The Firefox 3 instance that will not die

I downloaded the new beta of Firefox 3 and I can't seem to get it to run for more than about a minute. It seems to crash everytime I submit a form (which I need to do for this blogging tool) and in it's last attempt I've reached a new ability to not be able to kill the process in any way.

Before you ask, yes I tried to force-quit. I also went to the command-line in an attempt to recall my Unix days and kill-9 the process. Sadly, nothing works and I actually have to reboot and uninstall FF3. I am guessing the fact that (firefox-bin) appears in parentheses is a bad thing.

This is my own fault for not paying attention on a conference call.

[shvmoz]

Hi, Dave. I'm presuming that you're on OS X here, and that you've likely already upgraded to 10.5.3. Unfortunately, 10.5.3 has a bug that affects Firefox and other programs which load plugins from "/Library/Internet Plug-Ins", specifically the "VerifiedDownloadPlugin.plugin". Any process that opens this file will result in an unkillable zombie, and also cause a hang at shutdown. Even "nm", the library-inspection tool, will cause this behaviour if you point it at the file inside that plugin bundle. It made us quite sad. :(

We just committed an emergency fix for the problem to the Firefox 3 tree, though that doesn't help users of iTerm or other browsers that may be affected. If you have contacts at Apple, you can ask after the fate of Radar #5986742; we're hoping that they'll fix it for everyone as soon as possible (10.5.4?).

With respect to your crashes, it would be interesting to know more about the crash reports; you can see the links in "about:crashes", and I'd love to hear about the details via email. My first suspicion is an incompatible extension forced to install, but I keep a pretty open mind about crashes these days.

Thanks for helping us test Firefox 3!

[daverosenberg]

Wow! Thanks for the great response and feedback. I will take a crack at your suggestions here. Kudos for being so attentive!

[Ticked_Off]

Firefox 3 SUCKS! AVOID DOWNLOADING AT ALL COSTS! I got sucked in when I tried to log into my hotmail account (and it WOULDN'T LET ME!) until I did....

Quite apparently, Mozilla has linked up with and SOLD OUT to Microsoft...

Even after I configured Firefox 3 to delete my browsing history, IT WOULDN'T!

I finally dumped it and did system restore, only to find Mozilla had configured ver. 2.0.0.16 (their most recent, before feeding us their garbage version 3), COMPLETELY UNUSABLE AND UNRETRIEVABLE!

I Googled my previous, properly working version, got Mozilla's page (and ONLY theirs!) to download it, downloaded it, installed, and guess what????

I GOT AN ERROR MESSAGE, OVER AND OVER AND OVER! IT WOULD NOT CONNECT TO THE INTERNET!!!

Mozilla can STICK IT, as far as I'm concerned...They have lost ALL credibility with me and MILLIONS of others (just take a look at their "Bugzilla" page!)

I'll NEVER EVER use their crappy software again!
You'll be sorry, too, if you do!!!

TELL EVERYONE YOU KNOW TO STEER CLEAR OF MOZILLA SOFTWARE...EVERY TYPE AND EVERY VERSION!

WHAT A PATHETIC PIECE OF GARBAGE, WHAT A PATHETIC PIECE OF GARBAGE COMPANY!!!