470751 - should be option to run exe files

Status: VERIFIED DUPLICATE of bug 234289

(Firefox :: File Handling, enhancement)

Description

[charles.roddie]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.0.5) Gecko/2008120122 Firefox/3.0.5 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.0.5) Gecko/2008120122 Firefox/3.0.5 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

Firefox does not allow exe files to be directly run. This is a design flaw.
It should be an option because:
-normal (secure) internet use often involves downloading a lot of exe files
-if there is an option to open an exe file clicked on, then it is run in one click
-without this option, it takes 7 to 10 mouse clicks: click on exe, select open, navigate to place to be saved, click OK, double click on file, right click on file, select delete, possible click ok on delete confirmation dialog
-the extra clicks are not at the same time (before and after waiting for download, before and after running of file)
-Internet Explorer has this option and that makes it more function in this respect. The IE team decided that it was not necessary to remove this feature for security and the proportion of at risk non-technical users is lower for Firefox than IE.
-It is not a security problem because if people click on an exe file and download it they will almost always still run it. It just annoys users.
-If Firefox developers running exes easily a security issue it should be off by default but enabled by a user setting.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Navigate to a page with an exe installer file.
2.Click on the exe file.
3.
Actual Results:  
There is the option to save the file but not to run it.

Expected Results:  
There should be both the option to save the file and the option to run it.

Comment 2

[Steve England [:stevee]]

Or one of bug 42015, bug 106094, bug 81703, bug 91969 (that's one long dupechain!)

Comment 3

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

verified dupe