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I cannot continue working on my add-ons

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Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#61

Post by akjainaj »

a3n wrote: post #55
IChrisI wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like Tree-style Tabs will stop working then as well. That will be a sad day. Tree-style Tabs and some form of mouse gestures are pretty much all I need.

I won't need either of those, but this is a major part of why I like Firefox, each person can make it their own. These in particular make Firefox my own (your Firefox is not my firefox, but your firefox is OK), and I will be sad if they disappear without replacement: Disable Style Button https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/disable-style... Disconnect https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/disconnec…

It's just incredible that they're going to do away with XUL. Imagine if Google somehow decided to remove all the Android apps in the Play Store and told everybody to rewrite their apps or die. And what's even worse, most addon writers don't even receive money for that.

This is going to kill the addon community but I guess they don't care at all.

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#62

Post by leeoniya »

zerocrates wrote: post #58
Animats wrote: post #45

Firefox has three APIs: XUL, Jetpack, and WebExtensions. XUL has been on the way out for years, and never worked in mobile Firefox anyway. (Almost nobody runs mobile Firefox, so that turned out not to matter much.) Jetpack was introduced in 2013, and by 2014, it was actually usable. It's not clear when and whether Jetpack add-ons will stop working. Mozilla's developer documentation is so confused that you can't tell.…

> The trouble with Firefox chasing Google Chrome compatibility is that, once they get there, Google will probably change something so some Google service is essential to an add-on. I'd be more concerned that, once they get to Chrome compatibility, they've simply sacrificed one of the key things that differentiates them from Chrome. Firefox's die-hard adherents use extensions heavily, and many of the most popular, par…

the fact that they have no replacement for removed [and much-used] functionality seems completely nuts to me. their market share will plummet. i understand that old stacks must be removed at some point for security/performance/ergonomic reasons but leaving so many extension devs and users out in the cold with no alternatives is unthinkable.

i really believe they are signing their own death certificate. neither google nor yahoo will pay much for search traffic of a browser no one uses. i say this as a long-time fan, nightly firefox user and bug submitter (since v1.5). everything since Australis has been an unmitigated trainwreck :/. When Classic Theme Restorer [1] stops working, i'm sorry but i'm out....probably to https://github.com/Eloston/ungoogled-chromium for the time being.

my hope is that someone builds out a nice cross-platform browser around servo, or at least i can hack on https://github.com/browserhtml/browserhtml

http://electron.atom.io/ is an option, too

[1] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/classicthemer...

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#63

Post by vacri »

mnarayan01 wrote: post #6

I've been praying that Mozilla would rethink this, but that looks increasingly unlikely. I guess switching to a LTS release will tide me over for a time, but this really does feel like the end of an era.

This was my thinking as well. I'll probably move to the last ESR ('extended support release') before the cutoff period, just so I can keep using Tab Groups.

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#65

Post by st3fan »

Animats wrote: post #45

Firefox has three APIs: XUL, Jetpack, and WebExtensions. XUL has been on the way out for years, and never worked in mobile Firefox anyway. (Almost nobody runs mobile Firefox, so that turned out not to matter much.) Jetpack was introduced in 2013, and by 2014, it was actually usable. It's not clear when and whether Jetpack add-ons will stop working. Mozilla's developer documentation is so confused that you can't tell.…

> Almost nobody runs mobile Firefox, so that turned out not to matter much

Well. The number of installs of Firefox for Android is a nine-digit number.

Depending on your perspective that can be thought of as a big or small number.

But it certainly is not "nobody".

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#66

Post by [deleted] »

Animats wrote: post #45

Firefox has three APIs: XUL, Jetpack, and WebExtensions. XUL has been on the way out for years, and never worked in mobile Firefox anyway. (Almost nobody runs mobile Firefox, so that turned out not to matter much.) Jetpack was introduced in 2013, and by 2014, it was actually usable. It's not clear when and whether Jetpack add-ons will stop working. Mozilla's developer documentation is so confused that you can't tell.…

[deleted]

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#67

Post by baby »

If Tree Style Tab doesn't work anymore. What are the reasons to use Firefox? Also what are the alternatives. I tried Chrome but the Tree Style Tab-like plugin is clumsy.

Should I just not update firefox and wait until devs realize tabs were meant to be on the side? Honnestly as a power user I can't browse the web without tree style tab anymore.

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#68

Post by a3n »

stephengillie wrote: post #7

Isn't Firefox open source? Can't you just fork the project and start your own browser, where all these changes don't get made? Is the real concern about forking the userbase and ecosystem, and the fork won't have the critical user base to become self-sustaining? Edit: added paragraph for clarity.

I wonder how vetting of Certificate Authorities will happen. I suppose that if your OS has a sufficient number of trusted CAs, then any browser can rely on those.

But consider this, from Debian's ca-certificates package:

---

This package includes PEM files of CA certificates to allow SSL-based applications to check for the authenticity of SSL connections.

It includes, among others, certificate authorities used by the Debian infrastructure and those shipped with Mozilla's browsers.

Please note that Debian can neither confirm nor deny whether the certificate authorities whose certificates are included in this package have in any way been audited for trustworthiness or RFC 3647 compliance. Full responsibility to assess them belongs to the local system administrator.

---

So as long as Mozilla allows OSes, and presumably other browser forks, to benefit from their CA vetting and monitoring activities ...

There really is a lot that does, or should, go into browser development and maintenance.

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#69

Post by syshum »

ngokevin wrote: post #56
syshum wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Moz://a is paid millions by Google so that they're the default search engine in Firefox That has not been the case for a few years(2012? or 2013 I believe), Yahoo is currently the Default Search and pays the bulk of Mozilla budget, With the Verizon Deal Mozilla is likely worried that will change when the contract is up for renewal

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3099804/it-industry/ver... > Verizon must pay even if Mozilla walks from Yahoo search deal

Yes Verizon must honor the Contract, all contracts, Yahoo committed to, that is standard

That contract however I believe was for 5 years, I am talking about what happens after the 5 years is over, which I believe will be in 2019 or 2020. After which Verizon has no contractual obligation to continue paying Mozilla for anything and likely will cease the partnership

Re: I cannot continue working on my add-ons

#70

Post by a3n »

syshum wrote: post #42
a3n wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Firefox 57 will like see me stop using FireFox it will be no different than chrome so I might as well just use chrome Firefox probably won't phone google.

Yea that is not a concern for me... I am logged in to Google services all the time anyway and I have a Android Phone sitting 3 ins from my computer. I use Firefox for a few Productivity Extensions that will likely stop working in 57, as such there is no reason for me to continue to use FireFox.

And I'm logged out of Google services all the time, except for in, use and out. Because it's Google. Man. :)
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