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A look at Firefox forks

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Re: A look at Firefox forks

#191

Post by shiomiru »

zamadatix wrote: post #136
mixermachine wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are free to enable WebGl in the settings and install a Plugin that allows for blocking/allowing WebGl. The default should be privacy if you install a browser that focuses on privacy.

Would you expect a "privacy focused" browser to offer you networking disabled by default but the ability to enable completely unrestricted networking in the settings (you can install a plugin for CORS and the like if you want) or to natively provide the privacy controls you need to actually use the browser? If the latter, why is it different depending which attack surface you ask about? If the former, why not just ma…

> Would you expect a "privacy focused" browser to offer you networking disabled by default

Obviously not, because at that point it can no longer be used to browse the web. (That said, "do no network requests" should be the default idle state of the browser until appropriate user interaction. Allowing CORS is also a horrible default but that ship has long sailed.)

I also disable WebGL in my Firefox profile and this does not inconvenience me in any way. So I do not think WebGL support is as instrumental to browsing the web as you claim; it entirely depends on what sites you visit. (And let's be honest here, a very significant majority of websites does not need WebGL.)

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#192

Post by aucisson_masque »

notpushkin wrote: post #153
aucisson_masque wrote: post #132

> The Floorp project is a much newer entrant.... According to its donations page, donors who contribute at the $100 level may submit ads to feature in the new tab page So if I get it right, people can 'donate' money to floorp project in exchange for service (advertisement). Like when I go to the grocery shop and I make a donation, in exchange I get back home with a pack of beer. I didn't know I was donating so much,…

> I didn't know I was donating so much, my dumb ass thought I was just buying stuff. Got to put that on my Tax sheet. It’s not tax deductible, though (and even if you didn’t get anything in return, I don’t think Floorp is a registred charity anyway).

It was a joke, i know it's not deductible :)

Made me realize I never deduced all the open source project i gave to tho.

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#195

Post by creesch »

ksynwa wrote: post #180

The problem with Firefox forks I have: - you don't know when they are gonna keel over and die. - non-existent support from distro package repositories. Void Linux for example has an understandable policy of not providing Firefox and Chromium forks. I really don't wanna install them from appimages or fatpak. I have found using firefox provided by my distro with something like arkenfox to be a decent medium but it suck…

That, and in many cases they get "stuck" at the firefox version they are based on which means that newer things might not work and more importantly security fixes might not be applied.

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#196

Post by ForTheKidz »

cosmic_cheese wrote: post #68
slindsey wrote: post #50

For years I've thought of creating a "paid" Firefox fork that is _just_ Firefox rebranded, but otherwise the exact codebase. The money brought in would be used to pay an open source developer to work strictly on things intended to be sent upstream to the Mozilla Firefox. If nothing else, it would prove whether or not people are willing to pay for Firefox. The problem with Firefox currently is the organizational struc…

I don’t know that this idea would work for literally just Firefox, but I strongly believe that people would be willing to pay for a Firefox fork that has a laser focus on fit and finish and poweruser features. Think a “Firefox Pro” of sorts. Why do I think this? Three reasons: - It elevates the browser into a higher category of tool, where currently Firefox inhabits the same space as OS-bundled calculators and text e…

Inevitably, I'd want any feature worth paying for to be freely accessible. Presumably I'm not just trying to support the devs but also fund other people accessing the same features that draw me to firefox in the first place.

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#197

Post by rwmj »

guy234 wrote: post #170
slindsey wrote: post #50

For years I've thought of creating a "paid" Firefox fork that is _just_ Firefox rebranded, but otherwise the exact codebase. The money brought in would be used to pay an open source developer to work strictly on things intended to be sent upstream to the Mozilla Firefox. If nothing else, it would prove whether or not people are willing to pay for Firefox. The problem with Firefox currently is the organizational struc…

why wouldn't those people just donate to Mozilla?

Because historically that money has been squandered on C-suite salaries, irrelevant acquisitions (Pocket), and development that has nothing to do with the browser (like failing to make a phone OS).

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#198

Post by ForTheKidz »

mrweasel wrote: post #42
rrgok wrote: post #16

The browser engine landscape presents an interesting paradox: we have an open specification, yet multiple implementations with their own quirks and incompatibilities. This seems to undermine the very purpose of standardization. Consider our current situation: - The spec is largely influenced by the same big tech companies that develop the engines - Major engines (Blink, WebKit, Gecko) are all open source - Significan…

The issue is that if someone found a major issue in Blink, would it even be feasible to get every Chrome, Brave, Edge and Vivaldi user to switch to Firefox while the issue is fixed? The argument is still the same as with OpenSSH and OpenSSL. Having a single dominant code base is a security risk. The risk of OpenSSL has been realized and we now have good alternatives. OpenSSH have alternatives, but we're one major sec…

For those as confused as I, Blink is the webkit fork that powers the chromium-style browsers. Sort of like chrome's gecko.

Re: A look at Firefox forks

#199

Post by adhamsalama »

PufPufPuf wrote: post #188

Zen looks like Arc Browser, but Firefox-based and open-source. Exactly what I'm looking for! The UX pattern for tabs in Arc is amazing. No, it's not just "vertical tabs". It's an innovative blend of the concepts of bookmarks and open tabs. Sort of like files: they can be open or closed, and live in a folder hierarchy. But the development of Arc stopped half a year ago (except security Chromium updates), with a well-w…

Try Sidebery extension. It has nested tabs, workspaces and much much more.
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