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> But is Firefox an inferior browser? Several APIs that make powerful web applications possible are missing (e.g. WebUSB, various filesystem access APIs) and F

> But is Firefox an inferior browser? Several APIs that make powerful web applications possible are missing (e.g. WebUSB, various filesystem access APIs) and Firefox generally tends to lag behind Chrome when it comes to new APIs/web features. The lower market share means that many web sites don't support it properly. For example, I need to keep a Chrome profile around for Zoom since the button doesn't even show up on Firefox, and when I tried to join a Teams meeting with Firefox, it failed in some non-obvious way, causing me to be late to a job interview (may have been due to some extension misbehaving or some config issue). I don't know if that's just because the sites don't test and do user agent sniffing, or whether Firefox is actually missing some APIs that would be required, but from a user perspective, it doesn't really matter, I can't use the browser for things I can do with Chrome. I also still have occasional crashes.

eigenrick 5y ago
> Several APIs that make powerful web applications possible are missing (e.g. WebUSB, various filesystem access APIs) and Firefox generally tends to lag behind Chrome when it comes to new APIs/web features. WebUSB may not be the best example, as it was disabled by Chrome because there is no way to secure it. Though I agree in general that some APIs (WebGL) were experimental and behind a flag for too long in FF. As a counterpoint, Firefox is/was ahead on some important APIs (WASM, U2f) I have not shared your experience with Teams or Zoom. I use them both daily from FF on OSX.
zeepzeep 5y ago
> Firefox generally tends to lag behind Chrome when it comes to new APIs/web features Sometimes that is because chromium just implements anything they want and it's not in the spec.
- StillBored 5y ago
  And this is one of those places where FF could break with the pack. Sure implement webGL/usb/whatever but provide a simple browser and page enable/disable function for those people who aren't interested in having random websites sending rogue mining code to their GPUs, or various other API's that have questionable merit if you goal is a simple browser API/surface/function.

eigenrick 5y ago

> Several APIs that make powerful web applications possible are missing (e.g. WebUSB, various filesystem access APIs) and Firefox generally tends to lag behind Chrome when it comes to new APIs/web features. WebUSB may not be the best example, as it was disabled by Chrome because there is no way to secure it. Though I agree in general that some APIs (WebGL) were experimental and behind a flag for too long in FF. As a counterpoint, Firefox is/was ahead on some important APIs (WASM, U2f) I have not shared your experience with Teams or Zoom. I use them both daily from FF on OSX.

zeepzeep 5y ago

> Firefox generally tends to lag behind Chrome when it comes to new APIs/web features Sometimes that is because chromium just implements anything they want and it's not in the spec.

StillBored 5y ago
And this is one of those places where FF could break with the pack. Sure implement webGL/usb/whatever but provide a simple browser and page enable/disable function for those people who aren't interested in having random websites sending rogue mining code to their GPUs, or various other API's that have questionable merit if you goal is a simple browser API/surface/function.