. In general it's a good idea to keep SeaMonkey up to date, just because of the security fixes.
If you want some sense of the changes to the backend, it's shared between SeaMonkey and Firefox so some of the Firefox release notes apply.

That being said if you're willing to take proactive steps to defend yourself you can opt not to upgrade and although you're theoretically vulnerable to attack, you're safe enough in practice. (Note the user-agent string below my post.)
Installing NoScript and leaving it in default-deny mode is a good start, but depending on your browsing habits you may need or want more protection than that...

WaltS48 · Post by **WaltS48** » March 22nd, 2015, 3:06 pm

Not all but some.

See SeaMonkey 2.33 Release Notes

Probably incomplete.

Bug List

patrickjdempsey · Post by **patrickjdempsey** » March 22nd, 2015, 3:29 pm

Most of the items in the Known Issues list are very old and have been rolled over from previous versions. In fact, don't see anything in that list new to this version. Compare to the same list in 2.32: http://www.seamonkey-project.org/releas ... 32/#issues

"Given the large numbers of SeaMonkey 2.33 complaints that have posted here..."

here... where exactly? Looking through recent threads this is what I've learned about SeaMonkey 2.33:

The Refresh button is a footgun.
Norton is being rude.
Enigmail was broken.
DownloadHelper was/is broken.
Googlebar is broken.

barbaz · Post by **barbaz** » March 22nd, 2015, 3:43 pm

patrickjdempsey wrote:Looking through recent threads this is what I've learned about SeaMonkey 2.33:

The Refresh button is a footgun.
Norton is being rude.
Enigmail was broken.
DownloadHelper was/is broken.
Googlebar is broken.

And printing some things no longer works or requires clumsy workarounds...
and it's harder to set autocomplete settings for location bar...
and you don't get all notifications on Linux...

patrickjdempsey · Post by **patrickjdempsey** » March 22nd, 2015, 3:49 pm

Right... so two possible bugs, one of which is Linux only, and neither appears to be related to the topics the OP specifically mentioned.

My point is that 90% of the random topics claiming problems in new versions are either something a user did to themselves, or something 3rd party software did. It often takes a few weeks after a release to get to the point that there is anything near a list of real "problems".

patrickjdempsey · Post by **patrickjdempsey** » March 22nd, 2015, 4:03 pm

Also, what R.N. is looking for does in fact exist with every release. In SeaMonkey General someone (often rsx11m) generates a new topic like: "SeaMonkey 2.33 has been released!" viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2920331

The entire point of those posts is to list new features, fixes, and possible bugs.

Another great resource for learning about the status of up-coming versions and the SeaMonkey project in general, is the SeaMonkey StatusMeetings page: https://wiki.mozilla.org/SeaMonkey/StatusMeetings Which does have an RSS feed if you are into that kind of thing.

So here's the official word on what's up with 2.33 as of March 17th:
https://wiki.mozilla.org/SeaMonkey/Stat ... 03-17#2.33

Post by **LoudNoise** » March 23rd, 2015, 12:01 am

Moving to General. The topic has already captured one fellow looking for support.

patrickjdempsey · Post by **patrickjdempsey** » March 23rd, 2015, 2:46 pm

Also, just a bit of a casual recommendation (which I need to follow myself): some of us really need to start testing pre-release builds of SM. SeaMonkey has a very small testing base, which directly impacts the discovery of new bugs. When a bug like the print failure is immediately noticeable, that's generally due to a lack of testing. I'm not saying that the people testing SeaMonkey aren't doing a good job, I'm saying that everyone has different habits and different areas they focus on. Especially for Linux and OSX which not only have smaller user bases, but are different enough from Windows that bugs often occur in only one OS. Even if a bug cannot be fixed before a release, at least that bug can be listed on the Known Issues section of the release notes, and here in release announcements.

In addition to testing and filing bugs, SeaMonkey needs help in triaging (sorting) bugs that are already filed. After all, Unconfirmed bugs don't get fixed! This is something that SM devs are well aware of and has been a topic of the StatusMeetings for some time now:

"IanN thinks it would be useful to remind people on the newsgroups / forums that they can contribute by triaging. Tonymec will post a reminder to newsgroups / forums. See bug 1092632 (Sm_tri_HowTo) Document how to triage SeaMonkey bugs."

IMO SeaMonkey devs have made great strides in the last few years and the product is stable and competitive. They've done a pretty remarkable job in not only keeping up with changes that Mozilla is making to the Core, but in improving native features! They just need more help from us in the community to keep things running smooth. And the same thing applies for all of those extensions that busted this go around. A wider testing base might have discovered those bustages earlier and workarounds could have been available by the time of the release.

therube · Post by **therube** » March 24th, 2015, 7:37 am

(And of course we need builds, Windows in particular, for those who can't do it for themselves. But you've got to figure that they will start... eventually.)

patrickjdempsey · Post by **patrickjdempsey** » March 24th, 2015, 7:53 am

Yeah.... then there's that... but bug triage can be done without Nightlies!

R.N. Folsom · Post by **R.N. Folsom** » March 27th, 2015, 12:58 am

patrickjdempsey wrote:Most of the items in the Known Issues list are very old and have been rolled over from previous versions. In fact, don't see anything in that list new to this version. Compare to the same list in 2.32: http://www.seamonkey-project.org/releas ... 32/#issues

"Given the large numbers of SeaMonkey 2.33 complaints that have posted here..." here... where exactly? Looking through recent threads this is what I've learned about SeaMonkey 2.33:

The Refresh button is a footgun.
Norton is being rude.
Enigmail was broken.
DownloadHelper was/is broken.
Googlebar is broken.

___________________________________________________________________________
patrickjdempsey: Thanks very much for your response to my post. FYI, my original post's opening statement
"Given the large numbers of SeaMonkey 2.33 complaints that have posted here..." which generated your response
":? here... where exactly?" was because my post was among many posts complaining about one problem or another when trying to use SeaMonkey 2.33.1.

So your post, and all of the other posts above, have given me information about where to go for to find out what the problems are, for SeaMonkey 2.33 and 2.33.1. In particular, the Security Advisories for SeaMonkey
(https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/security/ ... seamonkey/)
was especially helpful.

And the list of 26 fixed bugs (at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/buglist.cg ... monkey2.33)
was quite comforting. So I will back up my laptop (in case 2.33.1 turns out to have some remaining problem that doesn't work well on my laptop), and then install SeaMonkey 2.33.1

Meanwhile:
At your convenience, I would like to know more about the items you mentioned:
The Refresh button is a footgun. What is a footgun?
Norton is being rude. I use Eset, but the Charles Schwab website uses Norton, so I hope I won't have trouble there.
Enigmail was broken. I have never heard of Enigmail, and I am guessing that it isn't a SeaMonkey item.
DownloadHelper was/is broken. I don't recall using DownloadHelper, although of course I have done many downloads.
Googlebar is broken. I am guessing that SeaMonkey's Googlebar is within the SeaMonkey window that contains a special area for using Google.
Instead, I usually use the white area that is to the right of < Back > Forward ^ Reload x Stop

R.N. (Roger) Folsom

therube · Post by **therube** » March 27th, 2015, 7:47 am

> Charles Schwab website uses Norton

Huh?
In any case, your Eset is not interfering with their "Norton".

> Enigmail
> DownloadHelper
> Googlebar

All extensions, so not part of SeaMonkey.

R.N. Folsom · Post by **R.N. Folsom** » March 27th, 2015, 7:22 pm

therube wrote:>
> Enigmail
> DownloadHelper
> Googlebar
All extensions, so not part of SeaMonkey.

therube:

Thanks for that information. But if those three items are extensions not part of SeaMonkey, do they come from the operating system?
(In my case, the operating system is 64-bit Windows7sp1, although of course SeaMonkey operates as 32-bit, like some other programs do.)

I am trying to figure out where each of those three items would come from. Maybe somewhere on my laptop, or on the internet?

R.N. (Roger) Folsom

Post by **rsx11m** » March 27th, 2015, 9:17 pm

No, they are definitely neither part of SeaMonkey itself nor part of the operating system but have to be installed separately. "Googlebar" may come as additional opt-out load with installers for other applications (always carefully read all pages when installing some application as you may have to uncheck one or more boxes to avoid one or more of those "extras" to be installed along with the desired application - that's how they make money for their "free" applications).

SeaMonkey 2.33 - A List of Problems is Needed

SeaMonkey 2.33 - A List of Problems is Needed

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