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Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

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Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, last time I checked the Firefox UI uses more screen real estate, leaving a little less space for the content. The difference with chrome is small, but clearly noticeable. If Mozilla fixes this, then they have an additional user ;)

Perhaps setting the UI density to “compact” will help? I like minimal UI, but Chrome’s feels a bit too minimal. I think Firefox on compact is a perfect balance.

Thank you very much, learned something new. I removed the Title bar too, makes ff more compact than chromium.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#222

It started with an older version. Logging into Google automatically linked your Google account to the settings page. At least in the last version, clearing your private data (ctrl-shift-delete) no longer deleted Google cookies. To completely log out required manually digging into the advanced settings and then rebooting the browser. Google fundamentally doesn't respect user privacy, and people should use Firefox.

Alternatively, Brave browser seems to Un-Google their Chromium based browser: https://brave.com/download-dev/ " Brave Core will arrive in beta form in late September and in major release form most of the way through October " https://www.cnet.com/news/brave-ad-blocking-browser-gets-chr...

I'm avoiding Chrome-based browsers as much as possible. I don't think monocultures are a good idea.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it harmful to log in once to both apps that use the same account in the same browser? Gmail and Calendar already share the same login. Is that hurting anyone?

Multiple users may use the same browser/devices but different Gmail accounts. Even ignoring the ( many ) privacy implications, this causes problems for syncing across devices. Lets say I share a computer with my partner, but we have separate phones. Should I need to check which Gmail account is logged in before bookmarking something? Why can't we share a Chrome profile across those 3 devices while still maintaining s…

> Multiple users may use the same browser/devices but different Gmail accounts.

Why would they use the same browser logon. Sure they might use the same be, sure, they might even not use a different user account on the computer, but your are suggesting that they would use the same Google account to log into the browser yet different Google Accounts to log into Google.

That seems improbable, and likely to have unintended privacy implication that account consistency would mitigate rather than exacerbate.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#224

It started with an older version. Logging into Google automatically linked your Google account to the settings page. At least in the last version, clearing your private data (ctrl-shift-delete) no longer deleted Google cookies. To completely log out required manually digging into the advanced settings and then rebooting the browser. Google fundamentally doesn't respect user privacy, and people should use Firefox.

Alternatively, Brave browser seems to Un-Google their Chromium based browser: https://brave.com/download-dev/ " Brave Core will arrive in beta form in late September and in major release form most of the way through October " https://www.cnet.com/news/brave-ad-blocking-browser-gets-chr...

I tend not to install browsers and other important software from the internet. Is this packaged by any major distro ? What are the blockers ? Non-free bits, analytics etc. ? Honestly, I wouldn't pick a browswer unless it's packaged by fedora/debian.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#225
post #95

If you have gmail, consider using an imap client. it might take a bit of tweaking the configuration, but i'd say it's worthwhile.

I use my Gmail account as my secondary e-mail address and can confirm IMAP still works. I even use Office 365 e-mail as my tertiary e-mail address in an IMAP client. I have no idea which specific features I'm missing out; from my PoV IMAP4 is the standard and the rest is missing out on that with these proprietary web portals.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might want to try it again. I have over 80 Firefox tabs open in multiple windows, multiple containers, and two Firefox profiles. It's still extremely fast.

Are you using any plugins to achieve this number of open tabs and and still have good performance?

It appears to work fine even without extensions (Ubuntu 16.04, Firefox 62), but I have some garbage-blocking extensions installed.

In my main Firefox profile, I use umatrix[1] to browse the WWW with all CSS and JS turned off by default, enabling them only when needed. Reader mode makes most articles readable with a single click.

Firefox's built-in privacy protection is also enabled.

If a website doesn't work with my settings, it takes about the same time to override the CSS/JS settings than the difference between an unblocked page load and a blocked page load. Pages load much faster in general, so it's a net gain in free time.

I also use Stylus[2] to turn off all CSS animation and add custom styling to websites.

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

[2] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/styl-us/

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#228

It started with an older version. Logging into Google automatically linked your Google account to the settings page. At least in the last version, clearing your private data (ctrl-shift-delete) no longer deleted Google cookies. To completely log out required manually digging into the advanced settings and then rebooting the browser. Google fundamentally doesn't respect user privacy, and people should use Firefox.

I completely switched whenever FF quantum was released to stable. The experience is amazing. I will say I think chrome dev tools are better though.

The biggest feature holding me back from using Firefox is the inability to drag multiple tabs at once. I often "split" a chrome browser window into two this way, or combine two chrome windows into one.

Re: Tell HN: Using Gmail? You will be force logged into Chrome

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely switched whenever FF quantum was released to stable. The experience is amazing. I will say I think chrome dev tools are better though.

The biggest feature holding me back from using Firefox is the inability to drag multiple tabs at once. I often "split" a chrome browser window into two this way, or combine two chrome windows into one.

This extension lets you split multiple tabs from a window to a new one: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/multiple-tab-...

It's not as pretty or intuitive as Chrome's “shift-click and drag” approach, but it works well enough.

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