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I would advice against using Chromium on Android. For one, it's still Google and to my knowledge still phones home to the mothership. For two, Chromium/Chrome i

by zaarn 8y ago

I would advice against using Chromium on Android. For one, it's still Google and to my knowledge still phones home to the mothership. For two, Chromium/Chrome is becoming the next IE and I sincerely believe that encouraging further ieficiation of the web towards Chrome is not desirable for anyone involved. On the other side, I would amend AnySoft keyboard into that list, which is much more useful than Hacker's Keyboard (due to being less dense) and has a pretty okayish autocorrect (still better than the rest). NewPipe is also a solid choice and I recommend it to everyone even if you don't want to FLOSS your phone since it's miles better than the youtube app (downloads, background play, doesn't require signup but still offers subscriptions and playlists, popup mode).

Fnoord 8y ago
You can use Firefox on Android, but applications showing WWW will use WebView or whatever it is called.
- zaarn 8y ago
  Correct, to my knowledge there isn't a way to avoid this cleanly.
  - Fnoord 8y ago
    I got developer mode enabled on my phone and it allows me to select an alternative for WebView, but there's no options available. Its terribly annoying because a browser is about customising the WWW to your tailor. Not possible with WebView. Adblocker for example doesn't work. Though microG doesn't implement Google Ads.
    - zaarn 8y ago
      I think that option only exists to taunt and laugh at you, not to actually change webview. For adblocking I use pihole in addition to uMatrix on the Firefox Mobile browser (and desktop), it gets rid of 99.99% of ads.
      - ufo 8y ago
        AdAway is another option, if you have a rooted phone and don't have pihole on your network.
        craftyguy 8y ago
        There are options that don't require root.. like Blockada and DNS66. Both of which are on f-droid.
        Fnoord 8y ago
        I run Pi-Hole in Docker and connect to it via WireGuard. I then use a forwarding DNS server which catches all DNS requests and uses DNS over TLS. Hardware used: EdgeRouter-Lite. Results: slightly higher latency, obviously, but no ads and secure DNS traffic and secure traffic regardless of where my client resides or over which network. I also use LineageOS with microG which doesn't implement Google ads in the first place, and Firefox + uBlock Origin just in case. uMatrix is good, but too much of a hassle to configure IMO.
    - adrianmalacoda 8y ago
      The list of allowed WebView implementations is baked into the ROM and, by default, only includes the AOSP WebView and various flavors of Chrome.
sureaboutthis 8y ago
I use Chrome on Android and all Google products extensively for the wide and free variety of programs and services they offer. As far as I know, no one knows anything about me that I didn't freely put online. I have not been oppressed, jailed or denied anything in life since.
- zaarn 8y ago
  IEfication isn't really about oppression tbh, it's about Websites telling me "This application only works in Google Chrome" and completely locking me out. And they work in Firefox once you spoof the useragent. If they don't it's 99/100 times because Chrome is not being spec compliant or doing something dumb. Rarely because Firefox simply doesn't support it. Having only one browser in the market/ecosystem is dangerous, we learned that with IE.
  - sureaboutthis 8y ago
    That has nothing to do with Chrome. It's bad (horrible!) web developers and their product. You can't blame Google or Chrome for that. Good web developers create sites built toward standards, not browsers. I occasionally read of people who claim such sites exist, and I'm sure they do, but I have as yet to find one while living on the web all day. (I'm a web developer.)
    - zaarn 8y ago
      I blame Google and Chrome. Because Google continues to push for marketshare. If their devs were good devs they would strive for a balanced marketshare, not domination. This is obviously not what Google is doing, therefore I blame them just as much as the web devs. If you want an example, though recently fixed after I sent of a very angry complaint, the ELSTER tax system in Germany didn't work if you had a certificate login on Firefox+Linux but it worked on Chrome+Linux. Another example is some of google's own websites, which break U2F authentication at times, though it might have been fixed in the meantime.
    - mrpopo 8y ago
      > You can't blame Google or Chrome for that. Google themselves are building "Chrome-only" websites. https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/4/16805216/google-chrome-only-sites-internet-explorer-6-web-standards https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/4/16805216/google-chrome-onl...
robocat 8y ago
> Chromium/Chrome is becoming the next IE Because it (a) works great for users, (b) is the most secure (check reported vulnerabilities) (c) by far the best at fixing reported bugs in my experience, and (d) is by far the best for development for me. Safari, Firefox and Edge are failing to win on the shit that matters, and as a web developer all three competitors make my life bad.
- zaarn 8y ago
  And we learned nothing from the IE era? The problem with IE wasn't only that it was bad, that was the cherry on the shitpile, the real problem was that it had 90% marketshare and websites simply would not work with anything else. In re: to your points A) doesn't work great for me, there isn't even an integrated side view or screenshot addon, not even mentioning the lack of integrated tracking blocker B) lower number of reported vulnerabilities != most secure, this should be fairly obvious if you ever worked with netsec and websec people C) I heavily disagree, chrome developers simply ignore bug reports if the resolution doesn't fit into their agenda. If your site doesn't work on chrome, you either suck it up and make it work or be prepared for chrome devs to ignore you unless you're big enough for them to care. D) For you maybe, rest of the world? maybe. The Firefox Dev console has been utterly sufficient for my use cases in webdev. You should intensely care about Edge, Firefox and maybe even Safari failing to win because if they do loose then you're going to be part of the group that will be responsible for the next IEficiation of the internet.
danShumway 8y ago
Chrome has been having a really negative effect on web standards recently. I don't want to derail anything going down that rabbit hole, but just to reitterate the point above: I wish more people would break away from Chrome. They have a bad habit of trying to force standards through the W3C without thinking through what they're doing, they're really bad at responding to bug reports or engaging with devs, they regularly introduce breaking changes to existing web content without giving user overrides. The recent audio changes are a good example of just how broken their dev process is[0]. Firefox is still Firefox, they're fine. The Edge team honestly is pretty great too. Working with Chrome devs as a web developer kind of stinks, and I think it's partially because they're so dominant and they just don't have to care. Especially on mobile, if you're even remotely a power user Firefox is just flat-out a better Android browser since it supports extensions. [0]: https://danshumway.com/blog/chrome-autoplay/ https://danshumway.com/blog/chrome-autoplay/
- zaarn 8y ago
  I totally agree, the extensions in Firefox Mobile are simply a lifesaver and being able to seamlessly send links to the mothership computer at home is simply unbeatable.
- slavak 8y ago
  As a longtime Firefox user, on mobile I actually use Opera. I really wish I could use Firefox on Android, but for some reason Opera is the last mobile browser to support proper text reflow, which is a feature I cannot fathom a reason for actually removing. On the plus side, it might not have extensions, but Opera is a pretty damn solid mobile browser, especially now that they've added night(-ish) mode support.
krn 8y ago
> I would advice against using Chromium on Android. CopperheadOS had a different take on this, and recommended Chromium for FLOSS-only Android[1]: "Avoid Gecko-based browsers like Firefox. They’re significantly less secure and are among the few apps not able to benefit from the full set of CopperheadOS hardening features due to shipping their own linker and custom JIT compiler within the app process. The WebView is inherently Chromium-based so using Gecko also means exposing the attack surface of two browser engines rather than one. Firefox Focus currently uses the system WebView rather than Gecko but Mozilla plans to change that." [1] https://copperhead.co/android/docs/usage_guide#browsing https://copperhead.co/android/docs/usage_guide#browsing

by zaarn 8y ago

Fnoord 8y ago

You can use Firefox on Android, but applications showing WWW will use WebView or whatever it is called.

zaarn 8y ago
Correct, to my knowledge there isn't a way to avoid this cleanly.
- Fnoord 8y ago
  I got developer mode enabled on my phone and it allows me to select an alternative for WebView, but there's no options available. Its terribly annoying because a browser is about customising the WWW to your tailor. Not possible with WebView. Adblocker for example doesn't work. Though microG doesn't implement Google Ads.
  - zaarn 8y ago
    I think that option only exists to taunt and laugh at you, not to actually change webview. For adblocking I use pihole in addition to uMatrix on the Firefox Mobile browser (and desktop), it gets rid of 99.99% of ads.
    - ufo 8y ago
      AdAway is another option, if you have a rooted phone and don't have pihole on your network.
      - craftyguy 8y ago
        There are options that don't require root.. like Blockada and DNS66. Both of which are on f-droid.
      - Fnoord 8y ago
        I run Pi-Hole in Docker and connect to it via WireGuard. I then use a forwarding DNS server which catches all DNS requests and uses DNS over TLS. Hardware used: EdgeRouter-Lite. Results: slightly higher latency, obviously, but no ads and secure DNS traffic and secure traffic regardless of where my client resides or over which network. I also use LineageOS with microG which doesn't implement Google ads in the first place, and Firefox + uBlock Origin just in case. uMatrix is good, but too much of a hassle to configure IMO.
  - adrianmalacoda 8y ago
    The list of allowed WebView implementations is baked into the ROM and, by default, only includes the AOSP WebView and various flavors of Chrome.

sureaboutthis 8y ago

I use Chrome on Android and all Google products extensively for the wide and free variety of programs and services they offer. As far as I know, no one knows anything about me that I didn't freely put online. I have not been oppressed, jailed or denied anything in life since.

zaarn 8y ago
IEfication isn't really about oppression tbh, it's about Websites telling me "This application only works in Google Chrome" and completely locking me out. And they work in Firefox once you spoof the useragent. If they don't it's 99/100 times because Chrome is not being spec compliant or doing something dumb. Rarely because Firefox simply doesn't support it. Having only one browser in the market/ecosystem is dangerous, we learned that with IE.
- sureaboutthis 8y ago
  That has nothing to do with Chrome. It's bad (horrible!) web developers and their product. You can't blame Google or Chrome for that. Good web developers create sites built toward standards, not browsers. I occasionally read of people who claim such sites exist, and I'm sure they do, but I have as yet to find one while living on the web all day. (I'm a web developer.)
  - zaarn 8y ago
    I blame Google and Chrome. Because Google continues to push for marketshare. If their devs were good devs they would strive for a balanced marketshare, not domination. This is obviously not what Google is doing, therefore I blame them just as much as the web devs. If you want an example, though recently fixed after I sent of a very angry complaint, the ELSTER tax system in Germany didn't work if you had a certificate login on Firefox+Linux but it worked on Chrome+Linux. Another example is some of google's own websites, which break U2F authentication at times, though it might have been fixed in the meantime.
  - mrpopo 8y ago
    > You can't blame Google or Chrome for that. Google themselves are building "Chrome-only" websites. https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/4/16805216/google-chrome-only-sites-internet-explorer-6-web-standards https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/4/16805216/google-chrome-onl...

robocat 8y ago

> Chromium/Chrome is becoming the next IE Because it (a) works great for users, (b) is the most secure (check reported vulnerabilities) (c) by far the best at fixing reported bugs in my experience, and (d) is by far the best for development for me. Safari, Firefox and Edge are failing to win on the shit that matters, and as a web developer all three competitors make my life bad.

zaarn 8y ago
And we learned nothing from the IE era? The problem with IE wasn't only that it was bad, that was the cherry on the shitpile, the real problem was that it had 90% marketshare and websites simply would not work with anything else. In re: to your points A) doesn't work great for me, there isn't even an integrated side view or screenshot addon, not even mentioning the lack of integrated tracking blocker B) lower number of reported vulnerabilities != most secure, this should be fairly obvious if you ever worked with netsec and websec people C) I heavily disagree, chrome developers simply ignore bug reports if the resolution doesn't fit into their agenda. If your site doesn't work on chrome, you either suck it up and make it work or be prepared for chrome devs to ignore you unless you're big enough for them to care. D) For you maybe, rest of the world? maybe. The Firefox Dev console has been utterly sufficient for my use cases in webdev. You should intensely care about Edge, Firefox and maybe even Safari failing to win because if they do loose then you're going to be part of the group that will be responsible for the next IEficiation of the internet.

danShumway 8y ago

Chrome has been having a really negative effect on web standards recently. I don't want to derail anything going down that rabbit hole, but just to reitterate the point above: I wish more people would break away from Chrome. They have a bad habit of trying to force standards through the W3C without thinking through what they're doing, they're really bad at responding to bug reports or engaging with devs, they regularly introduce breaking changes to existing web content without giving user overrides. The recent audio changes are a good example of just how broken their dev process is[0]. Firefox is still Firefox, they're fine. The Edge team honestly is pretty great too. Working with Chrome devs as a web developer kind of stinks, and I think it's partially because they're so dominant and they just don't have to care. Especially on mobile, if you're even remotely a power user Firefox is just flat-out a better Android browser since it supports extensions. [0]: https://danshumway.com/blog/chrome-autoplay/ https://danshumway.com/blog/chrome-autoplay/

zaarn 8y ago
I totally agree, the extensions in Firefox Mobile are simply a lifesaver and being able to seamlessly send links to the mothership computer at home is simply unbeatable.
slavak 8y ago
As a longtime Firefox user, on mobile I actually use Opera. I really wish I could use Firefox on Android, but for some reason Opera is the last mobile browser to support proper text reflow, which is a feature I cannot fathom a reason for actually removing. On the plus side, it might not have extensions, but Opera is a pretty damn solid mobile browser, especially now that they've added night(-ish) mode support.

krn 8y ago

> I would advice against using Chromium on Android. CopperheadOS had a different take on this, and recommended Chromium for FLOSS-only Android[1]: "Avoid Gecko-based browsers like Firefox. They’re significantly less secure and are among the few apps not able to benefit from the full set of CopperheadOS hardening features due to shipping their own linker and custom JIT compiler within the app process. The WebView is inherently Chromium-based so using Gecko also means exposing the attack surface of two browser engines rather than one. Firefox Focus currently uses the system WebView rather than Gecko but Mozilla plans to change that." [1] https://copperhead.co/android/docs/usage_guide#browsing https://copperhead.co/android/docs/usage_guide#browsing