Switch from Chrome to Firefox • Hacker News Board

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#291

Post by cracauer » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:44 PM UTC

The situation follows the "mobile" (cellphone, tablet) situation where Chrome was just not providing an extension API that could be used to implement adblockers (or much else for that matter, e.g. Cookienukers).

This is no surprise at all. Competitive pressure for "desktop" (non-crippled computers incl. Laptops) required providing suitable extension APIs, but the writing was on the wall for a long time.

Some powerful people inside Google consider it theft to browse the web while blocking ads.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#292

Post by wmab » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:44 PM UTC

Mistri wrote: post #274

I have 6 profiles that I like to keep separate, and the only browser that supports seamless switching in the toolbar is Chrome. That's the only reason I continue to use it. If Firefox were to implement this, I'd immediately switch. I know there's addons that try to simluate what Chrome does, but they just aren't as easy to use and don't do exactly what I want.

Have you looked into Containers to see if this will work as you want profiles to? https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/containers

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#293

Post by rc_kas » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:45 PM UTC

Does anyone have a single thing that Chrome does that FF does not?

For the life of me I cannot understand why anyone uses Chrome. But if anyone has information on Chrome that I do not, please let me know.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#294

Post by happytoexplain » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:45 PM UTC

taneq wrote: post #55

brento wrote: post #21

I think link forgot to mention a step 4. Step 4: Spend weeks getting used to new shortcuts, finding equivalent extensions/plugins and getting used to their dev tools.

Does it really take you weeks to get used to a new environment? WEEKS? That kind of thing bugs me for a few hours, maybe a couple of days.

I'd say "weeks" is somewhat quick. You may have biased expectations of interface size and/or the ability of users to internalize it.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#295

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:45 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#296

Post by neilsimp1 » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:45 PM UTC

DaveWalk wrote: post #217

SilasX wrote: post #189

Um, Firefox does the same sorts of thing. A) Want to use unsigned addons to play around, or tweak your existing ones[1]? Nope, even if you allow them in about:config, you can't; you have to use a special development version and update it separately. B) Want to customize your keyboard shortcuts? Sorry, that's not safe, you have to use a crippled API that won't take effect until a given page loads. C) Want to control y…

You raise very good points. The shortcuts thing has made me miserable for years. Surely the coders of Mozilla appreciate a good set of shortcuts, like in whatever IDE they write their code in!

It kinda drives me nuts that Ctrl+num changes to that tab number on Windows, but on Linux, it is Alt+num.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#297

Post by rifung » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:46 PM UTC

jwr wrote: post #161

I don't understand why Mac users use Chrome. Safari seems to be out of fashion: people just assume that it should not be used for some reason, even though it is actually a great browser. I use Safari for both my own browsing and for development (a fairly large ClojureScript application), and it is by far the best browser on the platform by all measures (speed first and foremost). The only place where Safari falls sho…

Disclaimer: I work for Google

I actually really liked Safari when I used it. The issue for me is just that I don't only use OS X and like having my stuff synced across devices.

If I had an iPhone I would probably be very happy with Safari.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#298

Post by rc_kas » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:47 PM UTC

billysielu wrote: post #156

I did switch to Firefox and then they broke all extensions so I switched back. Chrome just works better.

That was a major upgrade to Firefox. Most extensions have since done the fixes needed to handle the upgrade.

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#299

Post by neogodless » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:47 PM UTC

nneonneo wrote: post #236

neogodless wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion, profiles are useful for separating "who I am." Whether that's my personal life and my professional life, or if it's me or my spouse using the same computer. Containers are useful for separating "who I am to my providers." As far as Facebook is concerned, I am a Facebook user, but I don't use Amazon or Google. But Amazon thinks I'm an Amazon user that doesn't use Facebook or Google. You can accomplish t…

You can definitely have two profiles open simultaneously - on MacOS, this is achieved with “open -n Firefox.app --args -P [profile name]”; on Windows, “firefox -no-remote -P [profile name]”. Admittedly, that should _really_ be exposed in the UI somehow, but at least it means you can wrap up the command in a handy desktop shortcut (e.g. one that says “my Firefox” and one that says “her Firefox”).

OK - I hadn't come across that. I actually have the shortcut on my desktop that prompts you to pick a profile if you don't have any windows open already. I'll have to see if I can tweak the shortcuts to open each one! Thanks!!

Re: Switch from Chrome to Firefox

#300

Post by deviantfero » Thu, May 30, 2019, 5:47 PM UTC

The only reason I don't switch is that whenever Firefox has control of the webcam, I can't seem to be able to access the webcam with any other software, is this configurable? I work with webRTC a lot, so this is essential for me, I really want to switch