cancel
Showing results for 
Show  only  | Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
istrasci
New member
Status: New idea

Please do not block my browsing session just to force me to restart!  Let me restart when I want to.  For security reasons, I'm almost always browsing in Private Mode, and as such, logins and passwords are not saved.  So when I'm forced to restart because of an update, I have to save my current tab session, reopen them after FF has restarted, and re-login to every site I was using—many of which require 2FA, so it's extra annoying.

This is bad UX!  Put a notification, or even a whole separate tab telling me I need to restart.  But don't block out everything I was doing.  Even Windows doesn't do this...

77 Comments
rwg05
New member

I have Firefox 101.0.1 (64-bit) (was just forced to restart...) for Ubuntu and I do not see this option.

(Edit: this is in response to @Jon's comment. Sorry first time using this forum)

jscher2000
Leader

@rwg05 wrote:

I have Firefox 101.0.1 (64-bit) (was just forced to restart...) for Ubuntu and I do not see this option.

(Edit: this is in response to @Jon's comment. Sorry first time using this forum)


When you install Firefox through a package manager, the package manager usually schedules updates and overrides Firefox's setting. It also might be a slightly modified version of Firefox. You might check a Ubuntu forum to find suggestions from other Firefox users running the same package.

skunkbad
New member

I hate these forced restarts. I curse the name of Firefox every time it happens, because it NEVER happens at a good time. If I have to do something really important, should I always need to use a different browser?

Naov
New member

I hate it, specially during the pandemic where we use a lot of online meetings, suddenly the Force Restart in 15 minutes will happen. Sometimes I don't even see the notification because I have a big monitor and suddenly the forms I'm filling are lost, or I'm at the middle of a course I'm teaching and it closes itself.

If this happened every month or so it would be a little less frustrating (but still), however this happens every week it's insane.

angry_blob
New member

It's like the tenth time that Firefox decides that is time to update, does so, and then forcibly requires me to restart Firefox. But uh-o, I often use only private windows because I don't like cookies, and I don't want to have them saved on my PC; BUT IF THEN FIREFOX RANDOMLY RESTARTS, ALL OF THESE WINDOWS GO INTO VALHALLA, DON'T COME BACK, AND I LOSE TRACK OF EVERYTHING I WAS DOING. And, in my respectful and peaceful opinion, it's kind of dumb given that at no point in this process I asked for any of this. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Ps please don't tell me "you can disable cookies etc in settings" because I still want them on for when I'm using websites where I want to remain logged in. And no, I'm not going to waste hours to make a whitelist.

jscher2000
Leader

I also hate forced updates. What OS do you run? Windows and Mac users can set Firefox to prompt them when an update is available and you can either choose to download it immediately or later. When you defer the update, Firefox will usually ask again in about 12 hours.

To set that up, open the Settings/Preferences page and type update in the tiny search box near the top of the page.

For users on Linux that installed their Firefox from their package manager, the package manager usually determines when updates are installed, overriding Firefox's setting.

Screenshot: update prompt and relevant portion of the Settings/Preferences page:

Fx103-update-available-prompt-setting.png

 

Ipsrich
Making moves

I'm on Linux too, and the thing I don't understand is why Firefox needs to restart when the package manager runs an update.  I've not seen this elsewhere - if I see anything, it's a message telling me I need to restart the application if I want the latest updates.  The existing tabs all continue to work fine, so why can't I open a new tab?  This is really poor user experience.  Sometimes reloading a tab can lose loads from a long-running site.  I love just about everything else about Firefox (though I won't get started on the removal of the password manager app from Android!) so it would be lovely if this could be fixed.  Feel free to remind me on every opened tab that the browser needs to restart before the update will take effect, but please don't force it!

janpro
New member

I'm thinking about stopping updates to FF...
Bad idea, but far better than be uppset every now and then.

Coldnwet
New member

The problem is not automated updates, the problem is the forced shutdown of a current, running, instance of FF. It was bad enough when I couldn't create a new tab without getting interrupted, but now I can't even use current tabs without it happening.

I use private browsing exclusively on Firefox (because... you know, "privacy browser"). Until recently, Firefox would interrupt my browsing, telling me that I needed to update, but not to worry, all tabs would be restored. If you use private browsing, that's a lie. Firefox will restart and not a single one of my tabs will reload. I notice that my current interruption says: "Your windows and tabs will be quickly restored, but private ones will not." I suppose that's Firefox's idea of... progress?

I understand that updating Firefox is an issue on Windows, since Windows can't install an update to software and just let the current/old version continue running. However, on Linux that's not the case at all. Linux installs updates on a new section of a hard drive and lets the current/old version keep running until it's shut down. Once it's shut down any restart of the software will load the updated version. That's how all updates to Linux software works, even updates to the kernel (which require a reboot to take effect, but still does not interrupt your usage of the current/old version). All software - except Firefox.

Please don't hand-wave and tell me package managers override Firefox settings. Nothing in a Linux package manager forces Firefox to interrupt my browsing just because an update has been installed. This is entirely a Firefox problem and it's up to Firefox to solve this problem. Either actually restore all tabs (private or not) or stop disrupting the use of Firefox. I suggest Firefox pursue the latter course.

Until Mozilla/Firefox decides to take this problem seriously, I, unfortunately, will be pushed to using Brave as my daily browser. You see, Brave doesn't interrupt my browsing just because an update has been installed, it places an orange button in the upper right hand corner that says "Update." Nothing happens unless I click that button or restart Brave.

It's a shame, really. I like Firefox better than Brave, but these forced restarts are just not acceptable.

jscher2000
Leader

@Coldnwetwrote:

I understand that updating Firefox is an issue on Windows, since Windows can't install an update to software and just let the current/old version continue running. However, on Linux that's not the case at all. Linux installs updates on a new section of a hard drive and lets the current/old version keep running until it's shut down. Once it's shut down any restart of the software will load the updated version. That's how all updates to Linux software works, even updates to the kernel (which require a reboot to take effect, but still does not interrupt your usage of the current/old version). All software - except Firefox.


I think the Snap package works that way, but the older style may not.

Firefox should only show the restart required page when it tries to spin up a new process and encounters a tab crash because the executable on disk does not match the ones running in memory. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1651133

But as a Windows person, I can't test any of this.