291748 - Bad downloads. Change in file format. No recognition of previous format. Changes to filesize.

Status: RESOLVED EXPIRED

(Toolkit :: Downloads API, defect)

Description

[Finn Jarle Kvalheim]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.6) Gecko/20050223 Firefox/1.0.1
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.6) Gecko/20050223 Firefox/1.0.1

I was downloading firmware for my mp3-player. When clicking on the link to the
file I got the usual save-dialogue. Selected save and everything went on honky
dory. Problem is - the file was supposed to have the suffix .hex. It didn't
download with the suffix so I thought that it had just become lost somewhere.
Tried installing the firmware on my mp3-player - and it crashed the whole thing.
Since the warranty is over a couple of months ago I guess it's now a high tec
paperweight. 
When downloading the same file with IE I get a completely different file-size
and I get the .hex suffix. This problem with file recognition and erroneous
downloads has haunted FF for as long as I've been using it. Especially
media-files are -****- in FF, as they often get confused with txt(!)-files and
FF tries loading the whole thing into the browser. If there's one thing I can
promise you... -any- computer will get extremely slow when trying to cope with
100MB+ of plaintext. I guess there's not much you can do about my mp3-player,
but the one thing I can, and will do - is switch to Opera. I'm sorry, but I just
have to say it, even if it IS a bad example... You suck! (And so does my mp3-player)

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Nothing special...
2.Just download the file...
3.If you've got an MPMAN F75 or a MPEYE TS200 you can now go ahead and break it
with the psychobabble downloaded by FF.

Actual Results:  
My mp3-player died.

Expected Results:  
Downloaded the file correctly with the right file-size and suffix.

Nothing much to say here. Pretty totally frustrated about a broken player and a
browser I used to trust.

Comment 1

[zug_treno]

I downloaded the hex file with Firefox 1.0+, Mozilla 1.8b1 and IE6 but if I
compare them with diff they all seem the same. Only the IE6 file had the .hex
extension, maybe because the type is file/unknown?

Comment 2

[Hermann Schwab]

http://mpeye.net/download/down.php

here you can download some .alz files, don´t know what this will be, but read
the description and understand the technology.

Updating a firmware like a BIOS of a motherboard or the firmware of a small
device like MP3Player is always critical, if the device can´t receive the full
file, check it, and program only if the fingerprint of the file is correct. 

Best way: the device protects itself:
For doing this, you need enough RAM to buffer the complete file to be checked in
full size before programmed. No chance to get this for an MP3-Player, you don´t
need the RAM otherwise, so it only adds to cost.

2nd best way: external guardian
That's been the way for a lot of BIOS updates until lately. To program the BIOS,
you had to download the datafile from the internet, and eventually the latest
version of a programmer file.
You had to create a DOS diskette containing DOS, the programmer file and the
data file, and boot this diskette.
Why? Because Motherboard factories didn´t want to argue wether their
Motherboards were defective or the new bios, they just wanted to have a reliable
system to
1. check the files fingerprint
2. save the data to be replaced for maybe a restore
3. program the new data, if the fingerprint was correct.

These guys are just asking you to transfer a file using a USB cable.
You should be able to give them anything without breaking the firmware.
If they can´t filter bad input on their device, they should give you a program
which checks the correctness before transferring to the Player.
If they don´t want to do this, they can give you a fingerprint of their file,
a special checksum like MD5-Hash or SHA1-Hash.
Advantage is they don´t have to crae abot making programs for Windows/Mac/Linux
guys, they just deliver a file, able to be verified with a MD5 or sha1 or
something else. You don´t need to, but you can.
In your case maybe it's likely Firefox was the culprit, but it also could have
been the server prematurely disconnecting, or your ISP disconnecting and
reconnecting you to change the IP, or simply a loss of electrical power somewhere. 
Firefox has no means to check if the file received is correct for your player,
it could be anything as long as the length is ok.

Comment 3

[Gervase Markham [:gerv]]

This is an automated message, with ID "auto-resolve01".

This bug has had no comments for a long time. Statistically, we have found that
bug reports that have not been confirmed by a second user after three months are
highly unlikely to be the source of a fix to the code.

While your input is very important to us, our resources are limited and so we
are asking for your help in focussing our efforts. If you can still reproduce
this problem in the latest version of the product (see below for how to obtain a
copy) or, for feature requests, if it's not present in the latest version and
you still believe we should implement it, please visit the URL of this bug
(given at the top of this mail) and add a comment to that effect, giving more
reproduction information if you have it.

If it is not a problem any longer, you need take no action. If this bug is not
changed in any way in the next two weeks, it will be automatically resolved.
Thank you for your help in this matter.

The latest beta releases can be obtained from:
Firefox:     http://www.mozilla.org/projects/firefox/
Thunderbird: http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird/releases/1.5beta1.html
Seamonkey:   http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/

Comment 4

[Gervase Markham [:gerv]]

This bug has been automatically resolved after a period of inactivity (see above
comment). If anyone thinks this is incorrect, they should feel free to reopen it.