Firefox faces challenges as it matures

The browser's obstacles include: security issues, attracting new, non-technical users and, of course, the forthcoming IE 7

The updates will be downloaded in the background in bits and pieces at a time, so as to not interfere with the browsing experience, and users will be prompted to install them once the patch has been completely downloaded, he said. Moreover, the automated update feature also will take into account the add-ins a user has installed on a browser, to ensure compatibility between the updates to the browser and the extensions, he said.

"We're delivering a software update capability that is holistic, that takes into account how people use Firefox," Beard said. "This feature is one of the most significant enhancements. It has been a pain point for Firefox users and we believe we've delivered a solution that will let people stay current."

Microsoft, however, is reacting to the challenge by improving IE, analysts say.

"The real question is how well will Firefox fare against a reinvigorated IE," said Michael Gartenberg, a Jupiter Research analyst. "For many users, IE 7 will address some of the key reasons why they may have looked at Firefox, such as security or new features [not in IE.]"

In the excitement that surrounded its launch last year, Firefox was unreasonably portrayed by some as having unbreakable security, but the vulnerabilities that have been detected in recent months are injecting a dose of reality into this myth, analysts say.

Users who adopted Firefox, hoping never having to patch it, are disappointed and this in turn is slowing down its growth, said analyst Rob Enderle of The Enderle Group. "Firefox has had some visible growing pains," Enderle said. "As the product grows up, you face reality … and the massive interest has dropped off."

In the face of unavoidable security holes, the important thing is for Mozilla to react quickly to the discoveries with fixes, analysts say. "What the market has learned is that there are going to be vulnerabilities on any platform and that switching from one browser to another is not going to be a panacea," Gartenberg said.

This is why the automated update feature in Firefox 1.5 is a particularly important one, said Eric Peterson, a Jupiter Research analyst. "It's the kind of functionality they should have. They need to be ready to quickly address any kind of hacker threat to the application," Peterson said. "If they're making it fairly transparent to the user, that's great news. In retrospect, it's probably something they should have built in with the 1.0 release."

On the question of how responsive Mozilla has been in patching the security holes, the opinions are mixed. Gartenberg and Valdes both give Mozilla high marks, but others are less impressed. "Putting in place an automated update mechanism doesn't really get you anything unless there are updates to feed through it. What we've seen with some of the first security problems in Firefox is that their speed of getting to market with an update is the bigger factor," said Nate Root, a Forrester Research Inc. analyst.

As Mozilla continues to improve Firefox, it needs to place more attention on quality assurance, because the browser is developed by a community of open source volunteers, Root said. Particular stringency needs to be applied to reviewing the hundreds of add-ins available for the browser, some of which have been sources of security vulnerabilities, Root said.