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Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#261

Post by saagarjha »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #204
anoncake wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proper applications follow OS UI conventions, they appear in the task bar, are launched from the application launcher etc. Proper applications can also be sandboxed, though Spectre makes it a bad idea to run untrusted code anyway.

> Proper applications follow OS UI conventions (I'm going to ignore the use of "proper application" instead of "native (non-web) application"; it isn't helping your argument.) Native applications can choose whether they follow UI conventions or not; many games don't, for instance. Web applications have the same choice; they can use native controls provided by the browser, and I certainly agree that well-behaved web a…

> there aren't yet standard mechanisms for that (outside of mobile platforms)

macOS certainly has one.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#262

Post by numbers »

darkstar999 wrote: post #239

I've switched over to Firefox on all devices. It's especially useful on Android because I can use uBlock and other useful extensions, where Chrome doesn't have any. The only feature I hope for is "hit tab to search" after typing a domain name in the search bar. For example in Chrome I can type "youtube.com" and then hit tab, and then type in a search query.

I'm on iOS using firefox and I had no idea you can install extensions on the Android version of firefox, that's very cool!

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#263

Post by anoncake »

ceejayoz wrote: post #255
anoncake wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Word processors? Only if you're requiring something like Markdown. You havent heard of LibreOffice?

> You havent heard of LibreOffice? Don't be disingenuous. The thread's about Firefox and JavaScript. It's quite clear @tehlike wasn't talking about native desktop apps, but web apps.

I dont disagree that web apps would not exist if web apps did not exist.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#264

Post by seba_dos1 »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #157
vernie wrote: post #132

Didn't the whole creative coding community pitch a fit when Chrome did this?

Because Chrome had bugs in how it worked, and didn't make it trivial for people to re-enable when they want audio.

I wouldn't say "bugs". It was deliberate behavior.

Chrome simply broke a lot of content on the Web, while Firefox just mutes it and lets you unmute.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#265

Post by vetinari »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #121
vetinari wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It used to crash under Linux, when you updated it while it was running, and then opened new window or a tab. Now it shows a message that you need to restart.

Has never crashed on update for me, at least that I can remember after ten years. I have seen the warning message, that arrived years ago however. I'll add the caveat that I typically restart my browser at least once a day, perhaps avoids the problem.

It wasn't immediately after update. It was after you updated it while it was running and then you tried something, that triggered the crash (like opening a new tab).

Later it stopped to crash, but acted weirdly (clicks on links didn't work, etc).

Nowadays we have the notice to restart the browser. It didn't arrive years ago, just a few releases ago.

This was only under Linux, and only with the distro package managers. Under Windows or MacOS, the updater updates the browser on next restart, so this didn't happen.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#266

Post by toflon »

darkstar999 wrote: post #239

I've switched over to Firefox on all devices. It's especially useful on Android because I can use uBlock and other useful extensions, where Chrome doesn't have any. The only feature I hope for is "hit tab to search" after typing a domain name in the search bar. For example in Chrome I can type "youtube.com" and then hit tab, and then type in a search query.

I know it's not the same, but if you bookmark "https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%s" and put in a keyword like "yt". You can type "yt whatever" in the addressbar and it will do a search on youtube.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#267

Post by dorgo »

mushufasa wrote: post #196
brink wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same. Have you ever tried to click a link only to accidentally click something else because the page won't stop loading? It's infuriating.

this has been happening to me recently on Google search, as cards load with info about the top results. Anyone on Google reading this -- please either cut that out, or include css placeholders for content you expect your JS to load. Both waiting longer for content to load and having to go back from clicking the wrong thing detract from the raison d'etre of fast and relevant search.

I think I solved it by removing it in stylus:

#eobc_1,.r-i4KASL__ToPM,.r-iGs8q6iiSUas{ display:none !important; }

I think it was something like "other people also search for..." thing which poped up unexepectedly.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#268

Post by jerf »

giggles_giggles wrote: post #220
StavrosK wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I noticed something that struck me as an extremely dark pattern the other day. I was in the Netflix menu on my TV, and I loaded a show and was hovering over the "play" button, but figured I'd leave it there and not start it yet. A few seconds later, the video fades in and the episode starts playing! I didn't even notice it and kind of started watching the episode, but then realized that I hadn't actually started it m…

This only just started happening? I use a PS4 to watch Netflix and the auto-play has been happening for months. I find it so irritating that now I don't go to Netflix to browse anymore, because I don't have long enough to consider an option before it involuntarily begins happening to me. Now I only open the interface if I already know what I want to watch, which means I'm no longer exposed to anything new they add. T…

I wonder if Netflix has overoptimized this for their metrics. I realize "the plural of anecdote is not data", but I've had the same problems with it lately; it's impossible to "browse" anything before the UI starts yelling at you. I'm sure their metrics look awesome, though, with engagement up in all sorts of ways, but I question if it's "real" engagement.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#269

Post by anoncake »

snaky wrote: post #184
anoncake wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We cant ban just the bad Javascript, a browser cannot distinguish it from the good. And overall, Javascript does more harm than good.

> We cant ban just the bad Javascript Well, technically it's possible, and even some parts of the script could be allowed to run or not. > a browser cannot distinguish it from the good But the user can. And the machine could help, thanks to machine learning.

Consider Javascript that replaces native browser functions. Web pages that are essentially static documents, but still dont work without Javascript.

Is this good Javascript? I dont think so. Does disabling it on an individual level help? No.

Re: Firefox 66.0 Aims to Reduce Online Annoyances

#270

Post by maxaf »

Marsymars wrote: post #228
woogley wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the alternatives (gifs, frames advanced by JS) are even more bandwidth-heavy

If sites escalate to gifs or frames advanced by JS, I'll escalate to blocking gifs or JS. Autoplaying video is not acceptable.

I like what Slack does for GIFs: there's some (not sure if configurable) size threshold above which the GIF won't auto-expand. This is something browsers could do in general.
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