Beta testing Kee

Project news
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Would you like to try out the latest features and improvements before other Kee users?

If so, you might want to consider whether signing up for the new Kee beta testing channel is a good idea for you.

Being less well tested than the stable version on addons.mozilla.com means that this beta version comes with a higher risk but you’ll get access to things like the new search functionality and workarounds for various Firefox bugs weeks before other users, as well as helping to report any problems that might need fixing before the addon is rolled out to the whole community.

There has been a beta testing channel for Kee for many years but in a few days time, Mozilla will shut it down - if you’re a current beta tester, you’ll receive more information in a Firefox tab that appears when you update to the latest version on the current beta testing channel (e.g. via an automatic update). The full text of this update is at the end of this post just in case that’s useful.

The new beta testing channel is hosted on GitHub and you can subscribe to it by installing the signed XPI file attached to the latest release page (e.g. kee-2.2.5beta-an.fx.xpi)

Full text for existing beta testing users:

Attention Kee beta tester!

Thanks for beta testing the latest improvements to Kee. Your support helps deliver a high quality stable add-on to many people.

To continue beta testing, you MUST re-register your support by re-installing the add-on from this new location: https://github.com/kee-org/browser-addon/releases/latest

All of your existing settings will be preserved. The only difference will be that future automatic updates will be delivered from github.com rather than mozilla.org.

Hopefully the questions and answers below will provide you with all the information you need but if not, please search or ask further questions on the community forum at https://forum.kee.pm

Why am I being asked to do this?

Mozilla have just announced another breaking change to the Firefox add-on service which means that if you take no action, you will be removed from the beta testing program. This applies to all Firefox add-ons and is due to take effect in just a few days.

From now on, Mozilla will allow only one version of an add-on to be hosted on the official add-ons site (known as “AMO”). This means that any add-on with a beta testing process must now manage and host its own beta testing service.

The new Kee beta testing service is already live and hosted on GitHub but Mozilla do not permit us to automatically migrate your beta “subscription” to this new location so you must manually opt-in.

What happens if I do not install the add-on from the new beta channel location?

When the next stable version of Kee with a higher version number is released to AMO, you will be updated to that version and thereafter no longer be a beta tester. We hope you will choose to keep beta testing Kee but if you do not, your security will not be affected.

Why GitHub.com?

All Kee development work depends upon GitHub already. GitHub offers a way for the automatic update feature to be enabled without the need for any additional trusted third parties to be introduced to the development and release process of Kee. It’s also the fastest way to deliver this new service at short notice.

Can I trust this information?

This message has been displayed automatically after an update to the latest (and last ever) version on the beta testing channel you subscribed to previously. However, we recommend performing an independent search for information if you have any doubts about the legitimacy of this message.

1 Like
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I am on the beta program only because I am using a Mac: Firefox always insisted that the regular releases were not available for my platform. Will this change, or do I have to sign up for the new beta channel on GitHub?

Ian

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Mac users can install the stable version since Kee 2.0 was released so if you’d prefer to be on the stable version, just do nothing and you’ll be automatically switched to the stable version soon.

Don’t install an older version now just because it’s stable, since this could occasionally cause configuration problems.

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Thank you. I will probably move to the stable version. I would like to add that I am enjoying Kee.

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One big catch to all of this is that the user also needs to be using a non-standard version of Firefox. I was happily using the beta version of Kee on the standard Firefox channel, but when I tried to install the beta XPI from Github, Firefox stops the installation because it’s unsigned. It sounds like the only way we can keep using the beta addon is if we’re also using a non-standard Firefox (nightly or dev edition). Is there any way the beta addon can be signed so we can continue testing?

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The signed version of the beta is located further down the page directly under “Installation Instructions.”

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Hah, I thought the instructions that popped up were enough. I forgot to read the other instructions! Thank you Megamind.

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Hi,
after beeing migrated to kee 2.2.9 one of my logins does not work any more.
The affected url is: https://finanzportal-secure.vermoegenszentrum.de/vzdLogin/login?bank=vzdbde&lang=de
This url made trouble before: Kee did not detect this as a loginpage, thus did not offer me to store the login-data. After creating an entry for that url in the kee database, it worked partially: opening the page did not trigger kee to automatically fill in the userdata, as this is the case for many other urls, but by right-cklicking un the username field + using the kee-entry of the context-menu I cound chose: “select appropriate login data”. kee then offered me the correct logindata, which I could select. With kee 2.2.9 I am now not in the position any more to select the logindata. Kee behaves, as if I would have deleted the entry in the database.

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I’ve created a dedicated topic to document ongoing beta testing instructions, etc. since this news announcement was quite specific to the changes happening a year ago.