5 ms·

It seems that it's faster on every website I use except Gmail, Google Voice, and Youtube. I wonder whether Google is using some sort of Chrome-specific javascri

It seems that it's faster on every website I use except Gmail, Google Voice, and Youtube. I wonder whether Google is using some sort of Chrome-specific javascript to make those sites run faster in their own browser?

kroltan 6y ago
I'm not sure if this is still the case, but Youtube used to use WebComponents v0 which has to be emulated in JS in non-Webkit browsers, since only Google ever implemented v0, while everyone else agreed it required a bit more work, and other engines run v1 instead, which is not compatible.
- konart 6y ago
  Youtube was updated to the v1 quite some time ago with a fresh Polymer version >Polymer.version 3.4.0 Polymer uses v1 WCs since Polymer v2
  - kroltan 6y ago
    Thanks! I had no idea how to check if it was still the case.
- chrismorgan 6y ago
  The main YouTube site seems to still be lousy in Firefox. Buttons that should open dropdowns (e.g. the top right corner user icon and notifications icon) don’t. If I want to actually see notifications, I need to tack ?disable_polymer=1 onto the URL and experience the ancient site! YouTube Studio doesn’t suffer from these problems.
  - kroltan 6y ago
    Hmm, seems to work fine for me.
    - chrismorgan 6y ago
      I have no idea when it stopped working, because I scarcely ever used the affected buttons until very recently—I have a vague feeling it might have worked three or four years ago, but in the last couple of months it’s definitely not been working for me. uBlock Origin is the only extension that I have that could feasibly alter anything, and all it’s doing is blocking googleads.g.doubleclick.net. Nothing of interest shows up in the dev tools. 99.9% sure the bug is with YouTube, though in what particular way I cannot guess.
      - skykooler 6y ago
        I can confirm that uBlock Origin blocks the notification dropdown on Firefox. Does the dropdown get served by the ads server?
        chrismorgan 6y ago
        Ah hah! Figured it out: some cosmetic filter is killing the dropdowns. Unfortunately the effecting rule is not discernable in the dev tools, so figuring out which rule is at fault is tricky and slow. Found which one, too: it was a rule of my own that I added almost a year ago to kill off some of the annoying cards they pop up at the ends of many videos, which hide the video content; turns out my rule was just a touch too broad for how they do things. Mea culpa.
        skykooler 6y ago
        Aha! In my case it was a filter I added to block the "Upgrade to YouTube Red" banner that kept coming up even after I clicked "No thanks".
      - kroltan 6y ago
        I use uBlock (and some others) and have no problems clicking either buttons
yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago
It doesn't exactly need to be Chrome-specific; every browser/JS engine will have slightly different performance on different workloads, so Google just has to lean heavily on things that are golden-path for Chrome. They could even do this accidentally/nonmaliciously just by mostly testing on Chrome and not testing performance on other browsers.
- derf_ 6y ago
  > They could even do this accidentally/nonmaliciously Designing a development process that naturally achieves a malicious outcome is just as bad as actively making malicious decisions: https://www.zdnet.com/article/former-mozilla-exec-google-has-sabotaged-firefox-for-years/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/former-mozilla-exec-google-has...
  - afiori 6y ago
    Wouldn't it rather be "Maintaining and not fixing" rather than "Designing"? Google is perfectly allowed to make mistakes or forget something. The criticism is that this is a repeated behavior, as if they decided that it is never going to be a priority.
symplee 6y ago
I can corroborate this. YouTube especially. Does anyone have any hard numbers to validate this? Or are we just random outliers?
- dr_zoidberg 6y ago
  More anecdata: every Google product I use (GMail, Google Drive/Docs, YouTube) either works slower or eventually develops memory leaks on Firefox.
curiousgal 6y ago
Judging by how they treat those websites on Android on Firefox vs Chrome I am most definitely certain they are doing that.
- leeoniya 6y ago
  Reminds me of the Chappelle Show skit about Kinko's: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR7LOtMix9w&t=155 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR7LOtMix9w&t=155 "A lot of people ask, 'Why? Why treat [other browsers] this way?'" "Why? 'cause f*ck 'em, that's why."
vl 6y ago
Nothing specifically malicious. Since Chrome is default browser at Google, it’s used as default development and profiling browser, and then it’s ported to and tested on other browsers, obviously not as much.

kroltan 6y ago

I'm not sure if this is still the case, but Youtube used to use WebComponents v0 which has to be emulated in JS in non-Webkit browsers, since only Google ever implemented v0, while everyone else agreed it required a bit more work, and other engines run v1 instead, which is not compatible.

konart 6y ago
Youtube was updated to the v1 quite some time ago with a fresh Polymer version >Polymer.version 3.4.0 Polymer uses v1 WCs since Polymer v2
- kroltan 6y ago
  Thanks! I had no idea how to check if it was still the case.
chrismorgan 6y ago
The main YouTube site seems to still be lousy in Firefox. Buttons that should open dropdowns (e.g. the top right corner user icon and notifications icon) don’t. If I want to actually see notifications, I need to tack ?disable_polymer=1 onto the URL and experience the ancient site! YouTube Studio doesn’t suffer from these problems.
- kroltan 6y ago
  Hmm, seems to work fine for me.
  - chrismorgan 6y ago
    I have no idea when it stopped working, because I scarcely ever used the affected buttons until very recently—I have a vague feeling it might have worked three or four years ago, but in the last couple of months it’s definitely not been working for me. uBlock Origin is the only extension that I have that could feasibly alter anything, and all it’s doing is blocking googleads.g.doubleclick.net. Nothing of interest shows up in the dev tools. 99.9% sure the bug is with YouTube, though in what particular way I cannot guess.
    - skykooler 6y ago
      I can confirm that uBlock Origin blocks the notification dropdown on Firefox. Does the dropdown get served by the ads server?
      - chrismorgan 6y ago
        Ah hah! Figured it out: some cosmetic filter is killing the dropdowns. Unfortunately the effecting rule is not discernable in the dev tools, so figuring out which rule is at fault is tricky and slow. Found which one, too: it was a rule of my own that I added almost a year ago to kill off some of the annoying cards they pop up at the ends of many videos, which hide the video content; turns out my rule was just a touch too broad for how they do things. Mea culpa.
        skykooler 6y ago
        Aha! In my case it was a filter I added to block the "Upgrade to YouTube Red" banner that kept coming up even after I clicked "No thanks".
    - kroltan 6y ago
      I use uBlock (and some others) and have no problems clicking either buttons

yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago

It doesn't exactly need to be Chrome-specific; every browser/JS engine will have slightly different performance on different workloads, so Google just has to lean heavily on things that are golden-path for Chrome. They could even do this accidentally/nonmaliciously just by mostly testing on Chrome and not testing performance on other browsers.

derf_ 6y ago
> They could even do this accidentally/nonmaliciously Designing a development process that naturally achieves a malicious outcome is just as bad as actively making malicious decisions: https://www.zdnet.com/article/former-mozilla-exec-google-has-sabotaged-firefox-for-years/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/former-mozilla-exec-google-has...
- afiori 6y ago
  Wouldn't it rather be "Maintaining and not fixing" rather than "Designing"? Google is perfectly allowed to make mistakes or forget something. The criticism is that this is a repeated behavior, as if they decided that it is never going to be a priority.

symplee 6y ago

I can corroborate this. YouTube especially. Does anyone have any hard numbers to validate this? Or are we just random outliers?

dr_zoidberg 6y ago
More anecdata: every Google product I use (GMail, Google Drive/Docs, YouTube) either works slower or eventually develops memory leaks on Firefox.

curiousgal 6y ago

Judging by how they treat those websites on Android on Firefox vs Chrome I am most definitely certain they are doing that.

leeoniya 6y ago
Reminds me of the Chappelle Show skit about Kinko's: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR7LOtMix9w&t=155 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR7LOtMix9w&t=155 "A lot of people ask, 'Why? Why treat [other browsers] this way?'" "Why? 'cause f*ck 'em, that's why."

vl 6y ago

Nothing specifically malicious. Since Chrome is default browser at Google, it’s used as default development and profiling browser, and then it’s ported to and tested on other browsers, obviously not as much.