Firefox 1.5 Extensions & Themes

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Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 1 is due on 1st November, with the official Firefox 1.5 around mid-November. To help ensure a smooth transition it is a good idea to make sure your extensions and themes are up to date.

When Firefox 1.5 is first installed and run it will check to make sure the extensions and themes that you have installed are compatible. If they are not it will offer to search for updates and if none are found they will be disabled. I recommend that you check for updated extensions and themes before installing Firefox 1.5.

In Firefox 1.0.x select Tools>Options>Advanced for the option to check for updates to extensions and themes. This method is not 100% reliable and can miss an update.
You can check the homepage for the extension/theme or at Mozilla Update or The Extensions Mirror Forums for updated versions.

If you use Adblock then uninstall it and install Adblock Plus instead. Adblock is no longer being developed and will not work with Firefox 1.5

There will be some extensions and themes that are no longer being developed and will never work with Firefox 1.5, and others that will not be updated until after Firefox 1.5 is released.

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Tony

Re your last sentence — is there anywhere where the extensions a person uses may be checked for compatibility with Firefox 1.5?

Thanks!

John

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Mozilla Update and The Extensions Mirror both list what versions of Firefox the extension or theme will work with. The homepage of the extension may have a later version that is not yet listed on either of these sites.

It is best to check Mozilla Update first, and if the extension is not listed there then check the Firefox Extensions forum at the Extensions Mirror as this lists the extensions that are not available from Mozilla Update. To be listed at Mozilla Update the extension/theme has to pass quality assurance testing.

You need to look for maximum compatibility of 1.5 or greater, many will be shown as working with Firefox version 1.6a1, these will also work with Firefox 1.5 (Firefox 1.6a1 is the development version that will eventually become Firefox 2.0)

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(Edited by herworth on 29-Oct-05 19:03. edited to apologise about the poor spelling – should have checked it)

For some of the simple extension you can open the xpi file and change the level so that firefox recognises the extension but it won’t work with all the extesions.
I’ve tweaked 3 or 4 so I can keep them and so far it has had no ill affects. If it’s not going to work you can see straight away and then uninstall the extension.

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There are a couple of extensions that allow you to bypass the maximum version checking when extensions are installed. They also allow you to re-enable extensions that have been disabled. These should be used with caution as there is no guarantee that the extensions you install by this method will work and they could cause problems with Firefox.

MR Tech’s Local Install and Nightly Tester Tools

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