February 2004 Entries

I've updated my build instructions for build Mozilla Firefox/Thunderbird and Sunbird. It's now even easier to get your own Mozilla.

So read Build Mozilla Thunderbird and/or Mozilla Firefox and/or Mozilla Sunbird in 14 easy steps!

Christian Biesinger writes:
I've written a document about the structure of the Mozilla source tree, i.e. describing the purpose of the directories. It's currently located at http://stud4.tuwien.ac.at/~e0225227/tree_structure.txt but I would like to check this into the Mozilla source tree (in mozilla/).

The current view of Blogupdates isn't very good. At least it could be improved. So I tried to make it better.

Check out the beta version of Blogupdates.

These are the improvements:
- Hide stuff that's older than 1 month
- Dont use dynamic divs to show entries
- Show entires inline
- Keep all the cool features, like autoshow new entries since you last visited
- Support of blog brand image. For this to work you need the <image> stuff in your RSS feed. Check my Mozilla RSS v2.0 feed for example.

You like it or hate it? Please provide some feedback so I know what to change and what to keep.

Ben Goodger, main developer of Mozilla Firefox, writes:
Firefox 1.0 likely to be based off the 1.7 branch
Mozilla Firefox version 0.9 and 1.0 will most likely be based upon the 1.7 trunk to prevent and oustanding bugs or glitched. This is because we don't want to take our chances with 1.8a and wait for the dust to settle at ship time in mid year to see if 1.8 is any good.
Read the posting!

Scott MacGregor has just checked in a first attempt at a Thunderbird installer. It's not being built yet, but it will be coming. Stay tuned. It's Windows only. In the mean time you might use 4getmoz, which can download nightly builds of Mozilla Thunderbird.

Omar Shahine, who pretty much designed all the IMAP support in Entourage, talks about IMAP, Thunderbird, and mail clients.

Omar Shahine's main features for an IMAP client are:
- Support for IDLE. This is about to come to Mozilla.
- Store Sent mail & Drafts in the Server Sent Items & Drafts folder
- Support for Format-Flowed. This is already supported in Mozilla.

Read the blog entry. It's very interesting.

Robert O'Callahan writes in bug 230697:
I have been developing a new regression test framework, primarily for layout, but since it's end-to-end it also tests HTTP, Gfx/Widget, parser, content, views, etc. It's inspired by Hixie's test engine for Opera. It's fairly straightforward and requires only very minor changes to the Mozilla codebase. Basically we set up a special local Web server that feeds Mozilla a XUL app to drive the tests and a set of testcases. The XUL app loads each testcase and then signals the server (by requesting a magic URL) that the testcase is loaded. The server then takes a screenshot of the Mozilla window and replies to the URL request, causing Mozilla to move to the next testcase. The result is a set of PNGs, one per testcase. Regression testing consists of building a baseline set of PNGs and then rerunning the tests with a modified Mozilla, and comparing the PNGs.

That just damn cool! Read much more about in bug 230697. There's even a demo showing what it looks like when you do a diff on two images.

Launchy version 1.8.0 has been released. Perhaps it should be called 2.0.0 since it's almost a complete rewrite.

What's new:
- Now also works in Mozilla Thunderbird
- Big rewrite. Smaller, faster and more flexible
- Fixed missing parameters when sending mail using Mozilla Thunderbird
- iTunes support added
- Lotus Notes support added

Launchy is an Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird extension (Windows only) and will enable you to open links and mailto's with external applications like Internet Explorer, Opera, Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox, Netscape, Outlook, BSPlayer, Windows Media Player and others. Launchy will auto detect all applications. For at full list of supported applications please read the Launchy page.

World66.com lets you create a world map showing the countries you have visited. Here is my world map:

Visited 34 countries (15%). So I still have some traveling to do.

I've updated my Gecko Browser Statistics for gemal.dk to include December and January.

And it's interesting. In January 2004 30% of all hits was made by Gecko based browsers. Compared to December 2003 where 25% of all hits were made by Gecko based browsers. A very nice 5% increase.

If you look on the numbers for January 2004 by Release Version you'll see that 42% of all Gecko hits was made with version 1.5. That's around 220.000 hits. Please notice that Mozilla Firebird 0.7 also had Release Version 1.5. If you look by Gecko by Vendor / Version you'll see that Firebird/0.7 stands for 25% while Mozilla/1.5 stands for 15%. My site is still a Windows site, since 76% of all visitors are running Windows.

If you like numbers Gecko Browser Statistics is the page for you.

I just released version 2.1.0 of 4getmoz which is a Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Thunderbird download script for 4NT users. The 4getmoz script provides all 4NT users with an easy and fast way to download and install the nightly build of both Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox and Mozilla Thunderbird.

What's new:
- added Mozilla Thunderbird support
- big rewrite
- now installs in full product name directory fx C:\Program Files\mozilla.org\nightly\Mozilla Firefox
- cygwin build support
- defaults to tinderbox builds

More information about 4getmoz

A couple of people have asked me after my Backup your IMAP mail article, on how to restore the IMAP mail.

Since Mozilla stores the IMAP mail, and all other mail for the matter, in a plain text file, you can just copy the mail to the IMAP server. This might require admin rights on the IMAP server. I'm not sure if it can be done for all IMAP servers.

An easier way is to use Mozilla Thunderbird. Start it with the same profile as you do IMAP backup with. Now create an identical new IMAP account but dont choose any offline properties. Now you can copy from the backup mail account to the new one. If you lost some folders on the IMAP server, first recreate the folder. Then mark all the mails in the backup account and say Copy to and select your imap account. This way all of the mails from your backup account will be copied over to the IMAP server.

Different shell icons to identify each associated file type has just been checked in. Very nice. For more information turn to bug 99380 and Jez's Mozilla Icon Compendium.

Having all your mail on an IMAP server is great. This way you can always access it. No matter if you're at home or at work. But what about backup? If the IMAP crashes, you're lost! I have all my mail on an IMAP server, so I decided it was time to take a backup. This is my solution. I'm using Mozilla Thunderbird.

Before launching Mozilla Thunderbird make sure you have the Offline Extension installed. This normally done when you install Thunderbitrd.

First create a new profile in Mozilla Thunderbird. This can be done by running the Mozilla Thunderbird Profile Manager. From the command line run thunderbird.exe -ProfileManager. I called the profile IMAP Backup.

Now create your IMAP account. After this go into the Options via Tools -> Options.... Go to the Extensions tab and hit Install new Extionsion. Select the offline.xpi file you just downloaded. After the install restart Mozilla Thunderbird.

Now go into Account Settings via Tools -> Account Settings and select Offline & Disk Space. Check both checkboxes and press the Select folders for offline use.... Here you select all the folders you wish to backup. I selected all folders except the Junk folder where Mozilla put all the mails that's detected by Mozilla's spam filter. Now press Ok and Ok again to return to the main mail screen.

Now press the blue Offline icon the the lower right corner of Mozilla Thunderbird. Press the Download button and all of your mails will now download. This may take a while. When it's done you can exit Mozilla Thunderbird.

Your mail is now located in your profile directory. Here's how to find it. It's inside the IMAPMail directory.

If you like to zip up all of the mail files you have to zip those files that doesn't have an extension. The .msf files are just summary files and can safely be deleted.

And you're all done. Backup before you need to back up.

Update: Be sure to read Restoring your IMAP mail

Change your splashscreen for Mozilla

More splash

Just seen a checkin by Ben Goodger, who is the main developer on Mozilla Firefox. The checkin had the following comment extension manager stub. So the Extension Manager which is scheduled for Mozilla Firefox 0.9 is slowing coming along.

Maintaining extensions has always been a pain. Upgrading extensions, checking for updates, etc was up to the developers of the extensions. Now it's gonna be build into Mozilla Firefox. Great news.

Check the source for the extension manager

Darin Fisher writes:
The Mozilla string code will be undergoing extensive revision following the release of Mozilla 1.7 alpha. The changes will be mostly transparent, having very little affect on the string API. This change will be made first thing during the 1.7 beta cycle.

The work can being tracked here.

For the full message please read the netscape.public.mozilla.seamonkey newsgroup.

The Mozilla Foundation and European Mozilla contributors today announced the launch of the www.mozilla-europe.org web site and the Mozilla Europe non-profit organization to promote, develop and help deploy Mozilla products in Europe. These products include the award-winning Mozilla 1.6 web browser.

The www.mozilla-europe.org web site is launched simultaneously in four languages (English, French, German and Spanish), underlining the added value that Mozilla Europe brings to the Mozilla project by leveraging Europe's Mozilla volunteers and their expertise in localization. Other translations will follow soon, starting with Dutch, Italian and Slovak.

Press release

This is great great news! Perhaps there will be a Danish version of the site soon?

This page will describe how you can use some of Gnome's gtk2 icons with OpenOffice.org 1.1 instead of the default Icons. Currently, OpenOffice.org has a few limitations in its themeing capabilities, which should be addressed in it's next release.
http://www.pcc-services.com/ooo-theme.html

If you cant wait for OpenOffice 2.0 you can get one of the developer builds. The most current developer release is 680 m24. See the release notes. You can also get a list of all the developers builds.

Remember that these builds are for developers. There are no guarantees. Snapshots will be released every two weeks.

This release will install as OpenOffice.org 680, and comes with ugly hacked splash screen to make clear, that this is an iterims build between 1.1 and 2.0.

- Download OpenOffice 680_m24
- OpenOffice.org for Developers
- OpenOffice.org 2.0 timetable
- OpenOffice.org 2.0 Product Concept

Jeg har lige gennemgået en lille knæoperation. For omkring 1½ år siden rev jeg mit forreste korsbånd over i en fodboldkamp. Det blev så fjernet ved en efterfølgende operation. Jeg gik til genoptræning og det gik faktisk ganske glimrende, hvis man lige ser bort fra et par gange hvor mit knæ hoppede ud af led.

For at undgå disse "ud af led" sitiuationer, besluttede jeg mig derfor for at få et nyt kunstigt korsbånd. Og det er så det jeg har fået forleden dag. Operationen tager omkring 1½ time. Jeg valgte at blive spinalbedøvet (dvs. rygmarvsbedøvet). Efter sådan en bedøvelse, begynder ens ben langsomt at sove og man kan efter ca 20 min overhovedet ikke mærke det. Man kan således følge med i operationen, via en lille TV monitor. Det føles lidt underligt, da man jo kan mærke at der bliver gået godt til ens ben, heldigvis uden nogen smerte. Og smerter ville der nok være, da der skal bores et par skruer op i ens knæ som skal holde det kunstige korsbånd.

Man er på hospitalet, i mit tilfælde Bispebjerg Hospital, omkring en dags tid alt i alt hvorefter man bliver udskrevet og kommer hjem med et par krykker og en don-joy. Derefter følger 3 måneder med genoptræning hos en fysioterapeut. Omkring 1 år efter operationen skulle knæet være tilbage på fuld styrke.

Læs mere om om det spændende emne Korsbåndslæsioner

If you're interested in why the blogging world has to say about the Mozilla Firefox version 0.8 release head over to Asa's blog.

In his firebird gets blogged entry, there's loads of Firefox feedback from blogland.

Here's just a few of the quotes:
"For now I think I'm done with Internet Explorer", "Firefox is better than Internet Explorer. Don't argue, you know it's true", "Fastest browser I've ever used", "I can't say it enough times. Dump IE and use Firefox."

As earlier reported, Mozilla developers are updating the techniques for identifying spam. This will make the spam filter even better.

Technical this involves improving the tokenizer plus a new probability algorithm. More information in bug 230093.

Now Scott MacGregor has made an test build available (win32 only) with the new spam filter. It's recommended that you re-train with a clean training.dat before judging the effectivness of the new stuff.

Download the Mozilla Thunderbird test build

Remember: This is a test build! Read more about how to change the probability threshhold for determining if a message is junk or not.

Update: Read more about this release

Just composed a long mail and wanted to be sure that Mozilla didn't crash when doing so (I'm running nightly builds, so Mozilla sometimes crashes), so I first pressed File -> Save. Then I realized that I needed some addresses from a different profile so I closed the mail. Mozilla correctly asked me if it should save the mail as a draft. Yes please. I exited Mozilla and start the different profile and got the information I needed, exited and started my own profile again. I then looked at my IMAP draft folder. EMPTY! Looked in all the draft folders for all my accounts. EMPTY. Did a text search in the profile directory and the %TEMP directory and came up with nothing!

Now my questions are:
- Where is my Draft?
- What the #%&%# does the File -> Save do?
- How do you share an addressbook across two profiles?

Perhaps it's bug 98576 IMAP: 'Save as Draft' doesn't save the message. (if URI contains a space) that I experienced. Why this isn't a blocker I dont know!

Some of the Mozilla stuff that I found interesting during this weekend. Hope you enjoy:
- Cookies Preferences in Mozilla
- Introducing the Mozilla Visual Identity Team
- Mozilla Firefox 1.0 Roadmap
- What to expect from Mozilla Firefox 1.0
- Flash XPI for Linux Users
- Using Lotus Notes to develop XUL Applications
- Two for the Road: Oracle and Mozilla

Launchy version 1.7.0 has been released.

What's new:
- Mozilla Firefox support added
- MyIE2 support added
- Eudora support added
- Fix problem where Outlook Express wouldn't be detected
- Fixed strict JavaScript warnings

Launchy is an Mozilla extension (Windows only) and will enable you to open links and mailto's with external applications like Internet Explorer, Opera, Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox, Netscape, Outlook, BSPlayer, Windows Media Player and others. Launchy will auto detect all applications. For at full list of supported applications please read the Launchy page.

MT::Plugins::Acronym 0.7 has been released. Acronym is a plugin for Movable Type that adds acronym tags to known acronyms.

Read more and Download at:
http://gemal.dk/mt/

Fixed in version 0.7:
- More HTML tags ignored
- Better detection of HTML tags to ignore
- Acronyms like HTML! are also supported now
- Strict warning fixed
- More acronyms added to acronym.db. Total is now 170

Jacob Riis kommer med en interresant observering:
Der er stor aktivitet i den danske browser nyhedsgruppe. I den seneste måned er der så godt som hver dag tråde i gang med Mozilla. Der er virkeligt sket en stigning i antallet af Mozilla relaterede tråde.

Det er jo super dejligt at se! Måske Danmark kan blive et af de lande hvor Mozilla kommer op på en god markedsandel. Hvem ved?

Check nyhedsgruppen dk.edb.internet.software.browser. Hvis du er TDC kunde har du adgang til nyhedsgruppen via news.tele.dk serveren. Læs mere om opsætning af nyhedsgrupper.

Salgargumenterne jeg bruger når jeg skal foreslå Mozilla Mail eller Mozilla Thunderbird er først og fremmest sikkerheden. Hvis du vil undgå virus, spyware, etc og ikke gider opgradere din Windows en gang om ugen så er Mozilla Mail noget til dig. Desuden det fantastiske anti spam filter. Filteret lærer undervejs og er utroligt effektivt. Tager 99.9% af de spam mails der slipper igennem mit server side spam filter. Hverudover er searchbaren super. Hvordan levede jeg uden den?

Mht. til browseren, enten Mozilla eller Mozilla Firefox, er blokkeringen af popup vinduer altid et godt salgsargument. Herudover et google søgning meget nem at komme til. Find as you Type søgning sparer dig for mange CTRL+F tryk. Den måde bookmarks virker på er også langt bedre end i IE. IE's dårligst funktion, udover sikkerheden, er efter min mening Favoritter.

Jeg har allerede installeret Mozilla på min fars PCs og svingersmors PCer. Derved undgår jeg at de får virus og at jeg skal bruge et par timer på at fjerne virus og opgradere Windows.

Så hvis du ikke allerede bruger Mozilla, så er det bare at komme igang!

This is pure fun and kind of scary at the same time:
Internet Explorer is now just about the most secure browser available, says Microsoft - because so many security holes have been filled. Last week's Internet Explorer patch has made the browser at least as secure, if not more secure, than any other browser, according to Microsoft UK's chief security officer.

Read the article and remember to tell them your opinion.
By the way currently there's 24 unpatched Internet Explorer bugs.

Frank Hecker writes in the netscape.public.mozilla.crypto newsgroup:
As noted in prior discussions, the Mozilla Foundation and mozilla.org staff are considering adopting a formal policy regarding selection of new CA certificates for inclusion in the default certificate database distributed with Mozilla, Firefox, Thunderbird, etc. They have asked me to take the lead on attempting to create such a policy. As with prior policies I've been involved with (e.g., the policy for handling reports of Mozilla security vulnerabilities) my preferred approach is to try and develop this policy through a process of discussions in public forums and with parties affected by the policy (e.g., Mozilla developers and new CAs).

Check out the two Proposals:
- Mozilla Certificate Policy
- Mozilla Certificate FAQ

Mozilla Thunderbird 0.5 introduces a new feature, supporting multiple identities for an account. This is a powerful feature for users who have multiple email addresses that end up in the same mail account.

This way you dont have to create those dummy newsgroup or mail accounts just to get another identity.

Currently there's no UI for this feature so you have to manually edit the prefs.js file, which is located in your profile directory. Here's how to find your profile directory.

Read much more about Multiple Identity Support in Mozilla Thunderbird 0.5

I'm not sure if this is also supported in Mozilla Application Suite. Does anybody know?

The anti spam filter in Mozilla is amazing. But it seems that it's about to become even better. Mozilla developers will try to Update Junk mail filtering to use latest Bayesian techniques from spambayes.sf.net

The current anti spam filter is based upon the Bayesian Junk filtering. It uses the original Paul Graham technique for classifying messages. Bayesian classification as described in Paul Graham's A Plan for Spam. Using Bayesian filtering requires that you first train the mailer by showing it a bunch of mail that is junk, and a bunch of mail that is not. Then, you let it autoclassify new mail for you, and you continue to correct it as it makes mistakes.

PalmSource today introduced Palm OS Cobalt, previously know as Palm OS 6. Cobalt is a new enhanced version of the operating system that is designed to enable the creation of new categories of devices for the communications, enterprise, education and entertainment markets. PalmSource also announced Palm OS Garnet, an enhanced version of the popular Palm OS 5, designed to accelerate the development of Palm Powered handhelds and smartphones.
Read the story

Here's some interestings newsbits about the big bad Microsoft:

Microsoft's (Bumpy) Road to Longhorn
Microsoft's product roadmap for Longhorn has some potholes to navigate tn the coming two years. A new report states that Microsoft is facing a "product gap" over the next two years without a major new release regarding its flagship Windows operating system and Office productivity suite.

Microsoft not ready to battle with Google
Microsoft's latest assault on the Web search business is just getting under way, but already a familiar elephant may be ambling toward the doorway

MyDoom.C Slams Into Microsoft.com
A stripped-down version of the MyDoom worm, a k a Doomjuice, on Monday spread through network backdoor and attacked Microsoft's Web site.

- Microsoft Security Chats
- Open Source Perspective
- Microsoft offers cut-rate Windows

Finally it's possible. You can now promote Mozilla Firefox using some official buttons and logos. Get Mozilla Firefox - The Browser, Reloaded!

See them all af the official Mozilla Firefox ads page

Fx:

When you're on vacation there's suddenly time to read. And read I did!

I've started with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. Everybody has been telling me that I gotta read Harry Potter. It should be soo amazing and once you started you just could put down the book.

That was not my expirience. The book was ok, but for smaller kids. Not for grownups. The story is weak and it's way to easy to read. The persons in the book lacks detailed description. Basiclly I just dont get the hype about this book.

Then I read The Runaway Jury. A classic John Grisham book. It's a little confusing since it's about an entire jury, so it's jumping between the different people. Whenever I finish books like this I'm always a bit disapointed. I'm missing something. They just dont move me and I dont get as much into the books as with other books. The funny part of this book is that it's about the tocacco industry and the movie that's based on the book is about the weapon industry. Not really sure why they changed the theme so radical? But I continued with yet another John Grisham book. This time The Testament which was really good. It's a bit different than the normal John Grisham book. I normally never reads John Grisham but these two books was the only thing around when I finished Harry Potter. The by far best book I read was the last one. Burning Shore by Wilbur Smith. A really good book about two daring men, an extraordinary woman and the continent of Africa.

Mozilla Firefox 0.8 Released!
The latest release of Mozilla's next generation browser preview is now available! Get it!

Mozilla's next generation browser has changed names (again). Mozilla Firebird becomes Mozilla Firefox. For more information, read the Press Release

Clear HTTP Auth
This extension simply allows a user to clear any HTTP authentication data currently stored by the browser.

Session Saver
Remembers loaded tabs and their history items when Firebird is manually closed, then restores the tabs and history items when next started.

What CA certificates to include in Mozilla?
There's a big discussion going on at bug 215243 and in the netscape.public.mozilla.crypto newsgroup about which root CA certificates to include into the Mozilla browser and what criterias should be used. Really interesting since I've already filed a bug about including TDC OCES CA into Mozilla.

Here's a couple of interesting Microsoft Windows optimizations tips:
- 23 Ways To Speed WinXP Without Defrag
- Windows XP Service Configurations
- Microsoft Building Integration, Management into Longhorn Server
- NetFactorys Top Tweaks for Windows XP

My domain has been seriously hit by the W32/Mydoom@MM worm. I was not infected but just hit by massive amout of mails.

I've got more than 550.000 mails in 7 days! In the end my machine died. Now I changed the MX record to a larger setup and it should not happen again.

There's nothing really you can do about these sort of attacks. They function much like a DoS (Denial of Service) attack. The infected machines starts sending large numbers of mails to mailaccounts. Most of these mailaccounts dont exists but the mailserver still has to recieve the mail and reject it. And in the end the machine gets overloaded.

Mozilla Mail really helped me since it could detect 99.9% of the mails that got through my server side anti spam filter and move it to my spam folder. But having more than 100.000 mails in a folder can make your mail client really really slow. Outlook Express gave up and Mozilla was so so slow loading my spam folder with around 100.000 mails in it.

I've been gone for quite some time now and the reason is simple. I've been traveling!

My wife and I has been backpacking the last 1½ month around in Mexico, Guatemala and Belize. And it's been great! Absolutely great!

I'll write more about my traveling when I get some pictures/etc online. So stay tuned.

Things that I already miss:
- Great and cheap food
- The sun
- Travelling

Things that I didn't miss while traveling:
- The danish weather
- Getting up in the morning and going to work
- Reading news. Why read about war, violence, etc when you're on vacation?

So I justed wanted to say that I'm back online and will try to answer most of the massive amount of emails that I got.

BTW: It's my birthday today! I'm old..... 31