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Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

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141–150 of 234 posts

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#142
post #139

I have been a happy user of Kagi search for a couple years, but I really hope they don't start going everywhere. They have Kagi translate, they also mentioned building an email service. I like Kagi search because it works well. I actively avoid their other products because I want to encourage them to stay focused and make a good product.

Thank you for your feedback. Please do not avoid our other products :) It makes the Kagi eco-system stronger. We do not want to be a one product company, at mercy of big tech and other platforms. We are genuinly trying to create a user-friendly, user-centric alternative for consuming the web. It has always been the plan. And all that while keeping the search product changelog the most active of any search engine in the world https://kagi.com/changelog

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#143

Great to see them leave the Apple cage. But wondering why they would chose Linux before Windows and Android? Wouldn't these markets be much more relevant?

Easier to port to

The easiest solution would be to not port at all. Curious under what considerations it was deemed worthwhile for them to commit to this.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#144

Kagi is cool and all but... I'm in Europe. I'm busy disengaging from US based services. Any good EU alternatives?

> I'm busy disengaging from US based services. Can you explain why? From privacy and free speech perspectives aren’t US services now better? Kagi now probably has the best search privacy features in the world after recent upgrades with Privacy Pass and even a ToR endpoint.

I can understand their position. USA appears to be leaving NATO and promoting Russia's interests (through both pulling back from treaties and allies, and embracing Russian style diplomacy and oligarchical government), it's pretty easy to see why Europeans would get squirmy about American companies.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#145

Orion for macOS is still pretty buggy and, in my experience, a bit too frustrating to use as my default browser. I want to use it and pay the $5/month even though I don't use it all the time. It's close to being good, but not quite there yet.

It killed my battery. tried for a month.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kagi has crypto now too? I thought that was just brave.

The comment you replied to is also saying that they find the Brave crypto annoying.

I don't touch Brave because of the crypto thing and founder's affiliations.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you understand that stuff made in Europe and sold in Europe is also subject to the VAT?

it seems he also overlooked, in his tirade against EU VAT, that almost the whole world has VAT. It's just an handful of countries like USA and Malaysia that are the weird ones, and don't implement a VAT tax

VAT is a reductive tax that taxes the poor instead of the rich. Coincidentally, Trump supports adding VAT to the US.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain your use case? Looking at hundreds of results from a search query doesn't strike me as "finding things by accident", but I'm curious to know more.

I used to do this too - it used to be that after you passed the first couple of pages of results from the major/mainstream sites the rest would be minor personal websites, forums, and similar. Find one good article on one of them and it was often worth adding to your bookmarks or RSS collection to ensure you saw the writer's later additions.

Kagi has its “web” search, but you can switch to “small web” and get results like this. Or the “forums” lens if looking for user generated content.

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#149
post #48

I would've thought that Windows would be the next platform to port to given its larger user base. Maybe the decision speaks to the distribution of Kagi users across operating systems.

WebKit for Windows is not in a particularly well-maintained state, where WebKit-GTK (which is probably what Orion for Linux is built with) is in reasonable shape since it’s already used by GNOME Web (aka Epiphany). That might have something to do with it.

The gap between the Windows and GTK ports is shrinking. Every JIT tier has been enabled for JSC on Windows[1], and libpas (the custom memory allocator) should get enabled soon.

The Windows port is moving from Cairo to Skia soon as well, matching the GTK port (though I think the focus is enabling the CPU renderer to start).

Webkit's CI (EWS) is running the layout tests on Windows, and running more tests on Windows is mostly a matter of funding the hardware.

There's a few things still disabled on the Windows port, some rough edges, and not a lot of production use (Bun and Playwright are the main users). It'd definitely be more work than Linux, but it's not as bad as you'd think.

[1] https://iangrunert.com/2024/10/07/every-jit-tier-enabled-jsc...

Re: Kagi Is Bringing Orion Web Browser to Linux

#150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My guess is that they realize the opportunity created by Mozilla’s sudden change in privacy terms.

I think this is correct. I refuse to touch Chromium with a ten-foot pole, but there aren't really any other options on Linux. (Yes, there is LibreWolf and other forks, but I doubt any have the resources to "go it alone" should Mozilla fold or go completely turncoat.) The closest extant option is something like GNOME Web (also based on WebKit like Orion) but the lack of extension support and poor performance makes it…

WebKitGTk performance has improved a ton in the past few releases. Orion will ofc match that. Also working on WebExtensions in upstream hopefully by end of year.
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