8 ms·

I used Firefox since from the Firebird days until the memory bloat in 4.0 drove me to Chome. Now every time I try to go back, I find Firefox behind the competit

by lbenes 13y ago

I used Firefox since from the Firebird days until the memory bloat in 4.0 drove me to Chome. Now every time I try to go back, I find Firefox behind the competition. For example, when I loaded up FF to test out ASM.js, I found I was still on version 18 because your silent auto updater only works when you run as administrator. You expect all your users to run as root in 2013? Really? OK cidadel under ASM.js was pretty cool and memory boat seemed under control. Nice job BTW! So I set FF as my default browser. Next day I come to HN and open some CSS3 hair demo in a new tab. Next thing I know my browser is completely unresponsive. Until I find the offending tab and close it. Back to multi-process Chrome as my default. As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser? Fix your browser, and by then, maybe the mobile hardware will be fast enough to justify the performance hit from running everything inside a JavaScript VM.

cbhl 13y ago
> You expect all your users to run as root in 2013? Really? > As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser? Do you really expect anyone that isn't a developer to be running on a desktop in 2018? Really?
- alphakappa 13y ago
  Are you predicting that in 5 years only developers will have laptops? (I presume that your definition of a desktop includes laptops given the browser application we are talking about)
Yoric 13y ago
> As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser? Fix your browser, and by then, maybe the mobile hardware will be fast enough to justify the performance hit from running everything inside a JavaScript VM. I have several answers to that. Firstly, budget phones running everything inside a JavaScript VM works today. We have now proved it. Almost every optimization/new technology we have achieved along the way has also been made available to Firefox for Android and Firefox Desktop, so it's hardly an exclusive or. One of these new technologies is the much-wanted support for multi-process. It is not ready for deployment, far from it, but it is now field-tested, so I hope that we will all be able to benefit from this feature soon. Also, if you are a developer, you are certainly aware that this is not how things work. You simply cannot wait until a product is perfect before getting started with another product, because this is the road to never releasing anything, ever. Finally, glad that you returned to Firefox, however briefly :), and glad that you liked some of the experience. I hope we'll have you back once we have finally released a multi-process version. Or once you grow weary of Google owning all your data :)
- lbenes 13y ago
  Thanks for the reply. It was an honest question. I'm in IT and am responsible for FF being on the default image of hundreds of PC installs. I want to see FF desktop competitive, so that we all have a choice again. It's great that Mozilla is experimenting with new tech like FF OS, but It takes a great deal more resources to turn an experiment into a shipping product. And it's clear from the state of their desktop browser that their focus in on FF OS. It's clear that Mozilla is resource limited. I was also pushing for Thunderbird to replace Outlook, but after Mozilla's announcement that they were ending feature updates, that is never going to happen now.
  - synchronise 13y ago
    Pray tell, what feature updates do you need for an email client? Faster email delivery?
    - aclevernickname 13y ago
      the ability to connect to 10+ IMAP accounts and not use 700MB of RAM would be a nice feature. I can either run Thunderbird or Firefox on my netbook, but not both.
      - synchronise 13y ago
        I have no problem with that on this end. Perhaps it's just your install.
        aclevernickname 13y ago
        standard ubuntu builds, across multiple computers. Perhaps not.
    - kapilkaisare 13y ago
      No features come to mind, but I'd really like to see the UI improved. For instance, cramping all those rows of subject lines so close without any line spacing sucks. I tried figuring out the CSS needed to fix it, but was unable to locate any real documentation on it.
JohnTHaller 13y ago
The updater no longer requires you to run as administrator except the first time it installs its updater service. From then on, it will update without the UAC prompt. Chrome doesn't require running as admin to update because it bypasses Windows' security by running outside of Program Files, which can cause additional security issues.
- ryanpetrich 13y ago
  What additional security issues might those be? The only security issue I can see with that design is that is each user on the machine would need to update individually and thus users that login only infrequently would often have an out of date version of Chrome.
  - JohnTHaller 13y ago
    On Windows Vista, 7 and 8, things installed into the Program Files directory can't be altered without UAC kicking in and requiring admin rights. That's why apps require admin rights to update. This prevents viruses and other things from altering installed apps unless it's using an unpatched security issue. To allow updates to be done without needing admin rights, Firefox installs an updater service that only it has access to and that can only update its own files. This allows updates without UAC/admin and while still preserving the Windows app security model. Google Chrome gets installed into the APPDATA directory. In that location, any process running on the system under the current user can alter Chrome's files, since it isn't within Program Files and isn't subject to UAC/admin. This makes a standard Chrome install inherently less secure than Firefox, Opera, etc installed according to Windows' guidelines within Program Files. Google makes available another Chrome installer that installs into Program Files, but it isn't promoted to users (so they're unaware of the security differences) and it can't be updated without UAC/admin rights.
    - lbenes 13y ago
      I’ve seen dozens if not hundreds of infected machines. By far the most common infection vector comes from unpatched browsers or their plugins. It looks like my browser was not updating because of a 1.5 year old bug #711475 which is still marked at “New”. If it hadn't been for my interest in asm.js, I'd still be sitting at version 17 or 18, despite auto-updates and background service both being checked. Not auto-updating the browser is a much bigger security risk than your hypothetical issue for Chrome.
pcwalton 13y ago
Firefox OS is multi-process like Chrome. There is nothing technical in the browser engine that prevents Gecko from being multi-process; support for it is actually integrated quite deeply into the engine, more like WebKit2 than Chromium. The reason that Firefox isn't multi-process is purely an application-level issue, not an engine-level one.
- lbenes 13y ago
  Exactly my point. I was talking about Mozilla diverting resources from FF Desktop to FF OS. As a result, their desktop browser has fallen behind "modern browsers" like IE and Chrome. It's lacking key features like multi-process and auto-updating.
  - pcwalton 13y ago
    No, what you wrote is "As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser?" As I explained, the engine is not "bloated" or "outdated", at least in regards to multi-process or auto-update. Firefox OS uses the Gecko engine, but not the Firefox front end. The Gecko browser engine has full support for both of these features.

by lbenes 13y ago

cbhl 13y ago

> You expect all your users to run as root in 2013? Really? > As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser? Do you really expect anyone that isn't a developer to be running on a desktop in 2018? Really?

alphakappa 13y ago
Are you predicting that in 5 years only developers will have laptops? (I presume that your definition of a desktop includes laptops given the browser application we are talking about)

Yoric 13y ago

> As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser? Fix your browser, and by then, maybe the mobile hardware will be fast enough to justify the performance hit from running everything inside a JavaScript VM. I have several answers to that. Firstly, budget phones running everything inside a JavaScript VM works today. We have now proved it. Almost every optimization/new technology we have achieved along the way has also been made available to Firefox for Android and Firefox Desktop, so it's hardly an exclusive or. One of these new technologies is the much-wanted support for multi-process. It is not ready for deployment, far from it, but it is now field-tested, so I hope that we will all be able to benefit from this feature soon. Also, if you are a developer, you are certainly aware that this is not how things work. You simply cannot wait until a product is perfect before getting started with another product, because this is the road to never releasing anything, ever. Finally, glad that you returned to Firefox, however briefly :), and glad that you liked some of the experience. I hope we'll have you back once we have finally released a multi-process version. Or once you grow weary of Google owning all your data :)

lbenes 13y ago
Thanks for the reply. It was an honest question. I'm in IT and am responsible for FF being on the default image of hundreds of PC installs. I want to see FF desktop competitive, so that we all have a choice again. It's great that Mozilla is experimenting with new tech like FF OS, but It takes a great deal more resources to turn an experiment into a shipping product. And it's clear from the state of their desktop browser that their focus in on FF OS. It's clear that Mozilla is resource limited. I was also pushing for Thunderbird to replace Outlook, but after Mozilla's announcement that they were ending feature updates, that is never going to happen now.
- synchronise 13y ago
  Pray tell, what feature updates do you need for an email client? Faster email delivery?
  - aclevernickname 13y ago
    the ability to connect to 10+ IMAP accounts and not use 700MB of RAM would be a nice feature. I can either run Thunderbird or Firefox on my netbook, but not both.
    - synchronise 13y ago
      I have no problem with that on this end. Perhaps it's just your install.
      - aclevernickname 13y ago
        standard ubuntu builds, across multiple computers. Perhaps not.
  - kapilkaisare 13y ago
    No features come to mind, but I'd really like to see the UI improved. For instance, cramping all those rows of subject lines so close without any line spacing sucks. I tried figuring out the CSS needed to fix it, but was unable to locate any real documentation on it.

JohnTHaller 13y ago

The updater no longer requires you to run as administrator except the first time it installs its updater service. From then on, it will update without the UAC prompt. Chrome doesn't require running as admin to update because it bypasses Windows' security by running outside of Program Files, which can cause additional security issues.

ryanpetrich 13y ago
What additional security issues might those be? The only security issue I can see with that design is that is each user on the machine would need to update individually and thus users that login only infrequently would often have an out of date version of Chrome.
- JohnTHaller 13y ago
  On Windows Vista, 7 and 8, things installed into the Program Files directory can't be altered without UAC kicking in and requiring admin rights. That's why apps require admin rights to update. This prevents viruses and other things from altering installed apps unless it's using an unpatched security issue. To allow updates to be done without needing admin rights, Firefox installs an updater service that only it has access to and that can only update its own files. This allows updates without UAC/admin and while still preserving the Windows app security model. Google Chrome gets installed into the APPDATA directory. In that location, any process running on the system under the current user can alter Chrome's files, since it isn't within Program Files and isn't subject to UAC/admin. This makes a standard Chrome install inherently less secure than Firefox, Opera, etc installed according to Windows' guidelines within Program Files. Google makes available another Chrome installer that installs into Program Files, but it isn't promoted to users (so they're unaware of the security differences) and it can't be updated without UAC/admin rights.
  - lbenes 13y ago
    I’ve seen dozens if not hundreds of infected machines. By far the most common infection vector comes from unpatched browsers or their plugins. It looks like my browser was not updating because of a 1.5 year old bug #711475 which is still marked at “New”. If it hadn't been for my interest in asm.js, I'd still be sitting at version 17 or 18, despite auto-updates and background service both being checked. Not auto-updating the browser is a much bigger security risk than your hypothetical issue for Chrome.

pcwalton 13y ago

Firefox OS is multi-process like Chrome. There is nothing technical in the browser engine that prevents Gecko from being multi-process; support for it is actually integrated quite deeply into the engine, more like WebKit2 than Chromium. The reason that Firefox isn't multi-process is purely an application-level issue, not an engine-level one.

lbenes 13y ago
Exactly my point. I was talking about Mozilla diverting resources from FF Desktop to FF OS. As a result, their desktop browser has fallen behind "modern browsers" like IE and Chrome. It's lacking key features like multi-process and auto-updating.
- pcwalton 13y ago
  No, what you wrote is "As a Mozillian can you please explain why Mozilla is wasting their resources trying to power budget phones with a bloated outdated browser?" As I explained, the engine is not "bloated" or "outdated", at least in regards to multi-process or auto-update. Firefox OS uses the Gecko engine, but not the Firefox front end. The Gecko browser engine has full support for both of these features.