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How do I get firefox portable to notify me of updates and download them to a USB flash drive instead of leaving files on other people's computers?

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I am using Firefox as portable app, with --no-remote --profile "%profile_path%". I update it regularly, it's convenient for me to see notifications of new updates and install them whenever I see fit. I recently noticed that Firefox creates a folder on every computer C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\updates, which is not good for the portable version, really. The only way to stop this I found was to completely disable updates via distribution\policies. I don't want to. How do I get firefox to notify me of updates and download them to a USB flash drive (it will be perfect if i could specify folder for this purpose) instead of leaving files on other people's computers?

I am using Firefox as portable app, with --no-remote --profile "%profile_path%". I update it regularly, it's convenient for me to see notifications of new updates and install them whenever I see fit. I recently noticed that Firefox creates a folder on every computer C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\updates, which is not good for the portable version, really. The only way to stop this I found was to completely disable updates via distribution\policies. I don't want to. How do I get firefox to notify me of updates and download them to a USB flash drive (it will be perfect if i could specify folder for this purpose) instead of leaving files on other people's computers?

All Replies (8)

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P.S. I understand that you want to improve the update service for users. But if I can't solve this problem, I'll have to disable the updates completely and switch to manual updates. A lot of people use firefox portable, and firefox sync doesn't suit them for privacy reasons. You make a great browser that allows users to use itself as they wish. And I hope for your understanding.

Modified by r34lf0xf4n

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Hi r34lf0xf4n, Firefox Portable is a self-contained build that has numerous changes to avoid writing to other parts of the file system. Could you post this bug on their forums and see whether they can fix it in a future release?

https://portableapps.com/forums/support/firefox_portable

(I mention their forums because it is not built by Mozilla.)

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>> as portable app So, just script with cmdline args, not portableapps loader :) I have downloaded the portableapps version just now - it has the same issue. I used a portable app launcher before and it really doesn't do anything magical. The same command line parameters +presets for the new profile. They suggest using "portableapps platform" with its "updater", which I don't really need. + updates are released less frequently than on the official Mozilla channel

Maybe developers could add a command-line option to manage updates in future versions? I'd like that very much. The problem is also that if firefox is already installed on the machine, its update parameter is applied to the portable version, and if I change the portable version parameter, the parameter changes on the installed system.

Modified by r34lf0xf4n

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Perhaps you could raise this issue on the Firefox Development forum. I don't think we can help you with this here in support because those paths are not user configurable.

https://discourse.mozilla.org/c/firefox-development

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Thanx. My bad, I thought developers could hear me here =)

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r34lf0xf4n said

I am using Firefox as portable app, with --no-remote --profile "%profile_path%". I update it regularly, it's convenient for me to see notifications of new updates and install them whenever I see fit. I recently noticed that Firefox creates a folder on every computer C:\ProgramData\Mozilla\updates, which is not good for the portable version, really. The only way to stop this I found was to completely disable updates via distribution\policies. I don't want to. How do I get firefox to notify me of updates and download them to a USB flash drive (it will be perfect if i could specify folder for this purpose) instead of leaving files on other people's computers?
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See if the option to not check for updates is available.

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When you contact PortableApps, let them know that this notation is at the end of the update.txt file:

calling QuitProgressUI NS_main: unable to remove directory: tobedeleted, err: 41 NS_main: failed to schedule OS reboot removal of directory: tobedeleted

maybe it will help speed up a resolution.