4 ms·

That built in PDF viewer is another feature that could have been an addon. It's bloat which increases the browser's attack surface. It's completely unneeded giv

by elric 6y ago

That built in PDF viewer is another feature that could have been an addon. It's bloat which increases the browser's attack surface. It's completely unneeded given that just about every OS ships with some kind of PDF reader out of the box.

axelf4 6y ago
> It's bloat which increases the browser's attack surface. AFAICT PDF.js is just another JavaScript application and thus as sandboxed as any other website.
- est31 6y ago
  It's a js application and thus less exploitable than your average C application with tons of unsound code, but IIRC it belongs to the class of "privileged js" layer that Firefox has, so has special rights that usual website js doesn't have.
morpheuskafka 6y ago
The built-in PDF reader on Windows is literally to open the PDF in Edge.. so not very good UX for Firefox and also a good argument that browsers are expected to have PDF readers.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
toyg 6y ago
Thank Google - Chrome was the first browser to ship with a pdf reader, and people loved it. Now it's just expected that any browser should have a workable PDF reader built-in.
sp332 6y ago
The alternative was installing an Adobe plugin with no sandbox, so it made sense at the time.
godshatter 6y ago
I would like to see Mozilla modularize Firefox more. Browsers are such huge beasts that contain everything imaginable plus the kitchen sink these days. It would be nice for these kinds of features to be add-ons that can be disabled or deleted if their functionality is not needed or desired, freeing resources for other use. They can be part of the initial install so that Mozilla can provide the browser as they envision it, but be able to be removed for those who have other ideas of what their browser should consist of. I don't know how technically feasible that is with their code, but it makes sense to me from a developer standpoint.

by elric 6y ago

axelf4 6y ago

> It's bloat which increases the browser's attack surface. AFAICT PDF.js is just another JavaScript application and thus as sandboxed as any other website.

est31 6y ago
It's a js application and thus less exploitable than your average C application with tons of unsound code, but IIRC it belongs to the class of "privileged js" layer that Firefox has, so has special rights that usual website js doesn't have.

morpheuskafka 6y ago

The built-in PDF reader on Windows is literally to open the PDF in Edge.. so not very good UX for Firefox and also a good argument that browsers are expected to have PDF readers.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

toyg 6y ago

Thank Google - Chrome was the first browser to ship with a pdf reader, and people loved it. Now it's just expected that any browser should have a workable PDF reader built-in.

sp332 6y ago

The alternative was installing an Adobe plugin with no sandbox, so it made sense at the time.

godshatter 6y ago

I would like to see Mozilla modularize Firefox more. Browsers are such huge beasts that contain everything imaginable plus the kitchen sink these days. It would be nice for these kinds of features to be add-ons that can be disabled or deleted if their functionality is not needed or desired, freeing resources for other use. They can be part of the initial install so that Mozilla can provide the browser as they envision it, but be able to be removed for those who have other ideas of what their browser should consist of. I don't know how technically feasible that is with their code, but it makes sense to me from a developer standpoint.