Hi,
I think, that the version which I can download at
https://portableapps.com/de/apps/internet/firefox_portable
is the 32-Bit-Version. Is it planed to create also a portable version of the new 64-Bit-Firefox which is available since yesterday (Version 42)?
Thank you!
Magistus...
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I agree.
With the new release of Firefox 64 Stable I think we should have a portable app for it!
https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/latest/win64/en-US/
We do not release 64-bit only apps as stable. Only as tests. This is so every one of our apps works everywhere.
I already have a working dual mode 32-bit plus 64-bit version of Firefox Portable that I had prepped for possible release yesterday. I elected not to release it because the 64-bit version currently offers no performance advantage. I tested 32-bit and 64-bit against each other on my i7, 840 Pro SSD, 24GB box. On all benchmarks I tried, the 64-bit version performed the same as or slower than the 32-bit version. So, there's no real reason to release it at present.
More than doubling the size of an app to have it perform worse on 64-bit machines isn't a good idea.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
How many tabs were open during the tests? I have more 1000 tabs open and I am sure, that 64-bit would be much faster if you run the tests with so many tabs. My old Fireforx needs about 2 GB RAM every time. And I do have to run multiple instances of Firefox. If I try to open all tabs in one instance, I can not work on my computer anymore.
I am waiting for the 64-bit version since more than a year. I would pay for an 64-bit portable version! So please, release it!
Magistus...
That's a horrible idea since Firefox can eat your session when it crashes (I've had it happen to me 3 times in the last year). Why would you do that?
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Firefox crashes? No Problem:
https://addons.mozilla.org/de/firefox/addon/session-manager/
A wonderfull Add-On! Restart Firefox after a crash and you can open all tabs which were open at the time Firefox has crashed with one click! OK, two klicks...
I'm still wondering about the operating question which is... why? There's no real logical reason to do that. And Firefox doesn't load up your actual tabs until you interact with them, so most of those 1000 would just be static tabs not consuming any resources.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Well, every human has his own way to work. This is my way to work and it saves a lot of time. And many other people around the world have similar ways to work. Why do I have to explain it? Look at these pictures and find the similarity:
http://www.contentverse.com/office-pains/10-messy-desks-successful-people/
> Why do I have to explain it?
You don't have to explain it because I disapprove of it or think it's silly. You have to explain it and make a case for implementing it because supporting your one specific use case has ongoing implications for me as well as all other PortableApps.com users. Because we do not release separate 32-bit and 64-bit versions of stable apps (you never know what kind of system you may sync to, all our software "just works" everywhere... plus it's absurd to ask a normal end user to understand what kind of systems they use), we'd do a combined app like we do with 7-Zip et al. It will more than double the download time, download bandwidth (some users are metered), install time and install space of Firefox for millions of users. For the vast majority of them, there will be no benefit at all. So, a 44MB download with an 88MB install becomes a 90MB download with a 185MB install for millions of people and will only benefit a small handful of people.
It will also double the amount of time I spend building every single release from here forward. Time I have in short supply and don't get paid for. Then we'd have to float it up the line to Beta, ESR, and Developer editions as well to keep them all consistent as it would be a bit silly to have "stable" with a feature and functionality that we aren't testing out in Developer/Alpha and Beta channels. And do this for every language we support. Plus, I'd also have to update the PortableApps.com Installer to handle two downloads for live installers to handle the Development and Nightly channels if they go dual mode. And support that on an ongoing basis. And update the 2nd profile app to handle this kind of switching behavior.
In the end, this isn't just me building a quick dual mode version in just English for just one release. It's a long chain of time and support commitment plus affecting bandwidth and time throughout the development and use chain. So, it's a matter of figuring out if all of that cost today and in the future is outweighed by the benefit. If the one benefit right now is that you 1000+ tabs can be opened simultaneously in Firefox, it doesn't seem like it's worth it.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
If you really think, that there is no need of an 64 bit Firefox, than please explain this:
"To date Waterfox has over 4,000,000 downloads, spanning 180 countries."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterfox
I am sure, that the most apps which one can download at portableapps.com have less than 4 Million downloads. If I am right, than I ask you: Why do you create these apps and no 64 bit Firefox if there is more need for an 64 bit Firefox than for the other apps?
You ignored every single point I made above, including the one about 64-bit Firefox being the same or slower as 32-bit on every benchmark I ran, and set up a strawman instead. You also ignored the huge extra efforts and demands of me to do additional work for free.
The simple fact is that lots of people believe 64-bit apps are faster than 32-bit apps even when they are not. Even when they are slower. The same way millions of people believe 'memory cleaner' apps speed up their computers when they do nothing at all. In that respect, and in the context of this specific discussion, the 4 million downloads of Waterfox are meaningless.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
You don't believe in placebos, right? If the people feel better with 64 bit and if they can't get it here, they will search it somewhere else. I did the same. I found a way to make my own portable firefox using this german site:
http://mozhelp.clan.me/dateien/index.php?path=Programme/
It took less than 2 minutes and until now it runs good. The authors name (Caschy) I read often in the past. He has a good name. Therefore I have not many worries about this method.
Again: I don't say, that 64 is faster than 32. But in my case (many tabs) it should have advantages.
Caschy has been caught doing unlicensed modifications of Firefox with closed source additions. FirefoxLoader.exe is inferior to our launcher though it is based on our work.
You're still completely ignoring all the points of why it would be a bad idea for us to release it. The rather huge impact to us and to the vast majority of users who will have a big impact to download time, download bandwidth, install time, and install size. All for naught for most of them as it will run the same or slower.
Again, your specific use case is helped by 64-bit. The vast majority of users will be negatively impacted. Having 1000 tabs open is a 0.00000001% use case scenario. Helping you and negatively impacting millions of others while committing myself to hundreds of hours of extra development work seems like a bad tradeoff. I'm unsure why you keep ignoring all of those points.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Well, I can not check if this Loader is based on your work. Until now I see nothing what is inferior. Maybe as a normal user I am not able to see this. All I can say is, that is works! And if I have no other choice, than I have to use it.
No I am not ignoring what you say. Please see it from my view: 64 bit Firefox would help me a lot and therefore I try everything to get it! As I said yesterday: I would pay for it!
You can just as easily extract the files from the Firefox 64-bit installer and dump them into the FirefoxPortable\App\Firefox directory yourself. The Firefox Portable Nightly x64 does this without issue. The only thing it may have some issues with is restarts as it may not properly recognize Firefox is still running.
I may build in the ability for the app to handle x64 as an add-on or something in the near future.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Wow, that's a very special use case. I really do believe, that the 64-bit version may be a solution for such a heavy use of tabs. But I doubt, that there are many users, that come near such a huge number. I always thought, that I was too lazy to tidy up my tabs. Since I use tabbed browsing (firefox 0.8), I am prone to cluttering my tab bar, but I seldomly have more than 20-30 tabs open.
You could test the 64-bit development builds to see if they are a solution for your workload. Remember that they are experimental and not stable and are not for production use.
I have currently 1405 tabs open. I use TreeStyleTab and it works great.
And it's very useful for me and for Magistus.
Well, I know what portableapps dev thinking.
It a same as what Firefox used to think too.
FF want to kill 64 bit project.
Then Google Chrome make 64 bit.
And now why Firefox do that too?
Market.
Well, I dont really expect 64-bit will be faster, no. Even if true that 64 bit faster, The difference will not be felt-able.
Same as opposite. If 64 bit is slower. The difference will not be felt-able.
RAM double size? Ah RAM is so cheap. I wouldnt care about that.
FF lag? I care about that.
Here some detail, about FF on 64 bit
50% of Fx users on Windows run 64 bit OS. We've reached a threshold where the effort makes sense.
Firefox has been doing 64 bit builds for Windows for years. We once even had a 64 bit distro.
Offer our users a better experience with improvements in stability, performance, and security.
Remain competitive with the rest of the browser landscape.
Its good at all, only at memory usage which cheap, then some people will upgrade thier RAM.
Just add note in Portable FF 64 version.
Beware about high memory.
>>50% of Fx users on Windows run 64 bit OS.<<
this is exactly the problem. If you state, 100% of all users have 64 bis OS, then it will make sense to have 64 bit FF.
But this site is about ***PORTABLE*** Apps. That means the Programm must run on any computer I am likely to meet currently. This means 50% of them are likely to be 32bit. If 10% are likely to be 32bit, the portable version is still supposed to run on it. If not, it is simply not portable any more and will not belong here.
Otto Sykora
Basel, Switzerland
Well, as dev said "I already have a working dual mode 32-bit plus 64-bit version of Firefox Portable"
That wont be a problem
I think you have to think about who uses the portable versions.
I don't use them to work on any computer. I would never use my stick with all my apps and data on computers I don't own.
I use them only on MY computers and so I don't have to reinstall every app when I reinstall the OS.
And everybody who uses a portable version knows already more about a computer then 90% of all users.
I just extracted the 64 firefox setup, then i delete all contents from "FirefoxPortable\App\Firefox" and copy all the files from extracted core dir to it. I still have no issues with that. I have two profiles and when i quit from profile 1, using x32 i must wait more than 30s to launch the other profile, now it´s almost at the same time. Big difference for me.
I've done that, too. You get the same result by doing a custom install to your target folder (which is, arguably, simpler for the average user).
If you have to wait so long for it to terminate, then you probably had a corrupted file somewhere in your profile. That's not something inherent to it being 32-bit.
Another reason we should have Firefox 64 Bit.
http://www.techtimes.com/articles/116893/20151216/mozilla-firefox-43-for...
I think you're misreading it. It fixes some nasty vulnerabilities that were in the 64-bit build of Firefox 42. The 32-bit build of Firefox 42 was immune to them. There are no security fixes in the 64-bit build that are not in the 32-bit build. Generally, the 64-bit build will be a tad slower, a tad more unstable, use a decent amount more memory, and be more likely to have security issues in the first few general/stable releases.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!