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It wouldn't surprise me if there is an internal conflict at Microsoft about allowing Edge extensions. Back when Windows 10 came out, Cortana opened Bing search
by Sephr 10y ago
It wouldn't surprise me if there is an internal conflict at Microsoft about allowing Edge extensions.
Back when Windows 10 came out, Cortana opened Bing searches in your default browser. Someone made a Bing2Google extension for Chrome, and Microsoft responded by making Cortana only open Bing searches in Edge.
Now that Edge supports extensions, I can make a Bing2Google extension for Edge, but Microsoft will never accept it. If I make a Bing2Google userscript for Tampermonkey[1], Microsoft will probably take down Tampermonkey eventually once they learn about the userscript. There is already a very simple userscript available[2] that you can install right now to get this "banned" functionality in Edge.
Edge's extension ecosystem is a walled garden. When it comes to browsers, I prefer freedom over performance and efficiency. This is why I'm still not switching to Edge. I'll give Edge another chance if/when they open up their extension platform to everyone. For now, it's useless without Microsoft approval.
I use Tampermonkey for some userscripts on other sites and I don't feel comfortable relying on Microsoft's goodwill to not remove this extension.
[1]: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/p/tampermonkey/9nblggh5162s https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/p/tampermonkey/9nblggh...
[2]: https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/11308-bing-to-google/code https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/11308-bing-to-google/code
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoLet's not pretend Google Chrome is somehow less of a walled garden. You can only install extensions from their store, and yes, they've removed extensions for business reasons before.
- Sephr 10y agoThe difference is that the extension platform itself is open. I can compile Chromium and create/install/redistribute extensions all without ever asking for Google's permission, and still have an acceptable user experience on non-Windows platforms. Afaik, Edge doesn't allow easy extension installation prompts from third party websites. Yes, redistributing extensions for Windows Chrome users (not Windows Chromium) does require the Chrome Web Store. This is unfortunate, but at least Google has a better track record when it comes to banning extensions that modify their things on their own web properties.
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoCompiling UWP apps such as Chrome extensions doesn't "require Microsoft's permission" either and you can sideload them as well. However, as you point out, Google prohibits side loading for the majority of real Chrome installs. The time since I last found a malicious extension in the Chrome Web Store is five days[0]. They're terrible at policing this, which is a point I've actively complained about for years. [0]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13111884 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13111884
- epenn 10y agoYou can install a Chrome extension manually. The store is convenient but not required.
- noinsight 10y agoIf you enable Developer Mode and load unpacked extensions on Windows, it complains about it every time you start Chrome. I'd call that a (major) inconvenience.
- GunlogAlm 10y agoDoes it? I have never experienced this.
- antishok 10y agoIt does. You can pay 5 bucks to get a dev account on the play store and then upload your extension there (unlisted if you want), and install it from there, and you won't get the nag popup
- NTripleOne 10y agoYeah it shows a tiny little balloon-tip style thing over the hamburger menu. I was going to say it's not a big deal but I quite distinctly remember it being the entire reason I switched to Vivaldi instead of Chrome. Full extension store compatibility with none of the nagging, and all the other cool shit it does is just a bonus at this point.
- brownbat 10y ago> yes, they've removed extensions for business reasons before Interesting, which ones? I tried searching for some examples of removed extensions, so far I've only found some awful stuff like this: http://fortune.com/2016/06/03/google-chrome-jews/ http://fortune.com/2016/06/03/google-chrome-jews/ It's an ad company that allows ad blockers, so it seems at most like a small chain-link fence garden.
- jasonlingx 10y agoYouTube downloaders.
- Macha 10y agoAnd YouTube centre
- paulddraper 10y agoNo, you can "sideload" extensions.
- detaro 10y agoSame is possible in Edge as far as I know.
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoYou can do the same for Windows. People bring their religions in here without facts and end up at the top of threads. The parent post is baseless and wrong.
- paulddraper 10y ago> People bring their religions in here without facts and end up at the top of threads Only popular religions ;) I agree. I pointed out that your statement "You can only install extensions from their store" is incorrect for Chrome. Thank you for adding information about Edge.
- ocdtrekkie 10y agoAh, haha, yeah, that's fair. I usually disregard things that are "heavily discouraged" behind developer modes and checkboxes buried deep in menus.
- paulddraper 10y agoEnabling local extension install in Chrome is a single checkbox at the top of chrome://extensions -- the same place where you manage the rest of your extensions. But point taken.
- noinsight 10y agoIt can also be problematic if you want to author extensions on it... Google requires a $5 payment to be able to publish extensions. Reasonable, but what if you have issues making the payment? My 100% valid CC gets rejected though it obviously works everywhere else. Now, try to get support from Google for that...
- scrypt 10y agohttps://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium https://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium https://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron.php https://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron.php
- rehemiau 10y agoWhy would I need such "Bing2Google" extension if I can set Google as default search provider already?
- greglindahl 10y agoBecause Cortana, the chatbot thing, doesn't use your search default.
- nvr219 10y agoI've been using win10 for a while now, love it, never used contara.
- milankragujevic 10y agoI've been using win10 since it came out, despise it, never used the holographic blue lady.
- philliphaydon 10y agoWindows 10 is the best version of Windows to date. What do you despise about it.
- milankragujevic 10y ago1. I bought a laptop with Windows 10 with secure boot that cannot be disabled. I am stuck with it. FOREVER. 2. Forced updates and forced spying that auto-turns-on after updates 3. Cannot turn off updates 4. AntimalwareServiceExecutable uses 50% of my CPU constantly. With 2 cores at 2.2 GHz, that's A LOT. 5. Crashes due to driver issues that Windows installs itself from Windows Update 6. BSODs from drivers from WU 7. More spying 8. Explorer crashes constantly and sometimes the whole computer freezes and I have to restart Please note that this happens on multiple new and old computers, so don't give me the "oh it's a hardware issue" bullshit, my best friend who works as a PC service technician also experiences the same complaints from many people.
- mattkrea 10y agoI find it odd you mention freedom but run Windows. Bit of a conflict there, no?
- chc 10y agoI don't see much of a conflict. Windows doesn't abnormally restrict users' ability to do many things.
- kLeeIsDead 10y agoIt abnormally restricts my ability to write software.
- interpol_p 10y agoDoes it abnormally restrict your ability to write software, or to publish software? I imagine Windows doesn't do much to stand between you and writing your own code for personal use.
- kLeeIsDead 10y agoBoth. I write middleware for games for fun, which is a kind of middle ground between game programming and systems programming. The Windows APIs are horrible compared to their Unix counterparts.
- alkonaut 10y agoCare to explain? Oh you mean some APIs don't look the way you want, not that microsoft actively does something to stop you.
- kLeeIsDead 10y agoI feel like they secretly are.
- Tepix 10y agoIt does things that are not in your best interest. Like spying on you and serving you ads. Why don't you use an OS that you don't have to fight against?
- awqrre 10y agoI don't think that they care about tampermonkey/greasemonkey... a very small minority would be using it...
- BipolarElsa 10y agouBlock Origin can't even block twitch. very bad blocker.
- BugsJustFindMe 10y ago> Edge's extension ecosystem is a walled garden. When it comes to browsers, I prefer freedom over performance and efficiency. This is why I'm still not switching to Edge. That's one reason, I guess. My reason for not using Edge is that Edge still, after all this time, can't save files from the internet. That's, like, the second thing that I expect a web browser to be able to do after looking at files from the internet. ( You can test this at home. Go to visit some arbitrary text file in Edge. Let's say https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Microsoft/vscode/master/LICENSE.txt https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Microsoft/vscode/master/LI... for example. Now save it. File menu? Nope. Ctrl+S? Nope. Right-click? Nope. )
- morganvachon 10y agoI know it's not what you're looking for, but there is built in functionality to save a raw text file directly from Edge. You can click the Make a Web Note button to save it to OneNote. This, of course, requires that you actually use OneNote, which is not ideal for everyone.
- koolba 10y agoI can't tell if your comment is serious or sarcastic.
- morganvachon 10y agoWell I did say it wasn't what he was looking for. :-) In all seriousness, it is definitely a glaring omission in Edge. Though, I can see the OneNote integration being useful on a tablet.
- efraim 10y agoJust right-click the link and choose save target as. Saying that it can't save files from the internet is a bit exaggerated.
- BugsJustFindMe 10y ago
- wdr1 10y agoIt's amazing how Microsoft locks down every one of their products, from Edge to Cortana to Xbox, and then complains night & day when other companies do it. I believe when they were astroturfing against Google, they also added a search experience to Xbox -- one that defaulted to Bing & one that you could not change to anything but Bing.
- nommm-nommm 10y agoI don't consider Windows locked down.
- nugget 10y agoI am old enough to remember that Chrome didn't really take off until Google released an extension framework with many popularly supported extensions. There's likely a lot of room in the browser market for custom browsers curated and managed by trusted third parties but my sense is that a) given their history, people wouldn't necessarily feel comfortable having Microsoft fill that role and b) given their size, Microsoft wants Edge to compete directly with Chrome and Firefox for absolute majority market share, rather than chase single digit % niche markets (which would be a very exciting business for almost anyone else).
- deepfriedbits 10y agoInteresting. My memory is probably hazy, but for me, Chrome took off because the choices at the time were IE and Firefox, which used to be an insane memory hog.
- r3m6 10y agoThat was Opera. Chrome took off because it was and is advertised on any Google property.
- NTripleOne 10y agoChrome took off because it had the ability to not take 15 minutes to cold boot during the era when firefox did.
- nommm-nommm 10y agoI've been using Firefox continuously as my only browser since it was in beta and called Phoenix. This has never been even remotely true, at least on my experience.
- NTripleOne 10y agoTo carry on with your anecdotal evidence, I'm going to disagree and say that yes, there was a time where firefox was just dog slow to open - on all 3 of the PCs I owned at the time, two using only 2-3 extensions and one using none. If there wasn't, I never would have switched to chrome.
- josteink 10y ago> Someone made a Bing2Google extension for Chrome ... Edge's extension ecosystem is a walled garden. When it comes to browsers, I prefer freedom over performance and efficiency. Maybe I'm reading your comment wrong, but to me it seems like 1. you use Google Chrome and 2. Google search. If so, how are these not walled gardens? How do these promote freedom? I'm not sure I see how those are any better. If I misread your comment and you use actual free software for browsing the internet (which leaves you at Firefox and seemingly only Firefox), please have me and my comment excused :)
- taneq 10y agoThe difference here is that the user chose to walk into those gardens, and can walk out at any time (although I don't use Chrome - is it possible to change the search client?). It's not like Edge forcing them to use Bing.
- josteink 10y agoBut nobody is forcing them to use Edge or Bing anymore than they were forced to use Goolge (which forces Google search on you). There's absolutely nothing to these claims.
- roryisok 10y agoI doubt they'd kill tampermonkey for that. Switching their own app to use edge is a soft response, taking down a general extension because it might be used for that would be very hostile, and MS are not in the business of being openly hostile to developers of software for their platform It's also worth pointing out they allowed an Evernote extension, even though its a direct competitor to OneNote