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Add-ons in 2017

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Add-ons in 2017

#81

Post by tn123 »

gsnedders wrote: post #34
Yoric wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, XUL-based extensions are not scraped yet. They will, at some point in 2017, but we're not there yet. The reason to scrape them is simple: the total API surface of XUL-based extensions is pretty much all of the internal APIs of Firefox, which means that any change anywhere in the code of Firefox breaks some extension accidentally. That's a compatibility burden that Mozilla could afford when the only competitor w…

And, related to this, it makes it easier to move to Servo's layout code in the future, as it avoids Servo having to implement XUL and XBL.

The current Firefox UI is XUL and XBL, tons and heaps of it. Re-implementing it in e.g. HTML is not an easy task, in particular not when you also want the result to look at least somewhat OS-native (took XUL itself ages to get there, btw). You also cannot do the OS-native look in HTML alone, you need support from the engine, which means servo has a some work ahead on that front too.

So for the foreseeable future, servo is not an alternative to replace XUL/XBL anyway. mozilla said that themselves.

Using servo to render the actual web pages inside the browser, that's another matter (once servo is considered stable enough, of course). To the add-on developer, this should not really make any difference anyway, XUL add-on, SDK add-on or WebExtension alike, as most add-ons for the most part will use the regular DOM APIs which servo has to provide anyway to interact with web stuff.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#82

Post by Endy »

laurent123456 wrote: post #14
hucker wrote: post #10

Extensions is currently the only thing FF is better than the competition at, and they scrap it to copy Chrome APIs... I just can't understand why they would scrap XUL-based extensions before their new APIs reach feature parity. The day pentadactyl stops working is the day I stop using firefox.

I can see where they're coming from though. Today, developers need to create two versions of their extensions - one that works on Safari, Chrome and Opera (and Edge?) and one specifically for Firefox. As the market share of Firefox is not that high, maybe extension developers eventually won't be bothered with supporting that extra version, which means Firefox extensions will be less up-to-date and there will be less…

Then stop developing free software for Google. Be Firefox and/or Pale Moon exclusive. Problem solved.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#83

Post by mistermann »

Illniyar wrote: post #28

As always, the only question for me is whether tree style tabs is going to work with WebExtenstions. If not, then say hello to people staying with firefox 56 for years.

Is there still nothing comparable on Chrome? Is it not possible for some reason?

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#84

Post by Illniyar »

mistermann wrote: post #83
Illniyar wrote: post #28

As always, the only question for me is whether tree style tabs is going to work with WebExtenstions. If not, then say hello to people staying with firefox 56 for years.

Is there still nothing comparable on Chrome? Is it not possible for some reason?

Chrome had it, but they killed the feature a few years back and are intentionally not bringing it back because of the low user adoption.

There are some hacks that open a new window with tabs, and resizes the main window to put it side by side, but it doesn't feel right.

Or at least that was the case the last time I looked a year or two ago.

Edit: also, yes, from what I understand, the WebExtenstions Api in Chrome does not allow these modifications.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#85

Post by eitland »

jhasse wrote: post #48
nv-vn wrote: post #40

And this is how Mozilla goes out. Their last remaining reason for existence is being destroyed. They've already gotten rid of Thunderbird, Tab Groups, full themes, and more, but left us with the things nobody wanted (Pocket, Hello, etc.). They've also slowly let performance go in many places, seemingly. A few years ago, I switched to Firefox for precisely the set of features they've axed. It was also much faster than…

What do you mean by "full themes"? There are many different themes available for Firefox which still work with v50.

Not an expert but I think modern themes only style the top of the browser while traditional themes could style anything possibly including content.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#86

Post by eitland »

hucker wrote: post #10

Extensions is currently the only thing FF is better than the competition at, and they scrap it to copy Chrome APIs... I just can't understand why they would scrap XUL-based extensions before their new APIs reach feature parity. The day pentadactyl stops working is the day I stop using firefox.

One of them answered here and IIRC what (s)he said was that they won't cut off the old APIs until every popular extension can be upgraded to the new api.

So it was less of providing a poor api like Chrome and more like creating a newer and better API that also happens to be a superset of Chromes API.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#87

Post by jhasse »

eitland wrote: post #85
jhasse wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by "full themes"? There are many different themes available for Firefox which still work with v50.

Not an expert but I think modern themes only style the top of the browser while traditional themes could style anything possibly including content.

I think that's still possible. I'm using a theme which changes the appearance of TreeStyleTabs for example. And the colors of context menus, etc.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#88

Post by weaksauce »

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #65
nv-vn wrote: post #40

And this is how Mozilla goes out. Their last remaining reason for existence is being destroyed. They've already gotten rid of Thunderbird, Tab Groups, full themes, and more, but left us with the things nobody wanted (Pocket, Hello, etc.). They've also slowly let performance go in many places, seemingly. A few years ago, I switched to Firefox for precisely the set of features they've axed. It was also much faster than…

>> performance decline, RAM usage ramp up Thats what they want to fix by getting rid of XUL, among other things.

Poorly written addons were precisely the reason that firefox got a bad rap in the past. I hope webextensions being more common and restricted will help this out.

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#89

Post by jhasse »

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #65
nv-vn wrote: post #40

And this is how Mozilla goes out. Their last remaining reason for existence is being destroyed. They've already gotten rid of Thunderbird, Tab Groups, full themes, and more, but left us with the things nobody wanted (Pocket, Hello, etc.). They've also slowly let performance go in many places, seemingly. A few years ago, I switched to Firefox for precisely the set of features they've axed. It was also much faster than…

>> performance decline, RAM usage ramp up Thats what they want to fix by getting rid of XUL, among other things.

Doesn't make sense, since XUL has always been there, even when the RAM usage has been lower (if that is true as the OP states).

Re: Add-ons in 2017

#90

Post by Animats »

"By the end of 2017, and with the release of Firefox 57, we’ll move to WebExtensions exclusively, and will stop loading any other extension types on desktop. To help ensure any new extensions work beyond the end of 2017, AMO will stop accepting any new extensions for signing that are not WebExtensions in Firefox 53."

Based on Mozilla's track record, that's too soon. It took about three years after the announcement of the Jetpack API before it worked right.

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