Does a fire-fox eat water-hens ? And does Firefox eat Internet Explorers ? (I know the answer to the last one ;-)

Already the mozillazine forums are down under load, the mozilla ftp performance has been patchy, IRC is crowded and new bugs are being filed in bugzilla faster than ever. The number of people bitching and trolling in various places is ever increasing. If the number of users continues to grow exponentially ( according to Bart's blog - http://www.decrem.com/bart/archives/000032.html ), are mozilla.org and the community resources going to be able to keep up with the growth?

If stuff like mozillazine can't keep up based on donations (the new servers will get overloaded again after not too long, if the user base continues to grow), the foundation will have to do something about user support, won't it?

If the number of users continues to increase, will the number of "involved" users prepared to help out with time or with donations (for mozilla.org and/or mozillazine) increase in line with it? And if not, then what?

Ok, that's the longest question ever. A brief general thought would do as an answer though :)

Hooray!

OK - heres 3 quick and simple questions that shouldn't too long to answer. :-)

Will the new super-plugin format be supported in Firefox 1.0, or not until 1.1 (ie after return to the trunk)

Is it the intention of Mozilla.org to release Tb 1.0 at the same time as Fx 1.0?

When we will see Winstripe in Tb?

And 1 slightly longer question (because I'm annoying like that)

Does the new co-operation between Mozilla, Sun and Macromedia on plugins mean that versions of Firefox will be available at some point with Java (like Opera) / Flash (like IE) already included? I know that many users don't want these, but would be very useful for new converters / fresh installs.

Not really a Question for Asa, but in reaction to michaell's last post.

I think those are legitimate concerns but I've found that with the growing public awareness and user uptake for Firefox in particular. A lot of people provide basic help and advice outside the Mozilla.org domain.

This could be a help.

Most of the people I know that have taken up Firefox (or been persuaded to try it at least) are people that only ever used IE or perhaps in bygone days of yore they hardly remember use ancient versions of Netscape. They don't really visit any of the officially Mozilla related sites much.

When they come across an issue they ask of the people that persuaded them to try the fox in the first place. There's a "browser thread" at my own message board which in effect has turned into a Firefox tip, occasional news, and issues/help thread.

At another board I frequent there's a similar thread where people promote and help in whatever manner they can.

I've seen similar topics on all sorts of boards too.

Whilst the help might not be able to solve all problems etc. Whilst a lot of it isn't as knowledgeable as is found at Mozillazine forums. These kind of places serve pretty well the few peoples that use it.

It may not solve the burden on the official sites, but I think such things could be a growing source of help and ease things a bit.

I'm rambling aren't I? :D I'll quit.

I’m going to basically steal this question from Grev, How is it that one man (Asa) is blessed with so many gmail invites that he could stand on a busy U.S. street corner doling them out.

BTW just think of all the social networking data gmail invites offer... so who do you think would have the most prestigious gmail powers... who is that one person you would loved to receive an invite from.

shouldn't we be using bittorrents, and mirrors (automatically) for the downloads? what about http://www.archive.org/web/freecache.php?

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck
if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

Or, more seriously, when will Gecko get dressed with the latest in CSS fashion? I'm thinking, in particular, of the border-radius property, which only exists in a "proprietary" form right now (-moz-border-radius).

The CSS Level 3 specs are coming along nicely, with a few modules already being Candidate Recommendations, and others being close to.

Besides, Gecko supports a few of them properties already ("opacity", notably, which is a pretty nice one), so why not extend its capabilities? Having a head start in this domain would increase interest as far as Web developers are concerned, at least.

I would like to know what OS most mozillian use ? (based on d/l numbers).

When will we see a campaign like http://www.apple.com/switch/ for mozilla if ever?

How are the Mozilla developpers preparing for the one hacker finding a hole in Firefox 1.0 final in just two days after it's release allowing arbitrary code execution or such?
Is there a way to push an update to the users quickly enough to prevent the press from writing Firefox is just as big a risk as IE is now for the average user?

(and I do think michaells question is quite relevant too, being slashdotted probably scares the public away)

Do Ben and Scott ever sleep?

In (partial) answer to Bram's question, Firefox does have an auto-update system built in.

I'd like to add another question though: If a security hole was found, would an update consist of an entirely new build, or would it be possible to install a small patch in order to fix the problem?

I think that far more users would be likely to install a 100k patch (provided it was done automatically) than download a 4MB file and re-install their browser. Remember a huge number of internet users still use dial up modems to connect.

Dear Asa,

What is your favorite food?

Acording to http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/ there are many intersts and people working on various aspects of mozilla... primarily with firefox, plugins and mozillazine.... Are there any people that work specificaly with the Mozilla Suite?

Also, is it ok if I pop into #mozillazine and huggle you periodicaly?

I think that several of the questions being posed about how the foundation will deal with the increased user base of people who are not typical of current users are good questions to examine. An auto-update, in particular, would be something of note. Getting a Support/Discussions Forum (where "use the search feature" is not the only response) will help too. The Apple Discussion Forums are not a bad guide, although they could use more input from Apple on some problems.

Getting some more companies involved with product support/sponsorship would certainly help out as well. I believe that IBM, for example, and some of the others would find value for money spent in providing servers & etc to the foundation when compared to the costs of traditional print and TV ads. How about Time-Warner/RoadRunner or some such as an ISP/bandwidth sponsor?

Yes, mirrors would take some load off the servers as well.

P.S. I like your ferret or panda or whatever it is a LOT better than the "Firefox". Seeing as how there is someone who already holds the rights to the name Firefox it may be time for a new name/logo contest. How about a "Web Ferret"? Surely there must be something better out there which also is not already taken.

Dear Asa:

Can a complete computer klutz such as myself use Firefox?

Let's hope so. After all the news about IE this past week, it's time to boot that puppy off my computer...

"Seeing as how there is someone who already holds the rights to the name Firefox it may be time for a new name/logo contest."

Are you kidding??? Tell me you are...

Fred,
interesting metaphor for IE
>it's time to boot that puppy off my computer
I've always thought it more akin to Jabba the Hut

Asa,

Thanks for bringing "ask asa" back! :-)

If I'm like many skilled people that enjoy using Mozilla products (Firefox, Thunderbird, mostly), I would like to contribute some of that skill for these products. However, in my busy schedule I may have only 15-20 minutes a day, that I could possibly do anything. Can you recommend any way(s) that those of us with limited time resources but more skill than money can effectively contribute to mozilla?

Thanks,
Lloyd Cotten

Will Firefox 1.0 have the Macromedia Flash plug-in bundled in the install?

Well, it's been a week of switches in the Kiesche household. Dumped cable for satellite. Dumped IE for Firefox. Next up: Find a better way of getting on to the i-way.

So far the Firefox switch has been relatively painless. "Relatively", as I need to re-enter my personal information for comments such as at this site, otherwise it's been pretty invisible.

Hi Asa,

I was wondering if you could let us know who the employees of the mozilla foundation are, and what their functions are..

More specifically, i'm curious as to who the developers of Firefox are. I know Ben Goodger is the lead developer, and is hired by the mozilla foundation, but is he the only one working on it?

If you have time, could you answer the same question for Thunderbird?

Thanks :-)

Ffx crashed on a friend's computer today (first time I've ever seen it happen :) ), and I noticed that QFA still has the Netscape logo prominently featured in it and still says something to the effect of "tell us how Communicator crashed." At what point will the logo be replaced and/or the language matching the products it's bundled with?

Do you know your site is broken in Firefox? Well not 'broken', but the 'Notblog' bit of the header juts into the sitebar.

I have the same question as Lloyd.
Some days I may have 30 spare minutes to do something on Mozilla, other days I don't have enough time to finish my work...
I have some time, I can read [some] code, but can't program.
What would you recommend to people like us?

thnx
Thomas

>Asa,
>
>Thanks for bringing "ask asa" back! :-)
>
>If I'm like many skilled people that enjoy >using Mozilla products (Firefox, Thunderbird, >mostly), I would like to contribute some of >that skill for these products. However, in my >busy schedule I may have only 15-20 minutes a >day, that I could possibly do anything. Can >you recommend any way(s) that those of us >with limited time resources but more skill >than money can effectively contribute to >mozilla?
>
>Thanks,
>Lloyd Cotten
>Posted by codeman at July 2, 2004 04:08 AM

What is the telephone number for Good Samaritan Hospital in Long Island?