Firefox 38 released

[Touche]

> Mac OS X: Implemented a subset of the Media Source Extensions (MSE) API to allow native HTML5 playback on YouTube HTML5

> Implemented Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) API to support encrypted HTML5 video/audio playback (Windows Vista or later only) HTML5

> Automatically download Adobe Primetime Content Decryption Module (CDM) for DRM playback through EME (Windows Vista or later only)

:( Notice which OSes are left off the list. I don't blame Mozilla as they were just following inevitability but it's a sad day for the web as there's now a lot of content that, by design of W3C, only works on certain OSes.

Of course the EME champions promised us that this wouldn't happen and they are apparently silent for the moment.

[javaun]

Hey Touche, I work on Firefox at Mozilla. We launched EME on Win32 (Vista+) first because that is by far the biggest share of Fx users. We will keep rolling out new platforms, the work will be long and hard. Streaming providers want to move off of Silverlight and Flash but will still support them for the foreseeable future, so content is still available.

[TazeTSchnitzel]

> Mac OS X: Implemented a subset of the Media Source Extensions (MSE) API to allow native HTML5 playback on YouTube HTML5

Media Source Extensions, while compatible with Encrypted Media Extensions, the DRM system, are not DRM. They let JavaScript manipulate the byte streams of the video data before it goes to the video codec, so you can handle streaming and such from JS.

[acdha]

What video could you watch before that you cannot watch now? I also wish we lived in a world which didn't need EME but it's not like the status quo was video which played for everyone. It just meant that everyone had to download monthly updates to avoid security problems with the massive plugin they used to play video and Linux, etc. users were largely still screwed.

[venomsnake]

Well ... I have found that thepiratebay works flawlessly to deliver videos on any platform. It is sad that we are moving backwards. Right now I WANT to give netflix money for Daredevil ... and there is no legal way for me to do so ...

[mwfunk]

I'm not sure how this is any different from following the ongoing development of any other feature that requires platform-specific code to be written (WebGL, etc.). You will periodically see updates that only pertain to one platform or another, especially during bringup. No conspiracy there.

[portaljacker]

Does EME being implemented finally mean that I can uninstall Silverlight for watching Netflix in Firefox in the near future?

[nominated1]

Can someone explain why Mozilla is not signing gmpopenh264.dll and now eme-adobe.dll? These are executed from AppData (a folder with read/write permissions). Executing dll's from AppData is generally a bad idea but if I'm going to allow it I at least want a Publisher rule attached. Google signs their CDM (WideVine) dll delivered with Chrome that executes from AppData, why isn't Mozilla?

[hsivonen]

Firefox checks SHA-512 hashes at download time. If you have local malware that changes the GMP DLLs thereafter, the malware might as well change Firefox itself.

[yarrel]

Firefox is now a malware installer?

Awesome!

[kasabali]

> autocomplete=off is no longer supported for username/password fields

Super cool. Don't tell me what not to auto complete!

[whatsgood22]

>Improved page load times via speculative connection warmup

turning into chrome!

[xixixao]

So I got momentarily excited that there are new "tab preferences" (like having new tab open next to the current one), but unfortunately it's just a UI revamp of the settings pane, which since I'm on OS X I cannot care for much (the UI is a bit too flat and generally not as familiar as the native box, although who cares...)

[hobarrera]

I fail to see why Mozilla chose this direction. Firefox now looks more alien on all platforms with no real functional benefit.

[TazeTSchnitzel]

> Ruby annotation support

Finally! After only 24 years, East Asian languages get some attention.

Perhaps next Western browser makers might consider vertical text support.

sigh

[_lce0]

Honest question to Firefox dev's:

I want to keep using firefox, but not the DRM thingy. I'd rather not see any video on the web, to be forced to use DRM technology.

Do you plan to support a DRM-free version?

[cpeterso]

To disable EME, go to the Firefox Preferences menu and uncheck the "Play DRM content" checkbox. That will disable EME and delete the Adobe CDM binary if it has been installed. This preference doesn't disable DRM in Flash and Silverlight, however.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-drm

[bzbarsky]

Yes, we do. https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-r... has links to the following:

1) Instructions for disabling the DRM bit without uninstalling it.

2) Instructions for uninstalling the DRM bit (and having Firefox never install it again).

3) A link to a version of Firefox 38 that doesn't have the DRM bits.

It's worth reading the whole blog post, but the tl;dr is https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-drm and http://download.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/38.0/wi... (with the latter sadly not as user-friendly as it might be).

[serve_yay]

Interesting, I had not heard of ruby before! (more info here, as linked in TFA https://hacks.mozilla.org/2015/03/ruby-support-in-firefox-de... )

[wodenokoto]

I was really surprised to see this wasn't implemented much earlier. Chrome apparently had support for XHTML 1.1 Ruby since 2010!

I am also surprised to see how verbose actual ruby markup is.

Better examples of mark-up on wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_character#HTML_markup

[malka]

At first, I thought they added support for client side scripting in Ruby.

[y0ghur7_xxx]

What happened to opportunistic encryption? I loved that feature but it was disabled because of a bug. I hoped it would be enabled again in the next major release, but no mention of it. Can someone from Mozilla tell me more?

[lmandel]

Opportunistic encryption is being tested again in Firefox 39, which is scheduled to release on June 30, 2015.

[etimberg]

The broadcast channel support looks promising. Does anyone know if Chrome plans to support it in the future?

[McGlockenshire]

CanIUse pointed at a proposal for Chrome support which eventually points at this bug:

http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=161070

There are some work-in-progress patches posted there.

[0x0]

Could this be abused on iframed ad network domains / facebook like buttons / tweet buttons to track real time browser state and acitivity across all active tabs?

[justinph]

srcset! Finally, responsive images are gaining ground.

[dubcanada]

Anyone have any insight on why they removed autocomplete from username & password fields?

[Lost1337]

Uninstalled. I have enough of you guys copying Chrome and turning Firefox into a DRM and social media browser. Get lost!

At least the Seamonkey guys know that advanced users also have the right to have their Options inside of the browser's code, something what you Mozilla guys are unable to understand these days!

What is good for Chrome is not equal as good for Mozilla Firefox!

[dd9990]

The Readinglist feature seems to have disappeared from the Desktop build. I really liked using it in Nightly and on Android.

I briefly looked at Bugzilla and can't figure out its future. Is it really being replaced with a tie-in to a closed source US based startup company, Pocket? Can any devs comment?

[soganess]

This worked, so I imagine its being silently developed

http://www.ghacks.net/2015/02/07/mozilla-starts-to-push-read...

[acquacow]

Anyone else having issues with the bookmarks toolbar in 38? Mine draws blank when you open a window. I have to hide/show it before it draws correctly.

This occurs each time a window is opened.

[acquacow]

My menu button on the right of the address/search bar doesn't work anymore either. (OSX 10.10.2)

Gonna uninstall/reinstall

[quadrangle]

Looks like (haven't tested yet), this will finally support meet.jit.si for true free/open group video chat!

[AdmiralAsshat]

>CRITICAL Vulnerability can be used to run attacker code and install software, requiring no user interaction beyond normal browsing.

Uh, glad they fixed this one, but it sounds pretty bad. I'd kinda like to see the actual CVE/bug report.

[joshmoz]

You're looking at the key which defines what CRITICAL means. Look further down the page for info about actual vulns. I believe they're running a bit late posting the vulns for 38 today.