Firefox: Autoupdate from 4 to 5 on Linux

Question

I am using Firefox 4.01 on GNU/Linux x86_64.

Is there any reason why there is no autoupdate? In fact, when I look at the "About Firefox" dialog, it just says "Updates available at http://www.firefox.com/".

Answer 1

Long story short: Install it manually _{(unless it comes with your Linux package management, thanks Simon Sheehan for pointing that out)}

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First of all,

Firefox 4's silent update will only be offered on Windows, Mozilla has said.¹

however that applies only to security updates I suppose. That is backed up by the following statement:

We are treating the automatic update checkbox enabled as a 'Yes, I want Mozilla to keep me updated. Previously as a courtesy we had people opt-in between major versions due to the potential jarring nature of the update. We feel the difference between 3.5 and 3.6 is not severe and with 3.5 reaching end-of-life 3.6 is the security update for 3.5 users. ²

This has been the process for all major Firefox version before, as they're not an important Security Update per se but a manual update you can choose to make.

On June 21, the day Firefox 5 is supposed to ship, Mozilla will automatically push Firefox 3.6.18 -- a standard security update -- if the company resolves a few remaining bugs. If those bugs don't get fixed by then, the auto-update will hit Firefox 3.5 users some time later.

So no mentioning of automatically updating the major version here as well.

Answer 2

The auto update is only for minor releases 4.1 4.2

http://www.infoworld.com/t/browsers/mozilla-bring-auto-updating-firefox-174

"We'll only be using the major update dialog box for changes like 4 to 4.5 or 5."