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Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

robert.ocallahan.org

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Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#161

Post by freditup »

nawitus wrote: post #57
specialp wrote: post #54

This is actually very true. Having Chrome/V8 out there has definitely improved the state of browsers as far as performance; especially in regards to JavaScript. But now we face a situation where Google is getting such a market share with Chrome and their other web properties where lock in is a very real possibility, and the only way to keep an open, standardized web is to make sure there are still other browsers with…

I think the developer tools in the latest Firefox are absolutely fantastic. I don't think Chrome offers anything substantially better currently for frontend development.

Agreed, and each release they just get better and better. For example, the updated scratchpad in FF32+ is pretty neat with it's code hinting and completion.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#162

Post by boot13 »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #132
boot13 wrote: post #128

I'm having trouble understanding why this FUD is the top story on the otherwise excellent HN. Having choice is good, but assuming Google's domination would be a bad thing just because it was bad with Microsoft doesn't give Google enough credit. I currently use Firefox because it is the least crappy browser out there, but I'd love to switch, because it still has stability issues, particularly with animated GIFs and vi…

This highlights the irrationality of browser wars. Can FireFox be both 'least crappy' and 'stability issues'? Selection is made on emotional grounds, and rationalizations created after the fact.

Perhaps I expressed myself poorly. When I say that Firefox is the least crappy browser, I mean that all of the available browsers are crappy, and Firefox is simply the least crappy. I hesitate to say that it's the best browser, because that might lead to the mistaken belief that it's actually a good browser or that I like it, when in fact I don't. Does that clear things up?

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#163

Post by FreakyT »

kristofferR wrote: post #156
FreakyT wrote: post #115

Firefox on Windows is nice, but on the Mac the UI feels just slightly off, presumably thanks to the XUL layer. Until they finally ditch XUL and just start doing native UIs, I suspect they'll always be playing catch up in the "feeling native" game. Here are a few examples: * Still no elastic scrolling, 3 entire years after that became the standard scroll behavior for all Mac apps (this started in Mac OS 10.7) * Still…

Elastic scrolling was actually activated for a while, but they disabled it since it caused performance issues (especially on retina screens) due to the way it was coded: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=673875 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=939480

Interesting! That is also a great example of how XUL tends to force the developers to re-invent the wheel every time the OS GUI elements change, causing Firefox to lag considerably behind Chrome and Safari's UIs.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#164

Post by stephenr »

VikingCoder wrote: post #138
DCKing wrote: post #135

"Google is bent on establishing platform domination unlike anything we've ever seen, even from late-1990s Microsoft." [citation needed]. I think this is an assumption, and it needs to have some basis. Can somebody explain to me why it would be in Google's interest to obtain platform dominance? I find their own reasoning for making Android and Chrome in the first place quite compelling. They're making platforms from w…

Also, if it's lock-in, they're handing out the keys. Android and Chrome are open source, and you can easily download all of your data out of most of their services.

Android is open source in the same way that I can eat a cockroach.

In theory, yes. In practice, you can forget about.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#165

Post by Pacabel »

icantthinkofone wrote: post #112
srean wrote: post #43

Almost every other comment that have been posted so far are complaining that FF tabs are not independent processes. Let me express my contrarian opinion. For my use case FF is just excellent and has served me well, I have absolutely no complains now. There was a time when FF leaked, and held a lot of memory, that time has since passed, at least seams so. I regularly keep several hundreds of tabs open for months on en…

In fact, the infamous memory leak Firefox was 'famous' for was fixed in version 2.5 which tells me that anyone who still complains of memory leaks in Firefox is one who you do not want to listen to for advice. EDIT: I may have the version number wrong, it's been a long time, and, yes, the "leak" was a combination of things and not just one thing but my point is the same.

What makes you so sure that there was ever only one memory leak? What makes you so sure that one or more new ones haven't been introduced since then?

I've seen and heard a lot of reports from many different Firefox users about Firefox using an unreasonably large amount of memory, even when using fresh installations of the most recent version, and when engaging in very reasonable browsing patterns.

As a software developer faced with a large and frequent volume of reports of such a nature, the only responsible thing to do is to assume that there is truly a problem. This should be assumed even if the developers themselves may be having trouble reproducing the problem. Denying that the problem exists is usually the most counterproductive thing that can be done, because the problem likely does actually exist, and it doesn't get fixed.

By the way, I don't believe that there ever was a Firefox 2.5 release. Perhaps you mean Firefox 3.5?

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#166

Post by Hurricane2K5 »

srean wrote: post #43

Almost every other comment that have been posted so far are complaining that FF tabs are not independent processes. Let me express my contrarian opinion. For my use case FF is just excellent and has served me well, I have absolutely no complains now. There was a time when FF leaked, and held a lot of memory, that time has since passed, at least seams so. I regularly keep several hundreds of tabs open for months on en…

PRODUCTIVITY of 100 TABS? Why not show us how productive you are with hundreds of tabs open in FF? Or for that matter any other browser?

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#167

Post by tambourine_man »

If your only argument is ideology, you are in serious trouble. I know from experience.

Firefox changed the game back in the early 2000s not only because it fought for the open web, but because it was way better than the competition.

Granted, beating a very actively developed product is much harder than a stagnant one. Google's got a lot of smart people working on it. I think Mozilla is going to have radicalize and go places where competition isn't willing to be. Crazy different features and UI besides evangelizing on privacy.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#168

Post by lucb1e »

specialp wrote: post #54

This is actually very true. Having Chrome/V8 out there has definitely improved the state of browsers as far as performance; especially in regards to JavaScript. But now we face a situation where Google is getting such a market share with Chrome and their other web properties where lock in is a very real possibility, and the only way to keep an open, standardized web is to make sure there are still other browsers with…

I was in the same boat as you, switching to Chrome when Firefox went in a direction I didn't agree with. I never really liked the uncustomizable Chrome but I tend to vote with my feet if I can.

Months (years?) later of chrome-only usage I still disliked Chrome and decided Firefox was superior after all (just can't get used to some Chrome things), especially now that I no longer needed Firebug (everything is now available in Firefox itself). So I switched back a while ago and have no thoughts of switching again if Firefox keeps this up.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#169

Post by JoeAltmaier »

boot13 wrote: post #162
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This highlights the irrationality of browser wars. Can FireFox be both 'least crappy' and 'stability issues'? Selection is made on emotional grounds, and rationalizations created after the fact.

Perhaps I expressed myself poorly. When I say that Firefox is the least crappy browser, I mean that all of the available browsers are crappy, and Firefox is simply the least crappy. I hesitate to say that it's the best browser, because that might lead to the mistaken belief that it's actually a good browser or that I like it, when in fact I don't. Does that clear things up?

I understand. I mean only that we all (me included) choose what we choose for reasons unrelated to the actual thing. For instance, the major browsers are buggy and annoying in largely non-overlapping ways. This makes it difficult to compare them - any checklist will be apples and oranges because features and bugs are orthogonal between them, to some degree.

So we find ourselves offended by something in one of them, and fasten on another because its not deficient the same way. Without any thorough analysis.

Works the same way with cars, and politics.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#170

Post by stephenr »

_cipher_ wrote: post #121

I'm calling bullshit. Firecrap will support HTML5 DRM. What kind of choice are you talking about? We have _no choice_ (well, except from way smaller projects, which doesn't matter. I can't see the majority of users using netsurf or some other cool project). Yes, I still use firefox from time to time, but the situation is getting worse. Instead of fixing older bugs, they keep adding new ones. Huge memory leaks and for…

As opposed to bundling Flash player?
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