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I don't know if it's very smart to limit one of the most distinctive features of Firefox, the powerful add-ons available. Erodes the differences between Firefox

I don't know if it's very smart to limit one of the most distinctive features of Firefox, the powerful add-ons available. Erodes the differences between Firefox and other browsers. If Firefox is going to be just another Chrome, people will just use Chrome.

AstroJetson 11y ago
I agree, if they are all going to look alike, work alike and the base is now Chrome, then might as well use Chrome. But frankly if I wanted to use Chrome then I'd be using Chrome now. I've stopped the version madness here, I have some plugins that I love that preclude me from going forward. I'd rather see the team go "Hey we have 2.3 million person years of backlogged bugs, we are going to fix them before we make a fundamental change to the browser. Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk.
- mccr8 11y ago
  Visiting only trusted sites is a niche use case for web browsers.
- cwyers 11y ago
  > Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk. How can you possibly know this for certain?
- geofft 11y ago
  > Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk. What add-ons do you use on this extremely restricted set of internal-only websites?
eloisant 11y ago
The truth is Firefox already lost most of its market share to Chrome, so "powerful add-on" doesn't seem to be a strong enough selling point to retain users. It is, however, a big liability. In terms of security but also stability and performances. The way extensions work in Firefox is a bit crazy, it's like opening your belly and say "here, change whatever you want". It's the equivalent of a desktop OS where any installed application runs in kernel land where they can slow down everything, crash everything, make the browser unusable... Not only a bad written extensions can have disastrous consequences, it's impossible for the Firefox team to keep backward compatibility because they have no idea what XUL file the extensions developers are overlaying or what core JS object they've monkey-patched.
- wvenable 11y ago
  > The way extensions work in Firefox is a bit crazy, it's like opening your belly and say "here, change whatever you want". ...and my god it has been awesome. Certainly more awesome than any instability it may cause. > It's the equivalent of a desktop OS where any installed application runs in kernel Most major operating systems give extension capabilities to enhance them in deep ways. My Windows install has ClassicShell as a start menu replacement and DisplayFusion for multi-monitor taskbars. I have explorer plugins for Zip files, Git, and Subversion. Any one of those tools can crash and take down the whole desktop process. What you're describing isn't a modern power user OS -- you're describing iOS. A safe secure place where nothing interesting happens; only exactly what Apple has already imagined you could want. > Not only a bad written extensions can have disastrous consequences My browser crashes? Hardly disasterous! And then I can just uninstall any unstable extensions.
  - pcwalton 11y ago
    > My browser crashes? Hardly disasterous! If that crash leads to RCE (which, empirically, many of them do) then that isn't the characterization I would use.
    - wvenable 11y ago
      That's a risk, that as an informed and adult user, I should be able to accept on my own. If I wanted a much less useful but marginally more secure browser, I'd just use Chrome.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - pcwalton 11y ago
        That presupposes a bit of a false dichotomy, doesn't it? If the add-on APIs you need aren't there in the new framework, then the solution is to add them. I don't believe security and power should be in conflict--I want both!
cJ0th 11y ago
Well, from a business point of view it makes sense for them to assimilate (see Hotelling's law[0]) As a user I am unhappy about their decision. For me, the whole point of the existence of Firefox is the freedom to customize the browser in whatever way I want to. They shouldn't change that. If they really think that all their users are stupid then perhaps they could display a special warning when a "dangerous" piece of software (i.e one that uses XUL) is about to be installed. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_law

AstroJetson 11y ago

I agree, if they are all going to look alike, work alike and the base is now Chrome, then might as well use Chrome. But frankly if I wanted to use Chrome then I'd be using Chrome now. I've stopped the version madness here, I have some plugins that I love that preclude me from going forward. I'd rather see the team go "Hey we have 2.3 million person years of backlogged bugs, we are going to fix them before we make a fundamental change to the browser. Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk.

mccr8 11y ago
Visiting only trusted sites is a niche use case for web browsers.
cwyers 11y ago
> Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk. How can you possibly know this for certain?
geofft 11y ago
> Security is an issue, but with my work machine I'm not hitting sites that would put me at risk. What add-ons do you use on this extremely restricted set of internal-only websites?

eloisant 11y ago

The truth is Firefox already lost most of its market share to Chrome, so "powerful add-on" doesn't seem to be a strong enough selling point to retain users. It is, however, a big liability. In terms of security but also stability and performances. The way extensions work in Firefox is a bit crazy, it's like opening your belly and say "here, change whatever you want". It's the equivalent of a desktop OS where any installed application runs in kernel land where they can slow down everything, crash everything, make the browser unusable... Not only a bad written extensions can have disastrous consequences, it's impossible for the Firefox team to keep backward compatibility because they have no idea what XUL file the extensions developers are overlaying or what core JS object they've monkey-patched.

wvenable 11y ago
> The way extensions work in Firefox is a bit crazy, it's like opening your belly and say "here, change whatever you want". ...and my god it has been awesome. Certainly more awesome than any instability it may cause. > It's the equivalent of a desktop OS where any installed application runs in kernel Most major operating systems give extension capabilities to enhance them in deep ways. My Windows install has ClassicShell as a start menu replacement and DisplayFusion for multi-monitor taskbars. I have explorer plugins for Zip files, Git, and Subversion. Any one of those tools can crash and take down the whole desktop process. What you're describing isn't a modern power user OS -- you're describing iOS. A safe secure place where nothing interesting happens; only exactly what Apple has already imagined you could want. > Not only a bad written extensions can have disastrous consequences My browser crashes? Hardly disasterous! And then I can just uninstall any unstable extensions.
- pcwalton 11y ago
  > My browser crashes? Hardly disasterous! If that crash leads to RCE (which, empirically, many of them do) then that isn't the characterization I would use.
  - wvenable 11y ago
    That's a risk, that as an informed and adult user, I should be able to accept on my own. If I wanted a much less useful but marginally more secure browser, I'd just use Chrome.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - pcwalton 11y ago
      That presupposes a bit of a false dichotomy, doesn't it? If the add-on APIs you need aren't there in the new framework, then the solution is to add them. I don't believe security and power should be in conflict--I want both!

cJ0th 11y ago

Well, from a business point of view it makes sense for them to assimilate (see Hotelling's law[0]) As a user I am unhappy about their decision. For me, the whole point of the existence of Firefox is the freedom to customize the browser in whatever way I want to. They shouldn't change that. If they really think that all their users are stupid then perhaps they could display a special warning when a "dangerous" piece of software (i.e one that uses XUL) is about to be installed. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotelling%27s_law