5 ms·

I think the Firefox hate is completely justified. At this point the only positive thing about Firefox is that "at least it's not Chrome".

nacs 2y ago
As a Firefox user, this exactly. The amount of things that now need to be toggled off on a new install are approaching Windows “telemetry” levels: disable sponsored shortcuts on homepage, disable experimental “Studies”, sponsored suggestions in search bar, “suggested extensions”, Pocket, and the list goes on. I really need to look into a privacy friendly fork of FF..
- worble 2y ago
  I don't use it myself, but Librewolf is a pretty popular fork that attempts to be private out of the box and is usually updated pretty quickly.
  - Propelloni 2y ago
    Yes, or Waterfox [1]. [1] https://www.waterfox.net/ https://www.waterfox.net/
  - nacs 2y ago
    Thanks. Finally got around to installing Librewolf and it works great. Sensible defaults as Firefox should be.
  - EasyMark 2y ago
    I will definitely second this. I moved over to librewolf last year and love it. I’m glad Mozilla is staying in business though. I know not every organization has my beliefs and I can live with that
- HeckFeck 2y ago
  > I really need to look into a privacy friendly fork of FF.. I'd love to make the jump too, just that I rely upon FF sync too much. It's handy getting your bookmarks and other details on mobile devices. The other forks look to be desktop only.
  - metasaval 2y ago
    FYI, you can use a desktop fork and mobile Firefox with Firefox sync. source: I do that with floorp and Firefox for android.
    - metasaval 2y ago
      also just realized that waterfox does have an android version [1], if you want you use the same fork on desktop and android https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.waterfox.android.release https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.waterfox.a...
    - MrAlex94 2y ago
      Not to hang around like a bad smell every time they come up, but just think it’s worth noting they are not open source anymore, instead being “source available”. Really gives me the old school “greenwashing” vibes Microsoft used to do with their Shared Source licenses. Poor showing considering they used others work to get to where they are, then shut the door when others started doing the same. I would say feel free to give Waterfox a try - I’ve tried to strike the balance of useable web and privacy, with the added enhancement of Oblivious DNS enabled by default.
      - metasaval 2y ago
        In this case I had completely missed the bad smell, so I appreciate the comment cause it prompted me to look up the whole situation. yikes. I was already planning on moving to another fork soon since I wasn't using most of floorp's power features, so this just expedited that. Also from your language it sounds like you're a Waterfox dev? If so thanks for all your hard work on open source software! I haven't tried waterfox in years, I will definitely give it a go after uninstalling floorp.
  - cassepipe 2y ago
    True, it's very handy... but can't Chrome do it with a Google account ? (I really don't know) To me the really seeling point of firefox is being able to switch off search suggestions. Now the bar only searches opened Tabs, history, bookmarks and I can tab into them quickly. If nothing turns up, pressing Enter will still launch a search. Being able to do casual navigation without having to go through a search engine is a killer feature (and it's better for the planet). Not only tab but you can search directly into opened Tabs/history/bookmarks with the right %/^/* symbols ! EDIT : Almost forgot, it only really shines with that extension that prevent searches to turn up in your history --> https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/history-autodelete/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/history-autod...
- skeaker 2y ago
  This is an extremely uncharitable view of Firefox and an outrageously generous view of Windows. The things you listed take 2 checkboxes in a new tab window, 2 checkboxes in settings (which has a search bar that takes you right to them by just searching "studies" or "data collection"), 2 checkboxes in settings (search "suggestions"), 2 clicks (right click the pocket button and click hide)... The only tricky one is the recommended extensions but that's tucked at the bottom of a page nobody uses anyways (everyone just googles the extension they want and grabs it from the web), but even that takes like 15 seconds once you know what setting it is in about:config. I actually don't even disable the two telemetry checkboxes because they're transparent about the data they take and what they do with it, so I'm happy to share it. You can easily do all of this in one or two minutes and it won't roll itself back. With Windows you would be lucky to even have a supported method to disable their telemetry, and if you do get one it will probably be through an obscure series of registry edits that will ultimately get rolled back during a system update.
  - Aurornis 2y ago
    > This is an extremely uncharitable view of Firefox and an outrageously generous view of Windows. The things you listed take 2 checkboxes in a new tab window, 2 checkboxes in settings (which has a search bar that takes you right to them by just searching "studies" or "data collection"), 2 checkboxes in settings (search "suggestions"), 2 clicks (right click the pocket button and click hide)... The only tricky one is It’s wild to me that this is being presented as if it’s not a big deal. Shows how far the goalposts have moved in this conversation.
    - skeaker 2y ago
      It's not a big deal. They're easy to disable and easier to just ignore. It just doesn't matter in the way that you want me to panic over.
    - shiroiushi 2y ago
      How big a deal it is depends on what you're comparing to. Yeah, at first, when I read his post, I was wondering if it was a joke or something, with so many checkboxes in different places. Then I got to the point about Windows and realized he's right: compared to Windows, all those steps in Firefox actually aren't that bad, and actually stay unchecked unlike Windows which happily changes things back.
intelVISA 2y ago
Agree, hopefully King Andreas can carry the torch ignited by Old Mozilla that was lost a few years back.

nacs 2y ago

As a Firefox user, this exactly. The amount of things that now need to be toggled off on a new install are approaching Windows “telemetry” levels: disable sponsored shortcuts on homepage, disable experimental “Studies”, sponsored suggestions in search bar, “suggested extensions”, Pocket, and the list goes on. I really need to look into a privacy friendly fork of FF..

worble 2y ago
I don't use it myself, but Librewolf is a pretty popular fork that attempts to be private out of the box and is usually updated pretty quickly.
- Propelloni 2y ago
  Yes, or Waterfox [1]. [1] https://www.waterfox.net/ https://www.waterfox.net/
- nacs 2y ago
  Thanks. Finally got around to installing Librewolf and it works great. Sensible defaults as Firefox should be.
- EasyMark 2y ago
  I will definitely second this. I moved over to librewolf last year and love it. I’m glad Mozilla is staying in business though. I know not every organization has my beliefs and I can live with that
HeckFeck 2y ago
> I really need to look into a privacy friendly fork of FF.. I'd love to make the jump too, just that I rely upon FF sync too much. It's handy getting your bookmarks and other details on mobile devices. The other forks look to be desktop only.
- metasaval 2y ago
  FYI, you can use a desktop fork and mobile Firefox with Firefox sync. source: I do that with floorp and Firefox for android.
  - metasaval 2y ago
    also just realized that waterfox does have an android version [1], if you want you use the same fork on desktop and android https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.waterfox.android.release https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.waterfox.a...
  - MrAlex94 2y ago
    Not to hang around like a bad smell every time they come up, but just think it’s worth noting they are not open source anymore, instead being “source available”. Really gives me the old school “greenwashing” vibes Microsoft used to do with their Shared Source licenses. Poor showing considering they used others work to get to where they are, then shut the door when others started doing the same. I would say feel free to give Waterfox a try - I’ve tried to strike the balance of useable web and privacy, with the added enhancement of Oblivious DNS enabled by default.
    - metasaval 2y ago
      In this case I had completely missed the bad smell, so I appreciate the comment cause it prompted me to look up the whole situation. yikes. I was already planning on moving to another fork soon since I wasn't using most of floorp's power features, so this just expedited that. Also from your language it sounds like you're a Waterfox dev? If so thanks for all your hard work on open source software! I haven't tried waterfox in years, I will definitely give it a go after uninstalling floorp.
- cassepipe 2y ago
  True, it's very handy... but can't Chrome do it with a Google account ? (I really don't know) To me the really seeling point of firefox is being able to switch off search suggestions. Now the bar only searches opened Tabs, history, bookmarks and I can tab into them quickly. If nothing turns up, pressing Enter will still launch a search. Being able to do casual navigation without having to go through a search engine is a killer feature (and it's better for the planet). Not only tab but you can search directly into opened Tabs/history/bookmarks with the right %/^/* symbols ! EDIT : Almost forgot, it only really shines with that extension that prevent searches to turn up in your history --> https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/history-autodelete/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/history-autod...
skeaker 2y ago
This is an extremely uncharitable view of Firefox and an outrageously generous view of Windows. The things you listed take 2 checkboxes in a new tab window, 2 checkboxes in settings (which has a search bar that takes you right to them by just searching "studies" or "data collection"), 2 checkboxes in settings (search "suggestions"), 2 clicks (right click the pocket button and click hide)... The only tricky one is the recommended extensions but that's tucked at the bottom of a page nobody uses anyways (everyone just googles the extension they want and grabs it from the web), but even that takes like 15 seconds once you know what setting it is in about:config. I actually don't even disable the two telemetry checkboxes because they're transparent about the data they take and what they do with it, so I'm happy to share it. You can easily do all of this in one or two minutes and it won't roll itself back. With Windows you would be lucky to even have a supported method to disable their telemetry, and if you do get one it will probably be through an obscure series of registry edits that will ultimately get rolled back during a system update.
- Aurornis 2y ago
  > This is an extremely uncharitable view of Firefox and an outrageously generous view of Windows. The things you listed take 2 checkboxes in a new tab window, 2 checkboxes in settings (which has a search bar that takes you right to them by just searching "studies" or "data collection"), 2 checkboxes in settings (search "suggestions"), 2 clicks (right click the pocket button and click hide)... The only tricky one is It’s wild to me that this is being presented as if it’s not a big deal. Shows how far the goalposts have moved in this conversation.
  - skeaker 2y ago
    It's not a big deal. They're easy to disable and easier to just ignore. It just doesn't matter in the way that you want me to panic over.
  - shiroiushi 2y ago
    How big a deal it is depends on what you're comparing to. Yeah, at first, when I read his post, I was wondering if it was a joke or something, with so many checkboxes in different places. Then I got to the point about Windows and realized he's right: compared to Windows, all those steps in Firefox actually aren't that bad, and actually stay unchecked unlike Windows which happily changes things back.

intelVISA 2y ago

Agree, hopefully King Andreas can carry the torch ignited by Old Mozilla that was lost a few years back.