Need Information On Firefox V.55 Vs. Ff52esr (or Even Ff56)

Discussion in 'Software' started by Anonymouse, Nov 23, 2019.

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  1. Anonymouse

    Anonymouse Private E-2

    Hi Folks,

    I'm still using an older version of firefox to keep essential add-ons that Quantum no longer had. I'm having problems on a windows 7 computer with the version I have on it (FF52), and would like advice on the best way to proceed. I'm not willing to go to the current version of FF - I need the add-ons I have.

    Anyhow, I had copied over my profile from a different computer where I'd been using FF55. I'd had some problems with 55, so I installed 52 on this computer, but using the profile from the other computer. It's not working very well as I can't get vertical tabs or vertical tabs reloaded to work, it's also crashing fairly often for no apparent reason, etc.

    For what it's worth, this isn't a malware/virus problem - I'm running McAfee and also periodically malwarebytes, Adwcleaner, etc., and scans aren't finding problems (initial scan w/ adwcleaner found some stuff that was on the computer when I got it used). Computer has been restarted several times and so on, and I'm still having the problems. Could this be because the profile was from a firefox 55 version and it's being used on a FF52 version? Or would that not cause this sort of problem?

    I gather FF56 won't be able to access my older saved sessions (I use Session Manager and those are the sessions I'm concerned about - so if this is NOT a problem, please let me know).Wiki says: "...Another change was the introduction of the mozlz4 format, a proprietary variant of the lz4 compression format (.mozlz4 and .jsonlz4 file extensions instead of .json.lz4 as per unix/linux standard). Session data is stored in the lz4 format instead of plain text. Firefox 56 can not recognize the legacy plain text session files, only the lz4-encoded ones...." If this doesn't actually cause a problem with older Session Manager sessions, then I'd be interested in FF56 v. FF52ESR...

    So I'm wondering if I should go to 55 on this computer, or 52ESR (or FF56)? I gather the ESR would have a little better security - but want to know if there's a difference in reliability, memory issues, crashing problems, add-on compatibility or other features since 52ESR is, I gather, based on older code than 55?

    If someone could talk me thru the pros and cons of using 55 versus 52ESR I'd sure appreciate it!!! Or even point me to a good forum to get a solid answer to this question - I tried the Mozilla support site, and only got "must upgrade to current version!" - which is worthless to me.

    Also, I would be VERY grateful if folks could point me towards:
    1. a reasonably safe site where we can search and install legacy add-ons
    2. any webpage which has a good information showing which legacy add-ons now have reasonable replacements in the current FF version.

    Thanks in advance for any help on these issues!
     
  2. Eldon

    Eldon Major Geek Extraordinaire

    Correct.

    Also, while legacy add-ons are supported up to Firefox 56, they are not guaranteed to work.
    https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2017/02/16/the-road-to-firefox-57-compatibility-milestones/

    If you want to continue using legacy add-ons, use Firefox 52.9.0esr.
    https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/52.9.0esr/win32/en-US/
     
  3. Anonymouse

    Anonymouse Private E-2

    Thank you Eldon! Both the profile and the add-ons were from the other computer using FF55. I'll give 52.9.0ESR a shot and see how that goes.

    Another question for you - will my having used the profile & add-ons from the 55 version with 52 be likely to have corrupted them? If so, I can copy them over again from the laptop they originally came from (e.g., the FF55 version). I hope they'll work with the 52ESR version... I can't say I was all that happy with 55, but I suppose worst case I could go to it.

    Don't suppose you know where I can reasonably safely still get legacy add-ons? I gather there have been some people who've made them available, but I've no idea how safe those sites are thought to be?
     
  4. Eldon

    Eldon Major Geek Extraordinaire

    Not likely, but possible.
    I'm not aware of a site dedicated to legacy add-ons.
    Post a list of the add-ons. Someone may know of alternatives.
     
  5. plodr

    plodr MajorGeek Super Extraordinaire Moderator Staff Member

    There used to be a site at github. I think this might be it.
    https://github.com/JustOff/ca-archive
    I can't figure out how to find a specific addon.
    I've archived the legacy addons I used on a USB stick because Palemoon for a time used them. Unfortunately I never used vertical tabs nor vertical tabs reloaded so I don't have them archived.

    This might be an addon for a newer version of FF
    https://github.com/Croydon/vertical-tabs-reloaded
     

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