4 ms·

I find it rather discouraging to hear they are not removing the blocking API for now. It's basically an empty statement, not reassurance. They still may or may

I find it rather discouraging to hear they are not removing the blocking API for now. It's basically an empty statement, not reassurance. They still may or may not remove the API, they don't want to promise anything or show any commitment to users' needs and priorities.

wtallis 7y ago
It's basically the same as what happened two months ago with Firefox for Android being EOL'd pending a major re-write that may or may not support extensions. Mozilla is not willing to publicly commit to keeping their key features alive, and they keep hinting at the possibility that they will be leaving users behind in an attempt to be more like Chrome.
- Jonnax 7y ago
  A rewrite that is faster than Chrome for Android.
  - hajile 7y ago
    It may be faster than Chrome on Android, but it's certainly not faster than Firefox on Android with adblockers. Not loading/parsing multi-megabytes of Javascript and images is huge. Loads of ads these days incorporate entire JS framework toolchains resulting in a binary bigger than the page they're being injected into. Eliminating a few ads and the rest of your browser could be a lot less efficient and still perform well. That's all before discussing how adblockers also reduce who is tracking you everywhere.
    - Jonnax 7y ago
      It certainly is faster than Firefox for Android. There are benefits to adblocking of course. But there's no point lying.
    - tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
      In my experience and limited testing, even with warmed-up caches, Chrome (without Adblocker) was faster than Firefox (with or without Adblocker), sadly. I still use Firefox due to the security benefits of ad blocking, but I don't find the experience particularly enjoyable (although, thinking of it, it may have either significantly improved in the past ~half a year, or I just don't notice because of a more powerful CPU in my new phone).
  - bscphil 7y ago
    Eh. That may be the intent but they aren't there yet. I tested Firefox Preview on Speedometer 2.0 and got the same result I did with Firefox for Android 68. Chrome gets double the score (runs per minute) on my device.
- lol768 7y ago
  And the other point of view, directly from Mozilla: > We're certainly aware of how significant ad blocking extensions are. This release required a great quantity of features with only a six month timeline until now. > We already support a very limited set of the WebExtensions API to offer features like Reader Mode. Rest assured that more features will land in the coming months. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20298143 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20298143 This reads like FUD to me. The dev team know how important extensions are to their users. Can you provide a source that implies Fennec will be EOL before Fenix has extension and/or ad-blocking support?
  - mjw1007 7y ago
    In that discussion (and indeed in the message you quote), the mozilla developers had every incentive to say, if it were true, « we have decided not to replace fennec with fenix on Android until fenix supports ad-blockers ». They very visibly didn't take the opportunity to do so. From what I can make out on github, they're planning to replace fennec with fenix around the time the next ESR comes out (which I think is early 2020), and there isn't currently a project in progress to add the necessary web-extension support to fenix.
    - lol768 7y ago
      Thanks for this. >From what I can make out on github, they're planning to replace fennec with fenix around the time the next ESR comes out (which I think is early 2020), and there isn't currently a project in progress to add the necessary web-extension support to fenix. Would you mind linking the GitHub issues that have lead you to draw this conclusion, so I can take a look?
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
      - mjw1007 7y ago
        https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2019/06/27/reinventing-firefox-for-android-a-preview/ https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2019/06/27/reinventi... says they were planning in June to have a "feature-rich, polished" fennec release "this fall". https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 "[Meta] Fennec -> Fenix Transition" appears to say the transition will happen in Q4 2019. The Android releases of fennec used to be updated for each Firefox release, but moved to ESR with the most recent ESR release. I think that means that since then nobody has been keeping the Android port working as changes come in (but ESRs are supported for a year or more, so maybe I'm wrong to think that the date of the next ESR release is relevant). https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/574 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/574 is about web-extension support; the recent updates say: « Product is looking into feasibility » « Tentatively adding needs:gv label until we know what additional GV work will be needed to support general purpose extensions. » The issue is labelled 'Feature:FennecTransition' and 'feature request'. It isn't labelled 'should', and some other 'Feature:FennecTransition' issues are. It isn't clear to me whether they're planning to release a new version of "Firefox" on Google Play that uses the fenix codebase, or release fenix as a separate app and declare that the fennec one is obsolete. https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 and https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/934 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/934 have some interesting hints, but I can't tell what they've decided.
Allower 7y ago
And the alternative is an even more ridiculous claim to NEVER remove this API. Committing to your users needs and priorities is understanding that THEY MIGHT CHANGE.

wtallis 7y ago

It's basically the same as what happened two months ago with Firefox for Android being EOL'd pending a major re-write that may or may not support extensions. Mozilla is not willing to publicly commit to keeping their key features alive, and they keep hinting at the possibility that they will be leaving users behind in an attempt to be more like Chrome.

Jonnax 7y ago
A rewrite that is faster than Chrome for Android.
- hajile 7y ago
  It may be faster than Chrome on Android, but it's certainly not faster than Firefox on Android with adblockers. Not loading/parsing multi-megabytes of Javascript and images is huge. Loads of ads these days incorporate entire JS framework toolchains resulting in a binary bigger than the page they're being injected into. Eliminating a few ads and the rest of your browser could be a lot less efficient and still perform well. That's all before discussing how adblockers also reduce who is tracking you everywhere.
  - Jonnax 7y ago
    It certainly is faster than Firefox for Android. There are benefits to adblocking of course. But there's no point lying.
  - tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
    In my experience and limited testing, even with warmed-up caches, Chrome (without Adblocker) was faster than Firefox (with or without Adblocker), sadly. I still use Firefox due to the security benefits of ad blocking, but I don't find the experience particularly enjoyable (although, thinking of it, it may have either significantly improved in the past ~half a year, or I just don't notice because of a more powerful CPU in my new phone).
- bscphil 7y ago
  Eh. That may be the intent but they aren't there yet. I tested Firefox Preview on Speedometer 2.0 and got the same result I did with Firefox for Android 68. Chrome gets double the score (runs per minute) on my device.
lol768 7y ago
And the other point of view, directly from Mozilla: > We're certainly aware of how significant ad blocking extensions are. This release required a great quantity of features with only a six month timeline until now. > We already support a very limited set of the WebExtensions API to offer features like Reader Mode. Rest assured that more features will land in the coming months. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20298143 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20298143 This reads like FUD to me. The dev team know how important extensions are to their users. Can you provide a source that implies Fennec will be EOL before Fenix has extension and/or ad-blocking support?
- mjw1007 7y ago
  In that discussion (and indeed in the message you quote), the mozilla developers had every incentive to say, if it were true, « we have decided not to replace fennec with fenix on Android until fenix supports ad-blockers ». They very visibly didn't take the opportunity to do so. From what I can make out on github, they're planning to replace fennec with fenix around the time the next ESR comes out (which I think is early 2020), and there isn't currently a project in progress to add the necessary web-extension support to fenix.
  - lol768 7y ago
    Thanks for this. >From what I can make out on github, they're planning to replace fennec with fenix around the time the next ESR comes out (which I think is early 2020), and there isn't currently a project in progress to add the necessary web-extension support to fenix. Would you mind linking the GitHub issues that have lead you to draw this conclusion, so I can take a look?
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - mjw1007 7y ago
      https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2019/06/27/reinventing-firefox-for-android-a-preview/ https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2019/06/27/reinventi... says they were planning in June to have a "feature-rich, polished" fennec release "this fall". https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 "[Meta] Fennec -> Fenix Transition" appears to say the transition will happen in Q4 2019. The Android releases of fennec used to be updated for each Firefox release, but moved to ESR with the most recent ESR release. I think that means that since then nobody has been keeping the Android port working as changes come in (but ESRs are supported for a year or more, so maybe I'm wrong to think that the date of the next ESR release is relevant). https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/574 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/574 is about web-extension support; the recent updates say: « Product is looking into feasibility » « Tentatively adding needs:gv label until we know what additional GV work will be needed to support general purpose extensions. » The issue is labelled 'Feature:FennecTransition' and 'feature request'. It isn't labelled 'should', and some other 'Feature:FennecTransition' issues are. It isn't clear to me whether they're planning to release a new version of "Firefox" on Google Play that uses the fenix codebase, or release fenix as a separate app and declare that the fennec one is obsolete. https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/879 and https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/934 https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/934 have some interesting hints, but I can't tell what they've decided.

Allower 7y ago

And the alternative is an even more ridiculous claim to NEVER remove this API. Committing to your users needs and priorities is understanding that THEY MIGHT CHANGE.