Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Firefox Now Blocks Flash As Default Until Next Version Of Flash

If you are using Firefox, I have a question:  Is your browser acting up on you?

What happened is that Mozilla pushed through a well intentioned update.  It now blocks Flash as a default, and while you can turn it on if you like through the settings, I'm thinking I got into a chain of weirdness here that ended up with my having to do some tweaks.

Flash is that piece of software who has its origins back before the dawn of time, or rather 1999 or so that serves up videos, games, and the worst of all features of the modern web, advertisements.

You've got it on your computer unless you took steps to avoid having it.  I'd be willing to bet on it.  If I lost that particular bet go outside and enjoy the great outdoors since you Win One Internetz you 733t D00D!


For the rest of us, Flash is a bit of an annoyance.  Use is something you may not have thought about, an it's starting to fade away.  Personally, I won't miss it but I do keep it up to date and protect myself by only allowing it to run when I tell it to.

Back to that Flash thing.  I am now getting a black stripe at the top of my browser when Flash wants to be activated on any specific website.  In my case, that is exactly how I want it to act.  I want it to nag me when I hit a webpage that wants to use Flash so I know if I'm about to get a virus.

The reality is that when Facebook's head of security, that time sink of a website that mines what you are doing to serve it back to the advertisers that are paying for the site, says that it is Time For Flash To Die, you are witnessing the beginning of the end of an era.

In my own specific case, it locked my Firefox into "Safe Mode" and refused to let me out.  I had to "Refresh" the browser which meant I lost all my configurations and settings.  It took me the better part of an hour to get them back.  I also lost "Adblock Edge" and am having to retrain myself on something called uBlock Origin which is nowhere near as user friendly as the one I was using.

In order to re-enable Flash, and I do not recommend you turn it on for everyone but leave it nag you when it wants to be on:

Go to your Plug In Check Page
Click the scary "Update Now" button






The midsized scary red button will open a webpage for you to download the latest version of Flash, Manually.  Make certain that you clear the check box for their latest crapware download of McAfee Security software.

In my own opinion, there really isn't any reason to download anything from McAfee but that's my opinion.

Once you have done the install, it will force you to restart your browser.

Bad form, Adobe, Bad form.  Then again, it's always been this bad form so we are used to it by now.

So after you restart the browser, Windows Update had a fix for Flash as well.  After applying that update, and a final reboot, the resulting "about:addons" page that allows you to activate or disable your addons was no longer scary red.





The Plugin Status page still had the scary red big button, but the update now button was green and happy.

Lather, Rinse, and Repeat as necessary for all your computers.  Every IT person will be going through this sort of thought process for a bit, or have someone do it for them.

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