Firefox 19 was released today, with the usual lack of a proper announcement, and a confusing jumble of change information from Mozilla.
Instead of a proper announcement for the new version, all we get is this post announcing a new, built-in PDF viewer.
As usual, the release notes for version 19 are confusing, but at least the new version is mentioned, albeit in an unusual congratulatory note to ‘new Mozillians’ – whatever they are. And, as always, the complete list of changes for version 19 actually includes every bugfix in recent history. When are they going to clean this stuff up, one wonders.
Still, a built-in PDF viewer will allow users to steer clear of at least one buggy piece of Adobe software in the form of a Reader plugin. It remains to be seen whether the new viewer has as many security issues as what it’s replacing.
If you’re running Windows 7, and you haven’t already installed Service Pack 1, you should do so before April 9, 2013. After that date, Microsoft will no longer provide patches for Windows 7 without SP1. That includes security patches.
Microsoft will continue to supply patches for Windows 7 with SP1 until January 14, 2020.
Oracle/Sun has announced that additional security-related updates for Java will be made available on February 19. The emergency updates released on February 1 were originally scheduled to be released with the upcoming updates on February 19. Stay tuned.
Version 24.0.1312.70 of Google’s web browser contains the latest version of Adobe Flash.
Update: Something funny going on here. The announcement linked above states that version 24.0.1312.70 is actually for the Linux platform. It goes on to say: “This release contains an update to Flash (11.6.602.167). This Flash update has been pushed to Windows, Mac, and Chrome Frame platforms through component updater.” But what is the ‘component updater’, and how will it affect the version number of Chrome in Windows? There’s nothing on the Chrome support site about it. My own Chrome installation reports itself as being up to date at version 24.0.1312.57. Has Flash been updated in my installation or not? How can I determine what version of Flash is running in Chrome? Comments below the announcement linked above show other users similarly confused. Meanwhile, another new version was announced on Feb 14: “The Stable channel has been updated to 24.0.1312.71 for Windows Standalone Enterprise. This build contains an updated Flash (11.6.602.167).” That version at least seems to be targeted at Windows, but what is “Windows Standalone Enterprise”? It contains the same version of Flash as 24.0.1312.70, but again my version of Chrome reports that it is up to date at 24.0.1312.57. Not much we can do at this point except wait for Google to sort out this mess.
It’s that time again: time to patch your Windows systems. This month there are twelve bulletins, addressing a total of 57 vulnerabilities in Windows, Internet Explorer and other Microsoft software.
Updates this month comprise twelve bulletins, five of them critical, that address 57 vulnerabilities in Windows, Internet Explorer and other Microsoft software.
On a related note: is it just me, or are the release notes for Firefox kind of messed up? Looking at the page for the latest release, I notice the following:
The version being discussed doesn’t appear anywhere at the top of the page, in any headings, or in the page title.
The first reference to the version is in the list of issues fixed in the What’s New section, but issues fixed in previous versions appear as well.
What does appear in the page headings is “Notes (First offered to release channel users on February 5, 2013)”. Apparently this is telling us that the version being discussed was released on that date. But again, it’s not clear what version we’re talking about, unless you look at the page’s URL, which includes “18.0.2”.
The link to a complete list of changes takes us to a page that lists changes going back several months, in previous versions. It’s a massive list, again with no version information, despite being on a page with a specific version in the URL.
Comparing the complete list of changes for version 18.0.2 with the the list for version 18.0.1 shows that they are in fact identical. You have to go back to version 17.x to find a different list.
Confusing. To make matters worse, among all the Mozilla blogs, press releases and other related Firefox information on the Mozilla site, I’ve so far been unable to find a mailing list, feed or any other resource that simply announces new Firefox versions. I have to find out about new versions from SANS.
boot13