The current version of Firefox will likely be the end of the road for people using PowerPC Macs.
A final decision will be based on usage data that’s better than what Mozilla possesses right now, but technical difficulties raised by Firefox 4 improvements mean at a minimum that it’s a strong possibility only Intel-based Macs will be able to run the new browser.
"I am gathering data on the number of PPC users we have, but the likely outcome is that we will not be supporting PPC [PowerPC] for Firefox 4," said Mike Beltzner, Mozilla’s director of Firefox, in a mailing list posting on Tuesday.
Major changes are a fact of life in the computing industry, but it’s never easy to decide when users of older technology should no longer be supported. Keeping new software compatible with old hardware–and conversely, making sure new hardware can run old software–can be an expensive proposition when there are few users of the older technology left.
But Mozilla’s Firefox now is used by hundreds of millions of people, and even a small fraction of them can be a large number in absolute terms. It’s a plight of widely used software; for comparison, Microsoft has extended the lifespan of Windows XP several times beyond its original plans.
Dropping support for older machines, of course, can make those with the machines angry. Mozilla faced disgruntlement when it decided to cut off Firefox support for Mac OS X 10.4 after version 3.6. Using an old browser also exposes people to security risks, though Mozilla maintains older Firefox incarnations for a time after new versions supplant them.
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