14 DAY TRIAL // One of the problems, and there were quite a few, of Mozilla switching to a rapid release cycle of only six weeks is that users are bothered with updates a lot more often than they were used to.
No one enjoys maintenance work, even if it only means restarting the browser and then waiting for the update to install. This break in workflow means that a lot of people simply postpone or even ignore updates.
There's no point in releasing a new Firefox every month and a half if no one is going to update to it.
Which is why the need for a more streamlined update process, preferably a completely silent one, was obvious for Mozilla.
There is a big project underway working on several ends to make the update process painless or even completely invisible.
At least some of the improvements are slated for Firefox 10, but they may not all make it.
Background updates
One big step forward is background updates. The idea is to have Firefox download and pre-install an updated version as it's running.
Then, when users restart the browser, the last few steps are completed with only a very slight, hopefully unnoticeable delay.
This feature is being worked on, but there are no guarantees that it will land in Firefox 10. A more detailed description of how it works is here. Windows UAC
There's another step towards streamlining updates, which targets Windows users, the removal of UAC dialogs when updating. For each incremental, minor update, Windows users are asked to give their permission for the Firefox updater to run.
It's annoying and completely unnecessary. And any friction point leads to more users abandoning the update. Progress is underway on this feature, currently the plan is to completely eliminate the need for user approval in Windows XP and above.
The feature is mostly complete, but it still has to pass some tests and needs a bit more work before it can be deployed in Firefox 10, as notes from Mozilla's weekly meetings show.