Firefox 34.0 was released on December 1. The new version includes some security fixes, improves the search bar, and makes switching between profiles a bit easier.

As usual, there was no announcement for this version, despite Mozilla staffers telling me that major releases always get proper announcements on the Mozilla blog.

Further confusing things is a release notes page for version 34.0.5, linked from the main release notes page, that looks almost identical to the page for 34.0. Worse still, Firefox itself won’t update to 34.0.5, and the Firefox download page assures me that I’m running the latest version (that version being 34.0).

Is it just me, or is Mozilla getting worse at this stuff?

Update 2014Dec05: Apparently version 34.0.5 is somehow seen as optional. For whatever reason, the automatic updater and the download page see 34.0 and 34.0.5 as equivalent. The only way to upgrade from 34.0 to 34.0.5 is to download 34.0.5 from the ‘Download a fresh copy‘ page and install it on top of version 34.0.

Update 2014Dec08: Since the only difference between 34.0 and 34.0.5 is the default search provider, and that change only affects users in the US, it seems reasonable to assume that the Firefox download page (as well as Firefox’s self-updater) will only suggest 34.0.5 if you are in the US. My own tests were inconclusive.