User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.6) Gecko/20050317 Firefox/1.0.2 Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.6) Gecko/20050317 Firefox/1.0.2 This is a followup bug to bug #247884, see comments 134 and 135. The issue there was that when the user updates from a previous version (say, from 1.0.0 to 1.0.1) then the uninstall entry for the previous versions is not removed from Add/Remove programs. After installation both the entries will be available in Add/Remove programs, and using the previous entry will actually uninstall both versions of the program. But shouldn't the Add/Remove entry for Firefox behave in a similar way to the Add/Remove entry for, say, Office 2003? The left part of the attachment (Show Updates, combined screenshots) shows the MSO2K3 entry when the "Show updates" checkbox is not checked and the right part when it is checked (Windows XP SP2). Similarly, shouldn't the main entry for Firefox be "Mozilla Firefox 1.0" and when "Show updates" is checked it would also show "Mozilla Firefox Update 1.0.1", "Mozilla Firefox Update 1.0.2", etc? When Firefox 1.1 is released the main entry would be replaced with "Mozilla Firefox 1.1" and the update entries removed, until Firefox 1.1.1 is released and "Mozilla Firefox Update 1.1.1" would be added? Reproducible: Always

Added attachment, see previous comment.

But, at least with the way things currently work, you can't uninstall 1.0.2 and be on 1.0.1 again. They are completely different builds, not patches or service packs like in the case of MS Office. You're not installaing an "update", per se, but an entirely new version. Maybe this will be possible once Firefox starts using some sort of binary patching system, but that is a separate issue.

But shouldn't these updates be patches or service packs, instead of full- fledged installers (and then as a side-effect this bug could or would be solved)? On Windows there might be a slight problem since out of the approx. 15-16MB install then firefox.exe is 6.3MB or more than 1/3. It is not broken into sufficiently small parts (lots of DLLs..) so that any update will always be 7MB+.

The updates column only shows true "upgrades", like service packs and patches, while Firefox releases are currently entire installations. The point of that behavior is presumably to uninstall specific service packs if there are problems, and that's not possible with Firefox. There's only ever one version installed at a time. I'll wait to confirm, but this is almost certainly WONTFIX.

Has there been posted a bug saying that updates shouldn't be released as entire installations but rather as binary patches or individual file updates? If so, could this bug be added as dependant and re-evaluated later?

Because Firefox uses a new installer for each build update, it should either erase the keys of previous uninstallers (win install) or understand via product guid that the install may be an upgrade (msi install). I would be happy to help with this if needed. I have a good knowledge of windows installer and am on the WiX team.

I don't think that new versions should appear in add/remove programs for two reasons. You can't uninstall one and get back to a previous version, and even if you could hide them on xp you can't on win98, so it would just show multiple versions. This behavior is fixed since 1.0.3, and only displays the newest version.

Firefox 1.0 updated with 1.5 installer, later updated with 1.5.0.1 incremental shows as 1.5.0.1 in add/remove Firefox 1.0 updated with 1.5.0.1 installer shows as 1.5 in add/remove???? Seems weird to me! Same version, but different versions displayed (and reported in Patchlink).

(In reply to comment #6) > Because Firefox uses a new installer for each build update, it should either > erase the keys of previous uninstallers (win install) or understand via product > guid that the install may be an upgrade (msi install). This bug should block bug 231062 so when they do it, it works correctly.

(In reply to comment #7) > > This behavior is fixed since 1.0.3, and only displays the newest version. Last time I updated the Shockwave player it said it would install itself for Internet Explorer Mozilla Firefox 1.0 Mozilla Firefox 1.0.1 Mozilla Firefox 1.0.2 Mozilla Firefox 1.0.3 Mozilla Firefox 1.0.4 Mozilla Firefox 1.0.6 .... ... and then the list went outside the message box.

1) The new installer based on NSIS cleans up the old / invalid registry settings on install and uninstall that caused shockwave and other plugin installers to think there are multiple versions of the application installed. It also cleans up the old / invalid uninstall registry keys which caused multiple entries in add or remove programs as the previous installer did. 2) We now use the version from the build config so it should no longer display as just the major version in add or remove programs, etc. 3) The installer isn't going to support updating to a new version in the manner that would be required for this bug (e.g. a incremental diff update) or support uninstalling of just an update so the previous version is operational. Incremental updates are provided by software update but there is no way to uninstall the incremental update it provides. resolving -> wontfix

(In reply to comment #11) > > 1) The new installer based on NSIS cleans up the old / invalid registry > settings on install and uninstall that caused shockwave and other plugin > installers to think there are multiple versions of the application installed. > It also cleans up the old / invalid uninstall registry keys which caused > multiple entries in add or remove programs as the previous installer did. When was that fixed? I have Firefox 1.5.0.4 and I just installed a new Shockwave version this morning (10.1.3r18, posted by Adobe two days ago) and the Showckwave install still listed all Firefox version since 1.0 just as before (see comment #10).

The fix is on the current trunk and the MOZILLA_1_8_BRANCH which will become Firefox 2.0 bug 326580 landed it and bug 339061 is tracking the associated bugs