16 ms·

> FTP support has been removed sigh

jszymborski 5y ago
It's my initial reaction too, but if I stop to think of Firefox as a huge, difficult-to-manage project where each feature costs dev resources and increases security risk, FTP support is probably the feature I wouldn't mind removed right next to the Pocket integration.
- handrous 5y ago
  On the one hand I'm OK with removing features to keep the browser slim. OTOH Firefox is vastly fatter than it was in its early versions, which supported FTP (and Gopher!), so it doesn't seem like FTP or other minor protocols are an actual cause of complexity- and bloat-creep. [EDIT] I'd actually be a lot happier with this if FF were more aggressively adding new Internet or alternative-Web protocols, or trying to use their platform to give things like federated social networks more visibility and better prominence (via, say, optional but tastefully promoted integration with the browser). That might also, you know, differentiate them and give me a reason to recommend it to non-nerds again, despite "it's way, way faster than anything else, and lighter on resources, and blocks pop-ups and has tabs and doesn't have an ad banner!" no longer being enough (or even true, for some of those qualities) like it was in the early days.
  - signal11 5y ago
    > OTOH Firefox is vastly fatter than it was in its early versions, which supported FTP (and Gopher!), so it doesn't seem like FTP or other minor protocols are an actual cause of complexity- and bloat-creep. I’m sure someone will correct me, but without looking at the source code, I suspect the following will have played a role in increasing code size since the earliest days of Phoenix: * support for newer media formats, from MP4 through AVIF * DRM maybe? * WebGL * SVG? * The complexity of modern CSS
    - handrous 5y ago
      Much, much bigger JS engine/sandbox, probably. Backwards compat with an ever-growing set of HTML, CSS, and JS. I'd guess a modern CSS engine is several times (dozens of times?) larger than what Phoenix shipped with. I expect their internal UI-drawing code/framework is a lot larger than in the Phoenix days. Webassembly. Canvas. And yeah, several of the other things you mentioned—video used to be the responsibility of plugins, for example. [EDIT] in fact, some things browsers do now were seen as terrible ideas when Phoenix was released, because they would kill performance, since they're so much more expensive than alternatives. Vector graphics were regarded as to-be-avoided for a long time, because they're so much more taxing on the client than raster. CSS doing animations would have been considered insane, fit only for "look how I can bring your machine to a crawl with a web page" demos. Maintaining an entire "shadow DOM" of Javascript objects would have been regarded as parody-levels of resource wasting for all but very niche use-cases. No wonder the modern web is so slow and resource-hungry....
    - hutzlibu 5y ago
      Or Wasm, or WebRTC, or indexedDB ... plus anything else on that long list: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API
  - spiritplumber 5y ago
    Firefox supporting Gemini would be awesome.
- sambe 5y ago
  I don't think my estimate of the cost of FTP maintenance would be as high as yours. Why do you think FTP would still be such a cost at this stage?
  - asoneth 5y ago
    I'm curious what your estimate would be. Mine would be somewhere between 0.5FTE assuming the bare minimum of keep-the-lights-on QA testing for each release and ongoing bug triage up to maybe 3FTE if it requires periodic security and design updates to keep up with changing standards/platforms/protocols.
- coffeeling 5y ago
  The Pocket integration should be about the last thing removed: Independent revenue streams are something Firefox desperately needs.
btgeekboy 5y ago
It’s a terrible protocol not built for the modern internet. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a URL containing “ftp” that isn’t prefixed by http:// http://
- ducktective 5y ago
  Lots of university file dumps are served on FTP...
  - marcodiego 5y ago
    I used to add '+"index of"' when searching for files or dumps using google. It still works, but definitely not as good as a few years ago. A past time: typing '+"index of" main.dfm' to see what people were developing using delphi. '+"index of" dire straits sultans of swing mp3' still kind of works.
    - jmrm 5y ago
      I have tested and still works even with actual and a bit obscure software
  - agumonkey 5y ago
    and a lot more, it's a bit sad to lose ftp
    - edgyquant 5y ago
      Why not use an ftp client if you want to use ftp?
      - acwan93 5y ago
        Don't know why this comment is being downvoted. I'd prefer to use another client like Transmit or Cyberduck. Having it all in one browser introduces complexity I don't think the team at Mozilla wants.
metalliqaz 5y ago
I'm actually ok with this. I'm happy to have it open those links in my dedicated tool just like it does with bittorrent links, etc.
gbrown_ 5y ago
It was a convenience but one I can live without. Purely from a LOC view ripping out features from browsers is something I welcome.
- mixmastamyk 5y ago
  Should become extensions then. That’s why they were invented, no?
rubyist5eva 5y ago
Did you use it?
- ducktective 5y ago
  Obviously not as much as HTTP(s) but still there are FTP links which show up after a google search from time to time...I guess now I have to context switch to the file explorer...Thunar is OK but does Windows Explorer even support FTP?
  - scrollaway 5y ago
    There are more mailto: links on the web than ftp: ones, and yet most browsers don't natively do email. Firefox didnt remove the protocol from existence. They just removed a feature nobody uses, which is better handled outside the browser.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
      I thought mailto links would open in webmail if configured?
      - scrollaway 5y ago
        You're getting my point. ftp links will open in an ftp client if configured.
    - account42 5y ago
      FTP and HTTP are both about transfering files, SMTP is a very different use case.
      - scrollaway 5y ago
        Use your imagination. And this list. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_network_protocols https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_network_protocols
  - 5y ago
theden 5y ago
Have they mentioned the reason of its removal somewhere?
- hannob 5y ago
  It's insecure by default, the TLS-enabled version has never been widely adopted, never been supported by browsers and has some horrible security problems of its own (see alpaca attack). Removing FTP thus fits into the strategy of browser to prefer HTTPS.
vbezhenar 5y ago
IMO browser should focus on HTTP/HTML support. There are plenty of protocols and there are plenty of programs with proper support for those protocols. I don't see nothing wrong with using transmission for torrents, WinSCP for FTP, etc.
- WillDaSilva 5y ago
  I can see where you're coming from - having a browser support all these protocols seems like poor design. Let everything do what they're good at, and all that. But usability suffers when users need to install and open different applications for every protocol they want to use. I think it might be good if there was some robust way to provide low-level browser extensions (that would probably be loaded in as shared objects). That way Firefox could drop (or never add) support for FTP, bittorrent, etc., but those could still be access within the browser by installing the extensions through your package manager. I'd love it if I could send files to friends using bittorrent through the browser without having to rely on sites like instant.io or file.pizza. I do love those sites, but they're no replacement for a proper torrent client. In a perfect world we wouldn't have to move everything into the browser for users to consider using it. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world. On that note, this probably couldn't be done because of security concerns. Making it easy for people to hand over low-level control of their browser would be problematic.
- no_wizard 5y ago
  Turns out though, they're coming up with a way to support basically any TCP based protocol via WebTransport: https://github.com/w3c/webtransport/blob/main/explainer.md https://github.com/w3c/webtransport/blob/main/explainer.md
Vixel 5y ago
Ahh FTP. The original “cloud storage”.
_peeley 5y ago
Honestly, I'm more than happy to see older/niche protocols removed from web browsers. God knows the average browser contains way, way too much stuff anyway[0], not to mention there are FTP clients that are likely far better for that use case than Firefox would ever be. I wouldn't mind if FF (or other browsers) tightened their scope a little more often and adhered to the Unix philosophy a little more closely. 0: https://drewdevault.com/2020/03/18/Reckless-limitless-scope.html https://drewdevault.com/2020/03/18/Reckless-limitless-scope....
coldpie 5y ago
I've just switched to using my file manager for FTP. Works fine.

It's my initial reaction too, but if I stop to think of Firefox as a huge, difficult-to-manage project where each feature costs dev resources and increases security risk, FTP support is probably the feature I wouldn't mind removed right next to the Pocket integration.

handrous 5y ago
On the one hand I'm OK with removing features to keep the browser slim. OTOH Firefox is vastly fatter than it was in its early versions, which supported FTP (and Gopher!), so it doesn't seem like FTP or other minor protocols are an actual cause of complexity- and bloat-creep. [EDIT] I'd actually be a lot happier with this if FF were more aggressively adding new Internet or alternative-Web protocols, or trying to use their platform to give things like federated social networks more visibility and better prominence (via, say, optional but tastefully promoted integration with the browser). That might also, you know, differentiate them and give me a reason to recommend it to non-nerds again, despite "it's way, way faster than anything else, and lighter on resources, and blocks pop-ups and has tabs and doesn't have an ad banner!" no longer being enough (or even true, for some of those qualities) like it was in the early days.
- signal11 5y ago
  > OTOH Firefox is vastly fatter than it was in its early versions, which supported FTP (and Gopher!), so it doesn't seem like FTP or other minor protocols are an actual cause of complexity- and bloat-creep. I’m sure someone will correct me, but without looking at the source code, I suspect the following will have played a role in increasing code size since the earliest days of Phoenix: * support for newer media formats, from MP4 through AVIF * DRM maybe? * WebGL * SVG? * The complexity of modern CSS
  - handrous 5y ago
    Much, much bigger JS engine/sandbox, probably. Backwards compat with an ever-growing set of HTML, CSS, and JS. I'd guess a modern CSS engine is several times (dozens of times?) larger than what Phoenix shipped with. I expect their internal UI-drawing code/framework is a lot larger than in the Phoenix days. Webassembly. Canvas. And yeah, several of the other things you mentioned—video used to be the responsibility of plugins, for example. [EDIT] in fact, some things browsers do now were seen as terrible ideas when Phoenix was released, because they would kill performance, since they're so much more expensive than alternatives. Vector graphics were regarded as to-be-avoided for a long time, because they're so much more taxing on the client than raster. CSS doing animations would have been considered insane, fit only for "look how I can bring your machine to a crawl with a web page" demos. Maintaining an entire "shadow DOM" of Javascript objects would have been regarded as parody-levels of resource wasting for all but very niche use-cases. No wonder the modern web is so slow and resource-hungry....
  - hutzlibu 5y ago
    Or Wasm, or WebRTC, or indexedDB ... plus anything else on that long list: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API
- spiritplumber 5y ago
  Firefox supporting Gemini would be awesome.
sambe 5y ago
I don't think my estimate of the cost of FTP maintenance would be as high as yours. Why do you think FTP would still be such a cost at this stage?
- asoneth 5y ago
  I'm curious what your estimate would be. Mine would be somewhere between 0.5FTE assuming the bare minimum of keep-the-lights-on QA testing for each release and ongoing bug triage up to maybe 3FTE if it requires periodic security and design updates to keep up with changing standards/platforms/protocols.
coffeeling 5y ago
The Pocket integration should be about the last thing removed: Independent revenue streams are something Firefox desperately needs.

btgeekboy 5y ago

It’s a terrible protocol not built for the modern internet. It’s been a while since I’ve seen a URL containing “ftp” that isn’t prefixed by http:// http://

ducktective 5y ago
Lots of university file dumps are served on FTP...
- marcodiego 5y ago
  I used to add '+"index of"' when searching for files or dumps using google. It still works, but definitely not as good as a few years ago. A past time: typing '+"index of" main.dfm' to see what people were developing using delphi. '+"index of" dire straits sultans of swing mp3' still kind of works.
  - jmrm 5y ago
    I have tested and still works even with actual and a bit obscure software
- agumonkey 5y ago
  and a lot more, it's a bit sad to lose ftp
  - edgyquant 5y ago
    Why not use an ftp client if you want to use ftp?
    - acwan93 5y ago
      Don't know why this comment is being downvoted. I'd prefer to use another client like Transmit or Cyberduck. Having it all in one browser introduces complexity I don't think the team at Mozilla wants.

metalliqaz 5y ago

I'm actually ok with this. I'm happy to have it open those links in my dedicated tool just like it does with bittorrent links, etc.

gbrown_ 5y ago

It was a convenience but one I can live without. Purely from a LOC view ripping out features from browsers is something I welcome.

mixmastamyk 5y ago
Should become extensions then. That’s why they were invented, no?

rubyist5eva 5y ago

Did you use it?

ducktective 5y ago
Obviously not as much as HTTP(s) but still there are FTP links which show up after a google search from time to time...I guess now I have to context switch to the file explorer...Thunar is OK but does Windows Explorer even support FTP?
- scrollaway 5y ago
  There are more mailto: links on the web than ftp: ones, and yet most browsers don't natively do email. Firefox didnt remove the protocol from existence. They just removed a feature nobody uses, which is better handled outside the browser.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
    I thought mailto links would open in webmail if configured?
    - scrollaway 5y ago
      You're getting my point. ftp links will open in an ftp client if configured.
  - account42 5y ago
    FTP and HTTP are both about transfering files, SMTP is a very different use case.
    - scrollaway 5y ago
      Use your imagination. And this list. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_network_protocols https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_network_protocols
- 5y ago

theden 5y ago

Have they mentioned the reason of its removal somewhere?

hannob 5y ago
It's insecure by default, the TLS-enabled version has never been widely adopted, never been supported by browsers and has some horrible security problems of its own (see alpaca attack). Removing FTP thus fits into the strategy of browser to prefer HTTPS.

vbezhenar 5y ago

IMO browser should focus on HTTP/HTML support. There are plenty of protocols and there are plenty of programs with proper support for those protocols. I don't see nothing wrong with using transmission for torrents, WinSCP for FTP, etc.

WillDaSilva 5y ago
I can see where you're coming from - having a browser support all these protocols seems like poor design. Let everything do what they're good at, and all that. But usability suffers when users need to install and open different applications for every protocol they want to use. I think it might be good if there was some robust way to provide low-level browser extensions (that would probably be loaded in as shared objects). That way Firefox could drop (or never add) support for FTP, bittorrent, etc., but those could still be access within the browser by installing the extensions through your package manager. I'd love it if I could send files to friends using bittorrent through the browser without having to rely on sites like instant.io or file.pizza. I do love those sites, but they're no replacement for a proper torrent client. In a perfect world we wouldn't have to move everything into the browser for users to consider using it. Alas, we do not live in a perfect world. On that note, this probably couldn't be done because of security concerns. Making it easy for people to hand over low-level control of their browser would be problematic.
no_wizard 5y ago
Turns out though, they're coming up with a way to support basically any TCP based protocol via WebTransport: https://github.com/w3c/webtransport/blob/main/explainer.md https://github.com/w3c/webtransport/blob/main/explainer.md

Vixel 5y ago

Ahh FTP. The original “cloud storage”.

_peeley 5y ago

Honestly, I'm more than happy to see older/niche protocols removed from web browsers. God knows the average browser contains way, way too much stuff anyway[0], not to mention there are FTP clients that are likely far better for that use case than Firefox would ever be. I wouldn't mind if FF (or other browsers) tightened their scope a little more often and adhered to the Unix philosophy a little more closely. 0: https://drewdevault.com/2020/03/18/Reckless-limitless-scope.html https://drewdevault.com/2020/03/18/Reckless-limitless-scope....

coldpie 5y ago

I've just switched to using my file manager for FTP. Works fine.