What's new in Firefox 1.5 (comprehensive)

This page lists the improvements in Firefox 1.5 over the previous stable release of Firefox, 1.0.7. Last updated November 30, 2005.

This page is based on my changelogs for the individual releases leading up to Firefox 1.5 (a1, a2, b1, b2, rc1, rc2, rc3). It has about the same level of detail. Because it has that much detail, it's a bit long (even though it still only mentions a small percentage of all bugs that were fixed!). I've tried to group related bugs and put the most important items at the top to make it easier to skim this list. I've also tried to omit things that aren't relevant to users upgrading from Firefox 1.0.7, such as bugfixes for features that didn't even exist in Firefox 1.0.7.

New browser features

• 274784 - Make back and forward blazingly fast.
• Rearranged and improved options / preferences.
  • Instant Apply behavior for Options on Linux and Mac. This behavior can be enabled on Windows using about:config (browser.preferences.instantApply).
  • Searchable download actions manager (also used to manage full-page plugins).
  • Searchable cookie manager.
• "Clear Private Data" feature lets you clear your tracks quickly. For example, you can configure it to clear your History, Download History, and Cache whenever you exit Firefox. You can select what kinds of data are cleared when you use the Clear Private Data command, and you can choose whether it runs automatically when you exit Firefox or only when you press Ctrl+Shift+Del.
  • 285440 - As part of the "Clear Private Data" feature, a way to clear HTTP Auth information.
• Deployment
  • 231062 - Provide Firefox MSI package (wrapper for Firefox installer, not a "real" MSI).
  • 291033 - Enable support for profile temp directory on local filesystem. (MozillaZine article, gemal's blog entry.)
• 125998 - When viewing a standalone image, use a thumbnail of the image as the icon for the tab.
• 124561 - Anonymous ftp login failure should prompt for username/password.
• 276588 - Rework toolkit command-line handling. You can now open local files easily from the command-line (e.g. firefox.exe README.txt), and command-line switches should do the same thing whether Firefox is running or not.
• 238099 - CSS at-rule for matching on site/document URL. This makes it possible to include site-specific rules in user style sheets.
• 216466 - Use error pages instead of dialogs for e.g. HTTP networking errors. (Firefox 1.0.7 had this feature available as a hidden pref; the error pages in Firefox 1.5 are less buggy and prettier than the error pages in 1.0.7.)
• 179656 - Allow drag-and-drop reordering of tabs. You can also reorder tabs using the keyboard by focusing the tab bar and then pressing Ctrl+Left, Ctrl+Right, Ctrl+Home, or Ctrl+End.
• Fixed: 296868 - Improved software update service with small binary patches, cross-session incremental downloading of updates, and new update-notification UI.
• 179845 - Support dragging a link onto the New Tab / New Window toolbar button.
• 288053 - Re-enable automatic-ntlm auth for proxies.
• Report Broken Web Site feature in Help menu.
• 313529 - Support importing home pages from (some) other browsers and multiple versions of Firefox Start.
• 235204 - Web Search (Ctrl+K, etc) should show a search dialog when search bar is disabled.
• 309860 - Dragging a URL to the tab strip should respect the Shift key (use Shift to control whether the new tab is selected immediately).
• 303279 - Safe Mode: Use "safe" localstore.
• 304403 - Safe Mode: Better UE.
• 283598 - [Mac] New .dmg artwork with diagrammatic instructions.
• 220590 - [Mac] Delete (backspace) key should go back on Mac, too.
• 304469 - Add -new-tab option to auto-remote.
• 289362 - Replace Dictionary.com with Answers.com for dictionary lookup.
• Improvements to Find Toolbar and Find As You Type
  • 298658 - When Enter key is pressed in FAYT mode, we should close find toolbar.
  • 259454 - Make IME input (e.g., Chinese, Japanese and Korean) work in FAYT mode (when opened with "/" or "'").
  • 250274 - Find Toolbar: Esc should focus link.
  • 296827 - Dragging text into the Find text box should initiate search and enable next/previous buttons.
• Improvements to accessibility
  • [Windows] Support for Window-Eyes 5.5 Beta. Window-Eyes is a screen reader used by many blind and visually impaired Windows users.
  • DHTML Accessibility support.
• 236304 - [Mac] MacIE Profile Migrator.
• 236300 - [Mac] Safari Profile Migrator.
• 274374 - [Mac] OS integration features: Set default browser, set desktop background, and mail integration.

New web developer features

• HTML
  • 253391 - Elements with tabindex="-1" should be focusable even though not in tab order.
  • 188938 - Object should submit (name attribute on <object>).
• CSS
  • 24861 - Quotes nesting (CSS "quotes" property, <Q> elements).
  • 237568 - CSS3 :only-child.
  • 251162 - CSS3 columns (more info from roc's blog).
  • 72747 - CSS3 overflow-x and overflow-y properties.
  • 163174 - CSS3 cursors.
  • 38447 - URI Values on CSS "cursor" Properties. (Web pages can now specify custom cursors.)
  • 24676 - -moz-outline-radius.
  • 6647 - CSS outline property. (-moz-outline still works as an alias.)
  • 3247 - Counters in CSS-generated content.
  • 286303 - Implement CSS3 syntax for cursor urls.
• JavaScript and DOM
  • 306664 - Bump JavaScript version to 1.6, for E4X + Array extra + Array/String generics.
  • DHTML Accessibility support.
  • 290592 - Array extras: forEach, indexOf, filter, map, some, every.
  • 309242 - E4X. (Mostly-on by default; specify e4x=1 or JavaScript 1.6 if you want to include XML comment literals because otherwise they'll be treated as comment hiding hacks.)
  • 73409 - document.open("text/plain").
  • 167145 - Canceling keydown does not affect corresponding keypress/keyup.
  • 249998 - Accessibility APIs for DHTML (?)
  • 230909 - Make the dom.max_script_run_time pref work. (This pref controls the "this script is running slowly" dialog.)
  • Many fixes to make DHTML faster.
  • 155723 - Make innerHTML property work with XHTML (?).
  • 295401 - Allow DHTML accessibility to be used in text/html.
  • 290344 - Implement DHTML accessibility description relations.
  • 295544 - Expose more designMode options to web apps.
• Graphics
  • SVG support. (MozillaZine article, samples.)
  • <canvas> support. (MozillaZine article, sample.)
• HTTP
  • 248827 - Support HTTP/1.1 408 response code.
  • 244964 - Support quotes around the charset parameter value.
• An extension that adds XForms support is under development. Support for several XForms-related CSS classes was added.
• 280792 - Include Optional Support for MIT Kerberos for Windows.

New extension developer features

See also: New features for extension developers in Firefox 1.5.

• 302276 - Flip XPCNativeWrappers default to yes. It is now much easier to write extensions that interact with content without introducing security holes.
• PrefWindowV lets you create Preferences windows for your extensions easily.
• 282103 - Dynamic Overlays (?).
• 253742 - Allow extensions to ship platform-specific XPCOM components (dll/so) based on user OS.
• 295247 - Allow extensions to ship plugin DLLs.
• 296430 - Allow extensions to ship searchplugins.
• 303727 - Supply a supported way to access the nsIEditor of HTML input/textarea.
• 306478 - Extension manager should use xpinstall crypto hashes.
• 300423 - Expose nsIPipe implementation via component factory.
• 298498 - Allow extension XPIs to ship multiple independent extensions.
• 302834 - Components.utils.evalInSandbox should return result, throw exception.
• 292368 - Scriptable Hash Function API.
• 295265 - Reintroduce chrome registry overrides.
• 295109 - Support pr-loading gssapi libraries for negotiateauth.
• 255619 - Ability to restrict entire extensions to compatible operating systems.
• 223097 - Interface for checking a Node against a XML Schema type.
• 285584 - New accessible XBL widget, richlistbox (used by download manager and extension manager).
• 128398 - Hidden referrer column for History. (Examples of extensions this makes possible: How'd I Get Here, advanced history visualizations.)
• 142255 - API for prioritizing HTTP connections. (Examples of extensions this makes possible: prioritize current tab, prioritize downloads manually or automatically.)
• 179006 - API for managing user and UA stylesheets. (Examples of extensions this makes easier: Flashblock, per-site user stylesheet editor. This also makes it possible for user style sheet hacks, such as support for <blinquee> or blocking Google ads, to become simple extensions.)
• 282442 - API for configuring proxies. More info.
• 252067 - Translucent windows (Windows and Linux only).
• 274928 - Make it possible for apps, extensions, and vendors to all add tokens to the User-Agent string (using default preferences) without overwriting each other (general.useragent.extra.*).
• 278534 - Make tooklit chrome registry use plaintext manifests instead of an RDF cache. (Get rid of contents.rdf chrome registration nightmare.) (More info)
• Many changes to Extension Manager
• API for implementing new command-line switches (?).
• XTF (eXtensible Tag Framework) that allows defining and implementing new XML tags in C++ or JavaScript. (Used by the Mozilla XForms extension, for example.)
• Extension update changes
  • 310976 - Treat 1.5.* as 1.5.infinity. (So, for example, you might set an extension's maxVersion to 1.5.0.* to indicate that it is expected to work with all security updates to Firefox 1.5 that don't involve API changes.)
  • 300731 - Change app/extension version scheme going forward.
  • 296566 - Move Extension Update into Extension Manager.

Notable bug fixes

• 100022 - PAC: first page/homepage load fails (b/c automatic proxy configuration is slower than first HTTP request).
• 123315 - Search plugins (engines) should be installed in the user's profile directory.
• 230693 - Missing reload within view source window.
• 224002 - Double clicking tab close button creates new tab.
• 263532 - "Remember logon" dialog box should have "No" as default.
• 298934 - Replace "[Javascript Application]" in content-originating sheets with hostname.
• 294609 - Restore Ctrl+Enter to highlight for the Find Bar.
• 227826 - URL of current tab incorrectly changed when Alt+Enter opens new tab from location bar.
• 245418 - Menus and contextual menus open on wrong screen when using dual screens.
• 245392 - Installer options for shortcuts don't work (update/install adds unwanted icons to desktop/quick launch, creates empty folder in start menu).
• 279497 - Selected profile in profile manager does not always appear focused/highlighted.
• 267422 - Print Preview window is partly overlayed by background and is missing scrollbars.
• 86999 - Hebrew support for Universal (All) Autodetect.
• 223542 - Weird scrolling using autoscroll over iframe / frame.
• 295074 - POST responses remain in the memory cache when using XMLHttpRequest => huge memory leak.
• 62485 - Script type="text/ecmascript" is not recognized.
• 57724 - View Source corrects for parser errors and shows slightly different source than what was sent by the server.
• 269259 - When upgrading an extension, its metadata is not updated from the new install.rdf.
• 69114 - Opening Internet Shortcuts (.url files) doesn't work (using File | Open or file protocol)
• 245163 - Right-click context menu is cut off/disappearing/offscreen when it contains too many items (items added by extensions).
• 253950 - Less confusing UI when default profile is locked on startup.
• 217527 - Left column on Slashdot is sometimes too narrow or too wide for its contents.
• 238493 - Ads on Gamespot flicker into other parts of the page during page load.
• 95227 - Make it possible to set different default font type (serif vs sans serif) for different languages.
• 47350 - Current scroll position not retained, reloading or going back to multipart/x-mixed-replace (e.g. Bugzilla bug lists).
• 56314 - Reverse selection colors when page background is similar to default selection background.
• 274553 - Blocking iframes either via an extension or userchrome.css breaks find toolbar search.
• 62384 - Text Zoom doesn't change dropdown height (without reload).
• 97283 - Mouse wheel scrolling does not work for elements such as div using overflow - auto or scroll.
• 209020 - Meta HTTP-EQUIV="refresh" broken if midas (designMode) was ever used in that browser window.
• 198155 - Midas html editing mode persists after leaving the page that enabled it.
• 273785 - Plugins not scanned/detected on startup (empty plug-ins dialog in downloads, open-with dialog for PDFs).
• 278531 - Generic request prioritization (loadgroup prioritization) (e.g. for each HTTP host, load images with lower priority than pages).
• 271097 - Searchplugin auto update should ask user.
• 265028 - Clearing cache sometimes fails.
• 302164 - Shorten text and add descriptive button labels in "Remember Password" dialog (screenshots: old, new).
• 249883 - Do not open sidebar if panel content to fill it does not exist.
• 222654 - global/scrollbars.css for native scrollbars different on Mac (many Firefox themes break scrollbars on Mac).
• 258285 - Find Toolbar sometimes appears (pops up) when typing/entering arbitrary characters in textareas/form input fields, FAYT (find as you type) activated.
• 236107 - Wrong background for caption in groupbox.
• CSS
  • 76197 - Scrollbars should look disabled when there's nowhere to scroll (not yet fixed on Mac).
  • 151375 - Focus outline should be drawn outside of element.
  • 133165 - Focus outline should include larger descendants of inline elements.
  • 65917 - :active neither hierarchical nor picky about what can be activated.
  • 20022 - :hover state not set until mouse move.
  • 251986 - Keyboard scrolling does not work for elements such as div using overflow - auto or scroll.
  • 21616 - Space after ::first-letter pseudo-element line is larger than between other lines (improvement in first-letter drop-caps appearance?).
  • 78510 - Link should become :visited color if URL is loaded in another window/tab/frame.
  • 138403 - Text-align:left; for submit Button does not work.
  • 1781 - 1px double border invisible.
  • 292295 - Margin collapse fails if parent uses property clear.
• Windows, tabs, and focus
  • 176079 - Popup blocking does not stop Flash from opening windows. (Read more at jst's blog.)
  • 262915 - View-source: pseudo protocol forces opening of new window.
  • 243893 - Opening a new tab in menuless popup window results in invisible tabs.
  • 310825 - window.focus() in a background tab can steal focus from foreground tab.
  • 300453 - Disallowing scripts from raising and lowering windows also prevents them from focusing frames, including designMode frames. Also, sites like Gmail that focus iframes also focus the window even though they're not trying to.
  • 103638 - Targets with same name in different windows open in wrong window with javascript.
  • 313300 - Change default for browser.link.open_newwindow.restriction from 0 to 2. (Make "Force links that open new windows to open in... new tabs", which was available but hidden in Firefox 1.0.7, not apply to window.open with specified width, height, or other features.)
  • 275430 - Change default for "open links from other applications" to be "a new tab in the most recent window" instead of "the most recent tab/window".
• Downloads
  • 239006 - Download manager doesn't account for filesize when presenting combined percentages.
  • 245829 - Download manager progress and title do not update correctly, wrong number of files and percentage after finishing or canceling a download.
  • 249677 - Cancel does not delete temporary file in helper app dialog, if default action is save.
  • 251625 - .part files not removed when canceling or removing downloads.
  • 231048 - Download manager poorly renames existing files by incrementing number suffix.
  • 243324 - Download manager fails to close with files that download very quickly (small files / cached files).
  • 290381 - "Save Link As..." doubles the extension if the link contains an escaped hash/pound (#) sign encoded as %23.
• Accessibility
  • 175893 - Make XUL <tab>'s focusable.
  • 162081 - Wrong letter is underlined as accesskey / mnemonic when widget direction is RTL.
  • Many keyboard accessibility fixes.
  • Many screen-reader accessibility fixes.
• Speed and memory-use improvements
  • 227361 - Don't reflow documents in background tabs until window resizing is complete.
  • 131456 - Memory use does not go down after closing tabs.
  • Many other speed and memory-use improvements.
• Bookmarks
  • 178120 - Chevron box not updated when renamed bookmarks exceed/under-run the Bookmark Toolbar.
  • 255255 - After searching bookmarks, the results are not editable.
  • 269775 - Bookmarks toolbar 'shrinks' when window is resized/restored.
  • 274382 - Loading live bookmarks bypasses cache.
  • 258223 - Bookmark keyword quicksearch need a way to specify character encoding for query URLs.
  • 300412 - A menu option for Bookmark All Tabs (Ctrl+Shift+D on Windows, Cmd+Shift+D on Mac) and bookmark options in the right-click menu for tabs.
  • 271359 - Wrong favicons appear on bookmarks for sites with no icon of their own.
  • 305004 - Create a dated bookmark backup file periodically.
  • 266737 - Bookmarks Toolbar is blank/empty only showing chevron/">>" after being resized while minimized.
• Windows-specific bugs
  • 260437 - [Windows] "Set as Wallpaper" changes wallpaper for all users (should not save in Windows directory).
  • 191919 - [Windows] Opentype fonts with CCF are ignored.
  • 118563 - [Windows] The new print properties dialog does not save papersize.
  • 255947 - [Windows] Missing borders for the progress bar with native classic widget on windows.
  • 283730 - [Windows] "Save As" dialog tries to overwrite link/shortcut (.lnk) file instead of opening the directory/folder. (This was fixed in a way that does not make Firefox users vulnerable to a security hole in Windows.)
  • 76831 - [Windows] Slow to restore from minimized state (default config.trim_on_minimize to false).
  • 241282 - [Windows?] When choosing an alternative location via "Browse...", the Installer "defaults" to ns_temp subfolder.
  • 16940 - [Windows] IME is now disabled for password fields.
  • 255123 - [Windows] Opening URL from another app focuses an existing window before opening a new window.
  • 171349 - [Win98] Firefox icon is Win98's standard icon (taskbar & upper lefthand corner of app).
  • 284716 - [Win2k/WinXP] Create DDBs in nsImageWin::Optimize. (Fixes several performance bugs with large images, such as slow scrolling on exactaudiocopy.de.)
  • 231300 - [Windows] Clearing cache is slow (nsLocalFile::MoveTo is slow to move directories).
• Mac-specific bugs
  • 298430 - [Mac] Drop support for Mac OS X 10.1 (More information on Josh's blog)
  • 171680 - [Mac] Modifier keys have no effect on mouse wheel.
  • 309730 - [Mac] Tweak wheel+modifiers preferences on OS X.
  • 255415 - [Mac] Scroll wheel doesn't work after selecting bookmark from toolbar until you move mouse.
  • 307340 - [Mac] Disable "Full Screen" UI for 1.5.
  • 266769 - [Mac] Parent window isn't movable / draggable when sheet is open.
  • 228804 - [Mac] MathML rendering is worse on Mac OS X after adding Mathematica fonts in 1.3b and later.
  • 102330 - [Mac] Back/Forward menu gets stuck on click-and-hold.
  • 233977 - [Mac] Single-click selects entire address bar rather than activates cursor.
  • 202014 - [Mac] Add header/footer configuration for printing.
  • 303203 - [Mac] Turn on autoscroll on OS X.
  • 257854 - [Mac] OS X disk images should include an installation background. (Note: you won't notice this in nightlies because they don't have Firefox branding enabled.)
  • 283598 - [Mac] Give the Firefox .dmg a nice icon.
  • 302080 - [Mac] Opening disk image should display a EULA.
  • 271496 - [Mac] Both delete and del keys should delete bookmarks and history items.
  • 282940 - [Mac] Switch Mozilla/Firefox to CFRunLoopSource-based plevent handling. (More information on Josh's blog)
  • 274036 - [Mac] Scrollbars should look disabled when there's nowhere to scroll.
  • 298894 - [Mac] Clean up the enter key behavior mess.
  • 275519 - [Mac] Support Command+Option+Arrows for tab switching (like Camino).
  • 222364 - [Mac] Don't use sheet for the about box.
  • 273217 - [Mac] Lots of menu items are enabled that shouldn't be when no windows are open, and many menu items that are correctly enabled do not work.
  • 187508 - [Mac] Follow "full keyboard access" setting in System Preferences for tabbing navigation.
  • 151249 - [Mac] Middle click on link does nothing on Mac OS X (should open link in new tab).
  • 220589 - [Mac] Cmd-Enter and Cmd-Shift-Enter should work like win/lin builds.
  • 239218 - [Mac] Menus are nonfunctional when 'tools' have focus (Downloads / Extensions / Theme Managers, JavaScript Console and Page Info window).
• Linux-specific bugs
  • 287523 - [Linux: GTK] Insensitive (disabled) check/radio buttons can't be distinguished in some GTK themes.
  • 238854 - [Linux: GTK] Changing GNOME2 theme doesn't apply until restarting Mozilla.
  • 261679 - [Linux] Provide anti-aliased PNG icons for Gnome and KDE.
  • 241245 - [Linux] Auto download to 'Desktop' downloads to home directory on Linux.

More information

• Changelogs for other releases
• The Burning Edge (nightly build changelog)