Firefox Addons fix on Ubuntu 18.04

So after Mozilla fucked up extensions aka add-ons for their Firefox web browser (if you haven't noticed, you may stop reading now), they now released an update to fix that bug. After updating your Firefox browser, your add-ons should be back and operational once again.

To get this bug fix, you want Firefox version 66.0.4.

Unfortunately, running the Ubuntu Software Updater did, in my case, not actually update my Firefox browser.

Running sudo apt update, followed by sudo apt install firefox only informed me that I already had "the most current version".
firefox --version confirmed that my "most current version" was in fact Firefox 66.0.3.

It seems that at the moment (May 7, 2019), the Ubuntu repository does not (yet) have the Firefox release featuring that bug fix.

But there's hope!

Install Firefox 66.0.4 from Mozilla PPA repository:

1) Add Mozilla signing key:
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys A6DCF7707EBC211F

2) Add Mozilla repository:
sudo apt-add-repository "deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mozilla-security/ppa/ubuntu bionic main"
sudo apt update

3) Install Firefox (this will now obtain the latest Firefox version from the Mozilla repository you've just added):
sudo apt install firefox

4) For confirmation:
firefox --version returns
66.0.4

5) Launch Firefox to see all your beloved add-ons restored to their former glory.

The above instructions, namely details about Mozilla repository, taken from here.

Shopping with Amazon Australia

In short: Depending on what product you're after, it's not all bad.

I've compared a couple of items (ok, just 6), and even within that tiny sample, the results range from "that's ok" to "are you fucking kidding me":

Description	Amazon USA			Amazon Australia			Harvey Norman
	USD	AUD	AUD inc GST	AUD	Diff AUD	Diff %
Seagate Backup Plus 4TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0	USD 100	AUD 136	AUD 150	AUD 149	- AUD 1	- 0.67 % %	AUD 219
AmazonBasics External Hard Disk case	USD 7	AUD 9	AUD 10	AUD 12	+ AUD 2	+ 20.00 % %	AUD 14 1
Sanddisk UltraFit USB drive 16 GB	USD 8	AUD 11	AUD 13	AUD 9	- AUD 4	- 30.77 %	AUD 12 1
Mpow Car phone mount	USD 16	AUD 22	AUD 25	AUD 57	+ AUD 32	+ 128.00 %	AUD 24 1
Filter B&W Neutral density 3.0 MRC 110M 77mm	USD 100	AUD 136	AUD 150	AUD 323	+ AUD 173	+ 115.33 %
Buyee media player	USD 35	AUD 46	AUD 53	AUD 43	- AUD 10	- 18.87 %

¹ Comparable product

Note 1: For convenience, all prices have been rounded: Amazon US up to the next full dollar, Amazon AUS down to the full dollar.

Note 2: I've ignored shipping; for low-price items that are only slightly cheaper in the US, this might reverse the result.

Also, Amazon Australia still only features approx 60 million products, compared to 570 million items on Amazon US; so it's still a matter of luck to even find what you're after on the local site.

So there you have it. It's not as bad as I expected, but there are still a few instances of blatant rip-offs for Australian buyers; especially now that Amazon US is no longer available to us.

Firefox 3: Clearing address bar history

Unfortunately, just going to Tooss -> Clear Private Data and selecting Browsing History does not get rid of the address bar URL history. To at least stop the history of previously visited web sites coming up whenever you enter an URL in the address bar, you can set the parameter that controls the number of lines displayed in the drop – down list to 0 (zero):

Go to the list of configuration parameters by typing about:config in the address bar:


Find parameter browser.urlbar.maxRichResults. By default, this value is set to 12.


Double-click the parameter to change its value. Set the new value to 0.


Click Ok to confirm, and you're done.



Note that the change will only be effective after closing down Firefox and starting it up again.