5 ms·

I've been using Firefox for years without any problems and find it much better (just as fast, more privacy-minded) than chrome. I honestly don't understand (fr

I've been using Firefox for years without any problems and find it much better (just as fast, more privacy-minded) than chrome. I honestly don't understand (from a consumer standpoint) why people complain about Firefox. I can understand devs having browser preferences, but to say that "time forgot" firefox is ridiculous as a general user.

ZenoArrow 10y ago
Agreed. I prefer Firefox, but I recognise there's really not that much difference between Firefox and Chrome in terms of usability and features, they both seem about on par to me (some areas Firefox is slightly ahead, some areas Chrome is slightly ahead). The suggestion that Firefox is something "time forgot" is basically just trolling, someone looking for a reaction rather than something substantial.
- komali2 10y ago
  The numbers don't back either of your claims, though - significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox. I for one appreciate chrome for the fact that it syncs with my google everything, across all devices, google accounts, etc. I'm probably going to hate myself for my blase attitude towards security when I inevitably end up on some massive dump of hacked accounts, but I've kind of given up on privacy/security. It's just so convenient to be able to pull up on my phone the tab I had open on my browser when I'm in the kitchen cooking, or whatever.
  - ZenoArrow 10y ago
    >"The numbers don't back either of your claims, though - significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox." The reason we're in disagreement is we're picking different forms of comparison. You're looking at popularity, I'm looking at technology. I don't dispute more people use Chrome, but that doesn't make it automatically better from a technical point of view. As I said before, technically Firefox and Chrome are fairly equal, and there are benchmarks and feature comparisons that back this up.
  - myowncrapulence 10y ago
    for the fact that it syncs with my google everything, across all devices, google accounts, etc. Shudders My god that's the last thing I'd ever want and exactly why I avoid Chrome and Android devices.
  - rebelwebmaster 10y ago
    "It's just so convenient to be able to pull up on my phone the tab I had open on my browser when I'm in the kitchen cooking, or whatever." FWIW, Firefox supports syncing tabs between devices as well.
    - funnyfacts365 10y ago
      Yes it does. My 2 laptops and 2 Android phones all use the dame profile. Everything syncs, tabs, passwords, addons...
    - icc97 10y ago
      The firefox syncing is awesome. FF syncing feels friendly and the Chrome feels like a stranger being 'overly' friendly. Somehow I'm willing to sell most of the rest of my soul, but not my browsing history.
  - vacri 10y ago
    > significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox This is true. Significantly more people use "Safari and Chrome" than "Firefox". However, significantly less people use "Safari" than "Firefox". Chrome is the gorilla, Safari is waaaaaaay back in the pack.
    - bzbarsky 10y ago
      It depends on whether you count "desktop" market share, "mobile" market share, or "both" (and if "both" how you weight it).
CaptSpify 10y ago
As a dedicated FF user: It feels significantly slower than chrome, it's hard to figure out what tab is killing things, and they keep making choices that I consider highly questionable. I do love FF, and it is the browser I use everyday. But it's not without it's own warts, which Chrome is much better at hiding.
- iaml 10y ago
  Exactly that, it feels slow. On my laptop I have chrome and nightly firefox which typically is faster than stable branch. I have tons of addons in chrome and only ublock in ff, and yet chrome feels much more responsive compared to ff.
- disordinary 10y ago
  I've found that in recent times Chrome has started to feel bloated and slow and firefox (with minimal addons) feels much more zippy. However Firefox does seem to be a bit more temperamental when something else is using significant CPU. Ultimately I prefer Firefox.
- pimeys 10y ago
  After version 50.0 I switched back from Opera. The deal is to get the e10s multiprocess windows on. It might be disabled because some of the addons. You can try to enforce it or like in my case with only uBlock Origin and Privacy Badger installed, it was on by default. This browser is seriously fast now on Linux. I couldn't be happier with it. I've used it for weeks already, browsing a lot and it's still as snappy as when I installed it. Good job. And soon we'll start getting the Servo stuff...
  - CaptSpify 10y ago
    I've tried turning it on via https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis#Force_Enable https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis#Force_Enable, but it still doens't seem to be on per about:support unfortunately. If you have any other suggestions for getting it going, I'd appreciate it. One additional complaint I have about FF: It's hard to find out where to change the setting that I want. I constantly have to ddg for "How do I change $x" and I end up with 3 different answers for 3 different revisions. If anyone knows of a good resource for me to find this out, I would appreciate it.
etatoby 10y ago
Same here. I keep Chrome on Linux only for its developer tools, which are clearly more performant, and for its updated and sandboxed Flash. But I only bring it up for those two features. Otherwise Firefox with a ton of extensions, including Tab Center, is my default choice. I don't see in what way it would be inferior to Chrome. In fact, it has several user-level features that I miss in other browsers, such as column / rectangular selection of tables, automatic saving of form input, Ctrl+I dialog with a list of pictures in the current page, and so on. Don't tell me these are "power user" or developer features! Firefox for Android is also very good, IMHO better than Chrome, and it supports uBlock, Stylish, and so on.
- kbrosnan 10y ago
  Adobe reversed its NPAPI support instead of being stuck on the 12.x branch Adobe now ships the current version of Flash to Firefox on Linux. https://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/ https://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/
  - unsignedint 10y ago
    I migrated back to Firefox from Chrome recently after hearing this news. Though Flash is becoming less and less relevant, but it was bit annoying before.
baby 10y ago
Same here, I personally don't understand people who can use a browser that does not support Tree Style Tab. Serious browsing requires nested tabs on the side.
mistermann 10y ago
Open say 5 to 10 tabs with various twitter profiles loaded in them, does your Firefox still perform reasonably well? 3 twitter tabs open is enough to kill my performance.
- fredsanford 10y ago
  So, because of one poorly designed shitty website you're moaning about FF being bad? You should be moaning about Twitter with its bliveted 8 tons of javascript in a 5 pount sack. You can add espn.com, washingtonpost.com and nytimes.com to that list as well. Blivetware.
  - scrollaway 10y ago
    It's a fair complaint when this doesn't happen on other browsers. Your website doesn't have to have "shitty poor design" for it to lag FF. Compare scrubbing in this React player in Chrome and Firefox: https://hsreplay.net/replay/WpWzqzkCHTGdEmbguHUoiC https://hsreplay.net/replay/WpWzqzkCHTGdEmbguHUoiC It comes down to issues in the Firefox JS/DOM engines.
    - fredsanford 10y ago
      The websites I called Blivetware are shitty on all the browsers I've tried. I guess it's truly YMMV... In my experience, Twitter and ESPN can bring any browser to its knees
  - mistermann 10y ago
    I'd rather a browser that can handle shitty websites than hoping every website will somehow magically be written efficiently. Especially since FF is the only browser I know of that can't handle multiple active javascript sessions. It's completely absurd if you think about it, I mean it's a browser, for browsing websites, which use javascript.
- cyphar 10y ago
  The same happens for me in Chrome. Twitter is the issue, not your browser.
macspoofing 10y ago
We have a performance sensitive application. Firefox is faster than ie but slower than Safari, Chrome and Edge.
- bzbarsky 10y ago
  If there's any way you can provide a link that can be used to reproduce the problem (either here or in private mail), I would be very much interested in investigating this performance problem.
  - macspoofing 10y ago
    Sure. Sounds great. I'd prefer private message - what is your preferred way to receive the link?
    - bzbarsky 10y ago
      Email to my username at mit.edu would be great. Thank you!
    - bzbarsky 10y ago
      Thank you for the link! I have some more questions that I sent in email to you. Don't know whether those ended up in spam or something; could you check?
armitron 10y ago
> I've been using Firefox for years without any problems and find it much better (just as fast, more privacy-minded) than chrome. Then you must not value security at all. Firefox is by far the worst of the modern browsers in how easy it's to exploit. Don't listen to me, listen to the experts [1] [2] [3] I would go as far as to say that if Firefox is your main browser, odds are you're owned by multiple parties, and I don't mean nation states. This can not be fixed by iterative improvements, Firefox needs to die. By far the best thing you can do for your online peace of mind is to switch to Chromium/Chrome or (on Windows only) Edge. [1] https://twitter.com/thegrugq/status/803693249789509632 https://twitter.com/thegrugq/status/803693249789509632 [2] https://medium.com/@thegrugq/tor-and-its-discontents-ef5164845908 https://medium.com/@thegrugq/tor-and-its-discontents-ef51648... [3] https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-wont-attack-firefox-because-its-too-easy https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-w...
- yborg 10y ago
  Your statement may be valid, but the two links you provided don't seem to have much to say on that topic. The first refers to a bug currently fixed in current GA Firefox, the second is a rant about Tor bundle. If reblogging snark is the standard of proof here, anyone could justify any "modern browser" as "worst". My counterargument is that Firefox has always and continues to support tools such as NoScript and uBlock that prevent whole classes of attack. And Chrome, for example, is pwned like clockwork at every contest for exploitation. Behavior and not platform is the biggest determinant of security online.
  - armitron 10y ago
    If you're talking about Pwn2own, they've dropped Firefox from the competition __because it was too easy to exploit__ [1]. I quote: "For the last decade, the Pwn2own hacking competition has pitted the world's best hackers against web browsers to try and find zero-day vulnerabilities in a live event. The contest, which is sponsored by HPE and TrendMicro this year, is offering over half a million dollars in prize money, but for the first time, not a penny of that will directed to Mozilla Firefox. While Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome and Apple Safari are targets, Firefox isn't because it's apparently too easy and not keeping up with modern security: "'We wanted to focus on the browsers that have made serious security improvements in the last year,' Brian Gorenc, manager of Vulnerability Research at HPE said." How is that for a slap in the face? Selectively reading what you like and ignoring the rest [an entire section in the second link is devoted to Firefox issues that have nothing to do with TBB, including the conclusion] won't change the basic facts. Another point those not in the security domain miss, is that there are plenty of exploitable bugs that are deliberately kept private. Those who have visibility in these circles (such as thegrugq) are obviously in a much better position to appraise how secure a software system really is. Trying to determine how secure Firefox is just from CVEs and bugs that are made public will only lead you to a piece of the entire puzzle. In Firefox case, even that alone should be enough to trigger RED ALERT in somebody's mind. The best we can all hope for is for people to stop using Firefox and flock to alternatives that raise the bar significantly. [1] https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-wont-attack-firefox-because-its-too-easy https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-w...

ZenoArrow 10y ago

Agreed. I prefer Firefox, but I recognise there's really not that much difference between Firefox and Chrome in terms of usability and features, they both seem about on par to me (some areas Firefox is slightly ahead, some areas Chrome is slightly ahead). The suggestion that Firefox is something "time forgot" is basically just trolling, someone looking for a reaction rather than something substantial.

komali2 10y ago
The numbers don't back either of your claims, though - significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox. I for one appreciate chrome for the fact that it syncs with my google everything, across all devices, google accounts, etc. I'm probably going to hate myself for my blase attitude towards security when I inevitably end up on some massive dump of hacked accounts, but I've kind of given up on privacy/security. It's just so convenient to be able to pull up on my phone the tab I had open on my browser when I'm in the kitchen cooking, or whatever.
- ZenoArrow 10y ago
  >"The numbers don't back either of your claims, though - significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox." The reason we're in disagreement is we're picking different forms of comparison. You're looking at popularity, I'm looking at technology. I don't dispute more people use Chrome, but that doesn't make it automatically better from a technical point of view. As I said before, technically Firefox and Chrome are fairly equal, and there are benchmarks and feature comparisons that back this up.
- myowncrapulence 10y ago
  for the fact that it syncs with my google everything, across all devices, google accounts, etc. Shudders My god that's the last thing I'd ever want and exactly why I avoid Chrome and Android devices.
- rebelwebmaster 10y ago
  "It's just so convenient to be able to pull up on my phone the tab I had open on my browser when I'm in the kitchen cooking, or whatever." FWIW, Firefox supports syncing tabs between devices as well.
  - funnyfacts365 10y ago
    Yes it does. My 2 laptops and 2 Android phones all use the dame profile. Everything syncs, tabs, passwords, addons...
  - icc97 10y ago
    The firefox syncing is awesome. FF syncing feels friendly and the Chrome feels like a stranger being 'overly' friendly. Somehow I'm willing to sell most of the rest of my soul, but not my browsing history.
- vacri 10y ago
  > significantly more people use Safari and Chrome than use Firefox This is true. Significantly more people use "Safari and Chrome" than "Firefox". However, significantly less people use "Safari" than "Firefox". Chrome is the gorilla, Safari is waaaaaaay back in the pack.
  - bzbarsky 10y ago
    It depends on whether you count "desktop" market share, "mobile" market share, or "both" (and if "both" how you weight it).

CaptSpify 10y ago

As a dedicated FF user: It feels significantly slower than chrome, it's hard to figure out what tab is killing things, and they keep making choices that I consider highly questionable. I do love FF, and it is the browser I use everyday. But it's not without it's own warts, which Chrome is much better at hiding.

iaml 10y ago
Exactly that, it feels slow. On my laptop I have chrome and nightly firefox which typically is faster than stable branch. I have tons of addons in chrome and only ublock in ff, and yet chrome feels much more responsive compared to ff.
disordinary 10y ago
I've found that in recent times Chrome has started to feel bloated and slow and firefox (with minimal addons) feels much more zippy. However Firefox does seem to be a bit more temperamental when something else is using significant CPU. Ultimately I prefer Firefox.
pimeys 10y ago
After version 50.0 I switched back from Opera. The deal is to get the e10s multiprocess windows on. It might be disabled because some of the addons. You can try to enforce it or like in my case with only uBlock Origin and Privacy Badger installed, it was on by default. This browser is seriously fast now on Linux. I couldn't be happier with it. I've used it for weeks already, browsing a lot and it's still as snappy as when I installed it. Good job. And soon we'll start getting the Servo stuff...
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  I've tried turning it on via https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis#Force_Enable https://wiki.mozilla.org/Electrolysis#Force_Enable, but it still doens't seem to be on per about:support unfortunately. If you have any other suggestions for getting it going, I'd appreciate it. One additional complaint I have about FF: It's hard to find out where to change the setting that I want. I constantly have to ddg for "How do I change $x" and I end up with 3 different answers for 3 different revisions. If anyone knows of a good resource for me to find this out, I would appreciate it.

etatoby 10y ago

Same here. I keep Chrome on Linux only for its developer tools, which are clearly more performant, and for its updated and sandboxed Flash. But I only bring it up for those two features. Otherwise Firefox with a ton of extensions, including Tab Center, is my default choice. I don't see in what way it would be inferior to Chrome. In fact, it has several user-level features that I miss in other browsers, such as column / rectangular selection of tables, automatic saving of form input, Ctrl+I dialog with a list of pictures in the current page, and so on. Don't tell me these are "power user" or developer features! Firefox for Android is also very good, IMHO better than Chrome, and it supports uBlock, Stylish, and so on.

kbrosnan 10y ago
Adobe reversed its NPAPI support instead of being stuck on the 12.x branch Adobe now ships the current version of Flash to Firefox on Linux. https://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/ https://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/
- unsignedint 10y ago
  I migrated back to Firefox from Chrome recently after hearing this news. Though Flash is becoming less and less relevant, but it was bit annoying before.

baby 10y ago

Same here, I personally don't understand people who can use a browser that does not support Tree Style Tab. Serious browsing requires nested tabs on the side.

mistermann 10y ago

Open say 5 to 10 tabs with various twitter profiles loaded in them, does your Firefox still perform reasonably well? 3 twitter tabs open is enough to kill my performance.

fredsanford 10y ago
So, because of one poorly designed shitty website you're moaning about FF being bad? You should be moaning about Twitter with its bliveted 8 tons of javascript in a 5 pount sack. You can add espn.com, washingtonpost.com and nytimes.com to that list as well. Blivetware.
- scrollaway 10y ago
  It's a fair complaint when this doesn't happen on other browsers. Your website doesn't have to have "shitty poor design" for it to lag FF. Compare scrubbing in this React player in Chrome and Firefox: https://hsreplay.net/replay/WpWzqzkCHTGdEmbguHUoiC https://hsreplay.net/replay/WpWzqzkCHTGdEmbguHUoiC It comes down to issues in the Firefox JS/DOM engines.
  - fredsanford 10y ago
    The websites I called Blivetware are shitty on all the browsers I've tried. I guess it's truly YMMV... In my experience, Twitter and ESPN can bring any browser to its knees
- mistermann 10y ago
  I'd rather a browser that can handle shitty websites than hoping every website will somehow magically be written efficiently. Especially since FF is the only browser I know of that can't handle multiple active javascript sessions. It's completely absurd if you think about it, I mean it's a browser, for browsing websites, which use javascript.
cyphar 10y ago
The same happens for me in Chrome. Twitter is the issue, not your browser.

macspoofing 10y ago

We have a performance sensitive application. Firefox is faster than ie but slower than Safari, Chrome and Edge.

bzbarsky 10y ago
If there's any way you can provide a link that can be used to reproduce the problem (either here or in private mail), I would be very much interested in investigating this performance problem.
- macspoofing 10y ago
  Sure. Sounds great. I'd prefer private message - what is your preferred way to receive the link?
  - bzbarsky 10y ago
    Email to my username at mit.edu would be great. Thank you!
  - bzbarsky 10y ago
    Thank you for the link! I have some more questions that I sent in email to you. Don't know whether those ended up in spam or something; could you check?

armitron 10y ago

> I've been using Firefox for years without any problems and find it much better (just as fast, more privacy-minded) than chrome. Then you must not value security at all. Firefox is by far the worst of the modern browsers in how easy it's to exploit. Don't listen to me, listen to the experts [1] [2] [3] I would go as far as to say that if Firefox is your main browser, odds are you're owned by multiple parties, and I don't mean nation states. This can not be fixed by iterative improvements, Firefox needs to die. By far the best thing you can do for your online peace of mind is to switch to Chromium/Chrome or (on Windows only) Edge. [1] https://twitter.com/thegrugq/status/803693249789509632 https://twitter.com/thegrugq/status/803693249789509632 [2] https://medium.com/@thegrugq/tor-and-its-discontents-ef5164845908 https://medium.com/@thegrugq/tor-and-its-discontents-ef51648... [3] https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-wont-attack-firefox-because-its-too-easy https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-w...

yborg 10y ago
Your statement may be valid, but the two links you provided don't seem to have much to say on that topic. The first refers to a bug currently fixed in current GA Firefox, the second is a rant about Tor bundle. If reblogging snark is the standard of proof here, anyone could justify any "modern browser" as "worst". My counterargument is that Firefox has always and continues to support tools such as NoScript and uBlock that prevent whole classes of attack. And Chrome, for example, is pwned like clockwork at every contest for exploitation. Behavior and not platform is the biggest determinant of security online.
- armitron 10y ago
  If you're talking about Pwn2own, they've dropped Firefox from the competition __because it was too easy to exploit__ [1]. I quote: "For the last decade, the Pwn2own hacking competition has pitted the world's best hackers against web browsers to try and find zero-day vulnerabilities in a live event. The contest, which is sponsored by HPE and TrendMicro this year, is offering over half a million dollars in prize money, but for the first time, not a penny of that will directed to Mozilla Firefox. While Microsoft Edge, Google Chrome and Apple Safari are targets, Firefox isn't because it's apparently too easy and not keeping up with modern security: "'We wanted to focus on the browsers that have made serious security improvements in the last year,' Brian Gorenc, manager of Vulnerability Research at HPE said." How is that for a slap in the face? Selectively reading what you like and ignoring the rest [an entire section in the second link is devoted to Firefox issues that have nothing to do with TBB, including the conclusion] won't change the basic facts. Another point those not in the security domain miss, is that there are plenty of exploitable bugs that are deliberately kept private. Those who have visibility in these circles (such as thegrugq) are obviously in a much better position to appraise how secure a software system really is. Trying to determine how secure Firefox is just from CVEs and bugs that are made public will only lead you to a piece of the entire puzzle. In Firefox case, even that alone should be enough to trigger RED ALERT in somebody's mind. The best we can all hope for is for people to stop using Firefox and flock to alternatives that raise the bar significantly. [1] https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-wont-attack-firefox-because-its-too-easy https://it.slashdot.org/story/16/02/12/034206/pwn2own-2016-w...