[Ext] Update Notifier 0.1.5.5 - Get Extension/Theme updates

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Trepid
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Joined: June 3rd, 2005, 8:03 am

No icon appears

Post by Trepid »

I am running 1.5.0.1 on Win ME. I have installed the extension. No icon appears, nor is there one available on the "cusotomize" window.
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XerBlade
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Re: Update Notifier 0.1 - 2/18 - Extension/Theme update noti

Post by XerBlade »

anon42 wrote:
2. The suggestion I have is that it might be nice to have some kind of timer that triggers the update checking at a user-specified rate. I don't have the UN option set to check when FF is launched. And it din't detect that one of my extensions needed updating until I explicitly asked UN to check. Or was it the case that I just didn't give it enough time and you do have a timer in there?

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There is a timer built-in to Firefox. Update Notifier also picks up on it when Firefox itself checks for updates, you know, so you can currently control it by that at least.
The default is once every 24 hours. You can change it by changing the extensions.update.interval pref. Its value is set in seconds [86400 seconds is 24 hours].
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jw25
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Post by jw25 »

Great work. A very useful extension. I agree with the previous posts in that a progress indicator would be nice to have.
anon42
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Re: Update Notifier 0.1 - 2/18 - Extension/Theme update noti

Post by anon42 »

XerBlade wrote:There is a timer built-in to Firefox. Update Notifier also picks up on it when Firefox itself checks for updates, you know, so you can currently control it by that at least.
The default is once every 24 hours. You can change it by changing the extensions.update.interval pref. Its value is set in seconds [86400 seconds is 24 hours].


Thanks for that info. Using that seems reasonable.

What about my other request about somehow letting MR Tech's Local Install's auto save function get its "hands" on what is being installed by UN?
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RBH
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Joined: November 11th, 2004, 5:23 am

Does fire fox have to start and then it checks for up dates

Post by RBH »

I use minumize to tray always so I never start FF except when I have to restart to install an extension. Does it check automaticaly at dif times to see if there are updates or is it only when I start FF or tell it to check.
Also I thought it may be nice to have a window to inform user that extensions have been installed and the need to restart FF
Thanks great extension
RBH
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Kitefighter
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Post by Kitefighter »

When I updated from 0.1 to 0.1.1 the pref "Check for updates when Firefox starts" was cleared. This pref shouldn't get overwritten.
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tmlong
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Re: No icon appears

Post by tmlong »

Trepid wrote:I am running 1.5.0.1 on Win ME. I have installed the extension. No icon appears, nor is there one available on the "cusotomize" window.

Make sure that your main menubar is visible and the icon should appear there, because if it is on a toolbar then it will not show up in the "Customize Toolbar" window. If that is not the case make sure that in the options for Update Notifier you have the option "Display icon when no updates are available" checked. Sounds like you unchecked that option which will make the icon hide until a new update is found.

Kitefighter wrote:When I updated from 0.1 to 0.1.1 the pref "Check for updates when Firefox starts" was cleared. This pref shouldn't get overwritten.

That is because some people were complaining that the start time of Firefox was getting delayed (people who have like 30+ extensions/themes). So I didn't want people thinking that it would always have to delay Firefox like that after just installing the extension. I'm sorry that it switched your option to disabled, I thought it would be saved by Firefox.

anon42 wrote:What about my other request about somehow letting MR Tech's Local Install's auto save function get its "hands" on what is being installed by UN?

I will check out that extension and see what happens. I'm surprised that extension isn't triggered to save your extension/theme when you call the install method because Update Notifier uses the same mechanism for installing as Firefox does. I will see what I can do with it.

I will be adding an option to specify intervals for checking new extensions/themes and will also add an alert notification option to display when updates are available. Also, I will fix the displaying of Firefox and Thunderbird appropriately and look at adding some sort of progress bar. Thanks.

- TL
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XerBlade
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Re: No icon appears

Post by XerBlade »

tmlong wrote:That is because some people were complaining that the start time of Firefox was getting delayed (people who have like 30+ extensions/themes). So I didn't want people thinking that it would always have to delay Firefox like that after just installing the extension. I'm sorry that it switched your option to disabled, I thought it would be saved by Firefox.


If someone has a certain pref set at default, and the default for that pref is changed in a new version, upon update to that new version, the pref value will be changed to that new default.
This is because Firefox only stores non-default prefs (in prefs.js). Default prefs are assumed, so if the default value is changed, it will reflect that instead of keeping the same old value and switching from default to user_set mode.

RBH wrote:I use minumize to tray always so I never start FF except when I have to restart to install an extension. Does it check automaticaly at dif times to see if there are updates or is it only when I start FF or tell it to check.

Go to about:config and ensure that extensions.update.enabled is set to true (the default). This ensures that Firefox will automatically check for updates periodically.
Then, go to extensions.update.interval and set how long you want it to wait between updates in seconds (default is 86400 [24 hours]).
Update Notifier should pick up on it whenever updates are found for extensions, no matter which update check method is used.

Note to tmlong: If you could just add GUI in this extension for those 2 prefs, it might help.
Unrelated Note: You can also change the interval that it checks for Firefox updates via the pref app.update.interval.
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RBH
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Post by RBH »

what number would I put to check every hr
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tmlong
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Post by tmlong »

Yeah, I will definitely just add an option to modify the Firefox preferences for the update interval. No sense in creating a new update timer that has the same functionality. The only problem is that I was looking at the code and actually it looks like it is fired every 24 hours (extensions.update.interval) +- 10 minutes (app.update.timer). So it looks like changing the extensions.update.interval will only affect the time interval in increments of 10 minutes unless the app.update.timer is changed too. It took me a little bit to decipher the code in Firefox but I guess that somewhat makes sense because you don't really need to be checking for updates every 30 seconds or a minute do you?

I suppose in the extension I will have an option to check for updates every X minutes in increments of 10 (obviously it will be worded a little nicer)? Because I don't really want to be modifying the app.update.timer since it controls timers for other stuff as well. Do you really need to be checking for updates every less than 10 minutes? If anyone has any suggestions please let me know. Thanks.

- TL
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RBH
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Post by RBH »

Ok I'll wait till the update thanks
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RenegadeX
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Post by RenegadeX »

a.m.o. and other extension sites probably won't appreciate thousands of people's Firefoxes hammering their site every 10 minutes! As the default update interval is 24 HOURS, I would think that even providing easy-10 minute-intervals is far, FAR too frequent.

Even hourly updates is unnecessary.
Think about it - if you really can not live without obtaining an update the very hour it comes out, you really need to get off the Internet and get a life!!

To prevent mass-hammering, I would suggest offering a minimum of SIX-hour intervals.
Some people may even want to update FF *less* frequently. Their lives can continue quite happily without worrying about whether they have the 'absolute latest version' of an extension.
So I'd suggest: 6hrs, 12hrs, 18hrs, 24hrs, 48hrs, weekly.

If a user really feels that there are times they need to be informed of updates on a more frequent basis, then they can set the pref through about:config. But I fear that giving people the option (in an extension such as this) to enter any minute-value (even if it is in increments of 10) will see many people, especially n00bs setting it for the absolute-lowest value.
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XerBlade
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Post by XerBlade »

RBH wrote:what number would I put to check every hr

60 seconds times 60 minutes is 3600.
Note that I personally leave mine at default, since it is of little importance to me, since I manually check for updates first thing nearly every time I get back to my computer from doing something else.

RenegadeX wrote:a.m.o. and other extension sites probably won't appreciate thousands of people's Firefoxes hammering their site every 10 minutes! As the default update interval is 24 HOURS, I would think that even providing easy-10 minute-intervals is far, FAR too frequent.

Even hourly updates is unnecessary.
Think about it - if you really can not live without obtaining an update the very hour it comes out, you really need to get off the Internet and get a life!!

To prevent mass-hammering, I would suggest offering a minimum of SIX-hour intervals.
Some people may even want to update FF *less* frequently. Their lives can continue quite happily without worrying about whether they have the 'absolute latest version' of an extension.
So I'd suggest: 6hrs, 12hrs, 18hrs, 24hrs, 48hrs, weekly.

If a user really feels that there are times they need to be informed of updates on a more frequent basis, then they can set the pref through about:config. But I fear that giving people the option (in an extension such as this) to enter any minute-value (even if it is in increments of 10) will see many people, especially n00bs setting it for the absolute-lowest value.

True, there are way too many of those types out there, especially on AMO, who, well, just don't think before they act. I'd say bare minimum settable from within the extension options should be an hour (and that's for extension junkies who really, really don't want to be getting their updates several hours late). Of course somehow setting up the options panel to where it won't bork if someone sets a lower value in about:config or user.js.
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Alan Baxter
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Post by Alan Baxter »

tmlong wrote:Yeah, I will definitely just add an option to modify the Firefox preferences for the update interval.

Please don't do that. Automatically checking for updates daily is plenty often enough and if someone really wants to modify that then they can always go into about:config. I bet AMO would not appreciate at all Update Notifier providing users with an easy way to check for updates more frequently. Frankly I'm happy with it just providing the functionality that Fx 1.5 should have provided in the first place, i.e. an "Extensions updates are available" indicator like Fx 1.0.x had. Please don't make it do too much.
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wer
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Joined: February 24th, 2006, 12:26 pm

Indicator for application updates

Post by wer »

Does the extension also look for application updates? If yes, what would the indicator look like? And what would the indicator look like if there were theme and extension updates at the same time?
Wer
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