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How Firefox Got Fast Again

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Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#401

Post by jakub_g »

tspike wrote: post #368
mapgrep wrote: post #52

I switched back to Firefox 54 from Chrome when multiprocess browsing ("Electrolysis") came out of beta. It's been absolutely great. It's fast and I trust and like the nonprofit behind it. And all the extensions I care about are available. My main issue with Chrome was the endless nags to sign in to a Google account, and just generally wanting less dependence on Google. I also like that Firefox has a built in tracking…

Thanks for the reminder. I just downloaded the latest FF beta and exiled Chrome to an "only when needed" role. All the back-and-forth about speed and features is understandable, but misses the point that Firefox needs our support if we are to have any real non-proprietary options for what is quickly becoming the base system abstraction layer for most computing.

BTW: if using Android, if FF is not for you, try Brave instead of Chrome.

It feels exactly like Chrome (it's Chromium-based), but has a built-in adblocker, tracker blocking, HTTPS everywhere, no nagging to sign in, and does not throw "suggested news" (with no opt-out) upon you. Brave's founder is ex-Mozilla's CEO (Brendan Eich).

However latest FF on Android is actually not bad, at least if you have a modern phone (the UI feels slowish though on pre-2016 phones).

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#402

Post by CaptSpify »

gfodor wrote: post #153
iterati wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is sadly true. I switched off Chrome 5+ years ago due to the "vim-like" plugins being much better on FF than Chrome (specifically, my keybindings not working on built-in pages) and since FF56, vimperator and pentadactly no longer function. There have been months of back-and-forth between some developers and the FF team, but the functionality required for these plugins has never been prioritized and I had to disa…

Saka keys on Firefox has been a suitable replacement for me.

eh... I use it now, and it's OK. It's missing a ton of features that Vimperator had, and it will likely never get them.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#403

Post by Sylos »

contravariant wrote: post #76
wbkang wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same on Windows, I wish the light theme was the default.

I think light is the default for the release version, but devs seem to like dark UIs for some reason.

There's a Light theme, a Normal theme and a Dark theme.

Dark is the default for the Developer Edition, which is what you're thinking of. But Normal is the default for Stable. Light is almost the same as Normal, but with a few more elements in white.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#404

Post by _qbjt »

woolvalley wrote: post #341

Has anyone tried firefox 57 or 56 on macOS and still found it to be slower on a bunch of sites? Like facebook is unusably slow on firefox compared to chrome still. Google maps has slow downs too.

Yeah, YouTube is completely unusable for me on macOS Firefox 57. The video will completely stop while the audio continues playing and the only way to fix it is to adjust the current playback time. This is on a Retina MBP with 16GB of RAM. Doesn’t occur with the same version of Firefox on Windows.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#405

Post by allenz »

on_and_off wrote: post #387
ared38 wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox has had syncing built in for a while: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/features/sync/ Haven't tried it on iOS yet, but it worked great on my Android.

and this is where Chrome has a good hook on me. In order to switch, both FF desktop and mobile need to be better than Chrome. Does FF support a version of Chrome tabs too ? Damn, they have built themselves a good moat just with features I will miss.

I prefer FF over Chrome on mobile. FF mobile allows extensions such as uBlock Origin and Google Link Fixer which I find essential. FF supports sending tabs to other devices, if that's what you mean by Chrome tabs.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#406

Post by CUViper »

PuffinBlue wrote: post #393
callahad wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for choosing Firefox. 1. Are there any specific extensions you need? Happy to add them to our outreach list. 2. Sorry about Hangouts; follows a trend of Chrome-only product launches/re-launches from Google (five this year so far). Wish we could do more, but if Google's OK shipping things that only work on one browser, that's their prerogative. 3. Firefox also has completely separate profiles, in addition to…

> 1. Are there any specific extensions you need? Happy to add them to our outreach list. LastPass please. I'm sure it's on your list already, and I'm sure they know about it too but every little helps. I am happy to use pass/keepass (whatever version) but the family says only LastPass is acceptable.

LastPass updated a few days ago -- I'm using it with FF57 now!

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#407

Post by leeoniya »

jakub_g wrote: post #401
tspike wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the reminder. I just downloaded the latest FF beta and exiled Chrome to an "only when needed" role. All the back-and-forth about speed and features is understandable, but misses the point that Firefox needs our support if we are to have any real non-proprietary options for what is quickly becoming the base system abstraction layer for most computing.

BTW: if using Android, if FF is not for you, try Brave instead of Chrome. It feels exactly like Chrome (it's Chromium-based), but has a built-in adblocker, tracker blocking, HTTPS everywhere, no nagging to sign in, and does not throw "suggested news" (with no opt-out) upon you. Brave's founder is ex-Mozilla's CEO (Brendan Eich). However latest FF on Android is actually not bad, at least if you have a modern phone (th…

i would be using FF on Android if the scrolling was not so crappy. It's pretty terrible :(

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#408

Post by euyyn »

k__ wrote: post #376

How long will it take to forget about this again? The whole story reminds me of something a project manager, who worked at the Google homepage, once said. They worked their asses off to get the page smaller and smaller so the UX was unbeatable. Then, after they got enough users, they focused on different things, and more and more stuff was included. Somehow Firefox went the same way, right? First they created it so i…

The article mentions they're adding automatic tracking of performance to their tests.

> we’re adding lots of new tracking, including improvements to CI automation running performance tests, telemetry to track what users experience, and regression management inside of bugs.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#409

Post by sverige »

mgbmtl wrote: post #238
sverige wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been using firefox since forever too. (Actually, since Mozilla 1.0 (aka Nutscrape) in 1993 or thereabouts.) I'm at that point where I'm about to dump it again, as I have periodically in the past. They keep making it more and more like Chrome. If I wanted to use Chrome, I would. It's gotten to bloat maximum. It's slow as hell. It's less flexible and less easy to personalize. They have broken some of my favorite a…

I was feeling the same, but FF57 really is much better. It does break some extensions, but many have converted. Which are you having trouble with? The main one I'm missing is "Disable Ctrl+Q". My notes: https://www.bidon.ca/fr/random/2017-10-05-webextensions-supp...

The main one I've been missing is Pentadactyl (for quite a while). Vimium-FF is ok I guess.

My main objection is still the sheer size and the amount of memory it takes, and the continual feature creep to make it more and more like Chrome. I know I'm in the minority, and also that it's heresy to say anything bad about Mozilla here. Oh well.

I only wish I had lots of money and/or time so I could help revive the development of xombrero, but at least it's still available.

Re: How Firefox Got Fast Again

#410

Post by jakub_g »

drdaeman wrote: post #383
rhn_mk1 wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can absolutely run multiple different instances at the same time. I've been using Firefox this way for over a year, 2 instances open right now.

It is possible, but it's messy in terms of which one is the default (clicking on links outside of the browser), taskbar/launcher buttons (OS- and DE-dependent, some configurations have issues e.g. with pinning) etc. I think there was something else - minor and just slightly inconvenient - but I forgot. Compared to ProfileManager, Container Tabs are absolutely awesome. Completely different experience, smooth and nice.

ProfileManager is a bit awkward indeed. You can pass `-p primaryprofile` and `-p secondaryprofile -no-remote` to make sure that links from OS are not opened in the 2nd instance, but then, when you close Firefox and click an external link, it will open Firefox with the last opened profile, which might be `secondaryprofile`.

The solution for me was to use one Firefox installation per profile: primary = stable, secondary = nightly.

Container tabs are way nicer than this, but since I open lots of tabs, I still like the distinction between stable and nightly (stable = regular browsing, nightly = FB).

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