Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
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Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#2I would say that maybe they are underused or not well known by the general public, but not underrated.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#3Extensions are awesome but I think this article is a bit too optimistic. I mean I share the optimism but in practice a major challenge is the platform.
Chrome for example has a ton of limitations:
https://getpolarized.io/2019/04/05/Google-Will-Kill-Chrome-E...
If you want to do anything significant you have to get their 'permission' and at that point they throttle your extension release updates.
You can't just push an update immediately that gets sent out. They take a week to approve your extension.
This might sound reasonable until you realize that a week is an eternity for a continuous development shop. That might as well be a year.
ESPECIALLY if something is broken.
Imagine if you had a bug that destroys data and you need to rush out a fix. Nope.. You need to wait one week for that to go out.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#4I believe many people should attempt to create their own web extension, even if they don't publish it.
In my younger years, I used to crack and hack software just for fun. Those were my Softice years. Later, when Opera was not Chromium based, I also had several site customisations, since it was very easy to add my own JS and CSS to any web site.
Nowadays, I have 4 extensions created and tailored for my needs. One that deals with cookies (mostly "delete everything" outside of my white list) and three that add functionalities to specific sites (automating, managing lists, hiding or highlighting content, etc). Building them was fun, though not as much fun as playing against "copy protections" long ago: like going from competitive chess to creative DIY.
The only pain with custom made extensions is that Firefox is very reluctant to load them. I don't want to upload them them on some Mozilla server, so I have to enter some cryptic "about:..." URL, then click and navigate to my extension, for every extension at every browser start. This is one of the main reasons I'm using more Vivaldi than Firefox these past months.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#5Extensions are awesome but I think this article is a bit too optimistic. I mean I share the optimism but in practice a major challenge is the platform. Chrome for example has a ton of limitations: https://getpolarized.io/2019/04/05/Google-Will-Kill-Chrome-E... If you want to do anything significant you have to get their 'permission' and at that point they throttle your extension release updates. You can't just push a…
I experience the same one week delay with an extension. The publishing delay is always about a week, and that is highly unusual.
They state that the extension update is under compliance review, which may take several business days, though the similar approval times indicate that this is actually an arbitrary publishing delay, and that no human review takes place in all cases, otherwise there would be more variation between approval times.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#6Browser extensions are being underrated deliberately by browser developers. Ever since we lost XUL Firefox, anyone who wants to really do anything worth doing around a web browser should have already switched to Pale Moon. Doubly so with Google's Manifest v3, which is going to kill selective content download management.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#7Extensions are awesome but I think this article is a bit too optimistic. I mean I share the optimism but in practice a major challenge is the platform. Chrome for example has a ton of limitations: https://getpolarized.io/2019/04/05/Google-Will-Kill-Chrome-E... If you want to do anything significant you have to get their 'permission' and at that point they throttle your extension release updates. You can't just push a…
The same applies for my own fork of SingleFile, called SingleFileZ. I can publish any update of SingleFile in 1 hour. For SingleFileZ, which requires less permissions, I have to wait 7 days for exactly the same update. That's very demotivating.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#8Sometimes popular abandoned browser extensions get bought up by malicious actors that inject malware into your browser without you ever knowing because extensions get automatically updated.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#9I love that extensions turn the idea of browser differences into a strength.
It's a reminder that the websites you make don't just go into a black box, they have to co-exist with individual user preferences/needs.
Re: Browser extensions are underrated: the promise of hackable software
#10I launched my side project (https://www.checkbot.io/, a website best practices checker) as a paid Chrome extension and have been happy with the experience so far. The browser extension platform lets me easily support Linux, Chrome OS, Mac and Windows, with automatic updates and small installation size (~1MB). I get traffic from people discovering the extension via the Chrome store, and users can install and launch the app in seconds which lowers onboarding friction.
Compared to native apps, I think browser extension based apps reduce a lot of headaches for developers and users.