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Version:  3.0.4

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Difference between this and "nightly builds"?

Feedback Type:  Commentary

Contributed by: Splunge Thursday, May 12 2005 @ 07:09 AM PDT

Product Platform: MacOSX

Used Product For: 1-6 months

Recommend Product: YES

Sorry for the possibly stupid question, but what's the difference between using the "release" version of Firefox (1.0.4, for example), and downloading the "nightly build" releases of Firefox? Are they maintained by different developers and/or groups? Are there significant contrasts in features or reliability? Just wondering, and thanks for any help. Tom   

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2 comments |

Difference between this and "nightly builds"? - darkdog

nightly builds, as the name says, are daily updates on the app's development; the updates posted here on VT are released when the developers consider the app is good enough to be widespread, so these are more reliable.

regarding nightly builds: in many cases (i don't know how it works with firefox) unstable or non-working builds are somehow frequent, so if you can't afford having firefox broken you better not replace a stable release with a nightly build..

i hope this made things any clearer.. i'm not sure if i said it right ;)
/jp

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Thursday, May 12 2005 @ 08:11 AM PDT


Difference between this and "nightly builds"? - Makosuke

There's actually a fairly major difference between these 1.0.x releases and nightly builds. The difference is this, assuming FireFox follows standard procedure:

When Firefox was released as a 1.0 version, the code for that version was split off from the code that is under continued development. The development branch of the code is what the nightlies are based on, and it will eventually be released as version 1.1 (or whatever new "big" version).

The 1.0.x releases, however, are based on the "frozen" 1.0 code, with only the minimum of changes necessary to deal with security problems. This means that, as very little has changed since 1.0, they are far less likely to break than any given nightly build, but they do NOT include all the new developments that have happened since then.

So 1.0 is basically identical to 1.0.4 with the exception of a few security fixes (and possibly fixes to any simple bugs deemed major enough to warrant fixing before the next 1.x release), whereas the nightly builds probably have months of additional development work included.

It's the same with Camino--0.8.4 lacks many of the features added in nightly builds released well before it.

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Thursday, May 12 2005 @ 05:23 PM PDT