Waterfox Browser • Hacker News Board

Re: Waterfox Browser

#21

Post by pheeney » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:42 AM UTC

trufflepig wrote: post #18

sdan wrote: post #16

Doesn't collect any data Proceeds to links to Stackpath (in the footer) with a bunch of query tags : https://www.stackpath.com/?utm_campaign=Partner%20Display&ut... .

What’s stackpath

Looks like its a sponsor of their CDN. The link doesn't embed any tracking that I can see. Its simply a referral link so that stackpath can determine how many people clicked from waterfox.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#22

Post by beatgammit » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:43 AM UTC

trufflepig wrote: post #18

sdan wrote: post #16

Doesn't collect any data Proceeds to links to Stackpath (in the footer) with a bunch of query tags : https://www.stackpath.com/?utm_campaign=Partner%20Display&ut... .

What’s stackpath

From a quick search, it's a CDN.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#23

Post by frenchy » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:49 AM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #19

smacktoward wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, projects like this give me the heebie-jeebies, to be honest. NPAPI and XUL were discontinued for really good reasons. Some users say they still want them, but that's because (1) people hate change, even when it's good for them and (2) they don't really appreciate all the security baggage those old APIs were lugging around with them. Projects that assure those users that they can keep on trucking with their old…

The problem is that the replacement is crippled and Google is clearly more interested in stripping features from the extension API. I'm still waiting for a way to hide the tab bar which is a privileged UI feature now.

I'm not sure what Google has to do with this, but Mozilla have been adding features to the extention API since Quantum first came out.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#24

Post by sjwright » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:50 AM UTC

vecplane wrote: post #8

I wanted to use Waterfox, but I wasn't sure about the security side of things. When vulnerabilities are found in Firefox, we can expect them to be fixed pretty quickly. Can the same be said for this project?

Given the project is so small, I wouldn't trust their future response to be rapid even if they have been in the past.

Right now most security fixes come in the form of merging upstream security fixes from Mozilla. As their code base becomes increasingly divergent to the Firefox head, merging in upstream security fixes will become increasingly difficult and increasingly cumbersome.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#25

Post by sjwright » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:55 AM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #19

smacktoward wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, projects like this give me the heebie-jeebies, to be honest. NPAPI and XUL were discontinued for really good reasons. Some users say they still want them, but that's because (1) people hate change, even when it's good for them and (2) they don't really appreciate all the security baggage those old APIs were lugging around with them. Projects that assure those users that they can keep on trucking with their old…

The problem is that the replacement is crippled and Google is clearly more interested in stripping features from the extension API. I'm still waiting for a way to hide the tab bar which is a privileged UI feature now.

Being compatible with the Extension API doesn't require Mozilla to follow Google on every decision. As long as the deviations are well documented and developers perform feature detection, Mozilla won't ever have to make changes that serve the interests of Google ahead of their users.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#26

Post by unreal37 » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:56 AM UTC

sdan wrote: post #16

Doesn't collect any data Proceeds to links to Stackpath (in the footer) with a bunch of query tags : https://www.stackpath.com/?utm_campaign=Partner%20Display&ut... .

I have no problem with "utm" parameters. They're static and not personal to you. You can see them.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#27

Post by unreal37 » Thu, May 30, 2019, 2:57 AM UTC

sdan wrote: post #17

Says limited data collection Proceeds to use Google Analytics on waterfox.net

You seem obsessed with this. :)

Re: Waterfox Browser

#28

Post by drilldrive » Thu, May 30, 2019, 3:00 AM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #7

gruez wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAIK the main selling point is xul (legacy) extension support.

I guess if someone really needs to use a legacy extension, it's a good thing that it's around, but I'm personally glad that XUL is dead both from a developer standpoint and as a user.

I am glad Mozilla made the much needed change and don't have long-term problems with Mozilla other than perhaps lack of trust. I did not like how Mozilla made the swift change with little announcement for long-term add-ons though, particularly making the change right after allowing for multi-processing.

Re: Waterfox Browser

#29

Post by cbsks » Thu, May 30, 2019, 3:04 AM UTC

Why does it need to send your OS and browser version to check for updates? Couldn't it just look up whatever the latest versions are?

Re: Waterfox Browser

#30

Post by sjwright » Thu, May 30, 2019, 3:04 AM UTC

simula67 wrote: post #11

ravenstine wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess if someone really needs to use a legacy extension, it's a good thing that it's around, but I'm personally glad that XUL is dead both from a developer standpoint and as a user.

Not me. I lost DownThemAll[1] and TabWheelScroll after the extension overhaul [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DownThemAll !

I loved DownThemAll, but I'm not sad to see it go because I realised how rarely it was actually needed these days. The downloading interface built into Firefox really is fine 99% of the time.

On the rarer occasions that I need to download extremely large files, I send them to an HTTP download client (pyload) that runs directly on my NAS in docker.