Wasn't there someone on HN a while ago saying that Focus was built on WebKit which makes it basically a Google thing?
Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
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Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#12I have been using Firefox focus for a while and I have 2 main problems with it. The adblocker is worse than ublock origin (eg. try to google Kindle) and there is no simple way to use tabs. I still use it to open links, but a lot of the time I end up having focus open it on Firefox.
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#13A nice trick with Focus on iOS is that you can set it to be the adblocker for mobile Safari. So, you install it, but don’t have to switch browsers to partially benefit from it. There are apparently paid adblockers that route your web requests for all apps through a VPN. Personally, I’m not interested in any aspect of that last sentence. Filtering just Safari locally for free is good for me. I’ve been against adblocke…
Incidentally I enabled this yesterday because I was grtting tired of “Congraulation! You won an Amazon gift card!”. I feel the loading speed has improved since. I am not sure how effective Focus will be against popups but let’s see...
1. Search “Safari” on the phone under “Settings”
2. Find “Content Blockers”
4. Choose “Focus”
If you don’t see “Focus” in the list, or if you want to configure “Focus”, open the “Focus” app, and click on the settings icon (top right corner).
Note if the site you are trying to read is broken (see 1 as an example, ironically), just open up Safari settings as instructed above, undo Focus, then reload the page. When you are done, just slide back on. This is unfortunate though.
1: https://blog.chromium.org/2017/01/open-sourcing-chrome-on-io...
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#14It is far from fast and it is annoying to switch tabs. I used to use it initially, but I found the features a bit too restrictive so I uninstalled it.
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#15Is there a real difference between Firefox Focus and Firefox Klar? Is use the latter for a while now (and love it) and wonder if I am missing something. Wikipedia tells me something about "Klar" being used in a german context because of the "focus" magazine ambiguity (which is kinda weird as this magazine didn't have any relevance since forever). Edit: Ah... further reading in the german wikipedia revealed that the p…
Klar is just Focus for German-speaking countries, the name is the only difference. As you note, the name change is due to the eponymous magazine.
Klar also doesn’t send analytics to a third party like Focus does.
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#16Wasn't there someone on HN a while ago saying that Focus was built on WebKit which makes it basically a Google thing?
Chromium-based browsers such as Google Chrome run on Blink rendering engine. Blink was forked from Apple’s Webkit, Safari’s rendering engine.
But Apple does not allow third-party rendering engines on iOS, so Mozilla and other vendors have to build theirs on top of Webkit.
Google has made iOS code available in Chromium repository by supporting both Blink and Webkit. See [1]. Not sure about Mozilla.
Note you cannot read the blog article without turning off Focus as content blocker (but you don’t have to quit (see 2).
Also, when I was young I was very confused which rendering engine was used because the user-agent header in HTTP was such a piece of mess (thanks to the browser war in the 90s). You are going to see webkit, blink, mozilla and NT in there.
[1]: https://blog.chromium.org/2017/01/open-sourcing-chrome-on-io...
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#17I have been using Firefox focus for a while and I have 2 main problems with it. The adblocker is worse than ublock origin (eg. try to google Kindle) and there is no simple way to use tabs. I still use it to open links, but a lot of the time I end up having focus open it on Firefox.
> The adblocker is worse than ublock origin (eg. try to google Kindle)
Could you elaborate on this? Granted I'm using ublock origin only on Desktop, but I'm still kinda confused what's the issue there for you because for me ublock mostly does what it's supposed to and when it doesn't it's usually an issue of "not blocking enough".
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#18Wasn't there someone on HN a while ago saying that Focus was built on WebKit which makes it basically a Google thing?
Chromium-based browsers such as Google Chrome run on Blink rendering engine. Blink was forked from Apple’s Webkit, Safari’s rendering engine. But Apple does not allow third-party rendering engines on iOS, so Mozilla and other vendors have to build theirs on top of Webkit. Google has made iOS code available in Chromium repository by supporting both Blink and Webkit. See [1]. Not sure about Mozilla. Note you cannot rea…
Ok, Google, Apple, whatever. When I see the Firefox brand I'm hoping for a product that focuses on privacy. Not an Apple product with a Firefox sticker on top. Apparently this is just my misconception.
EDIT: I say "google, apple, whatever", but I should clarify. There's this talking point on HN that Apple is so good for user's privacy. It's not, hence "google, apple, whatever".
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chromium-based browsers such as Google Chrome run on Blink rendering engine. Blink was forked from Apple’s Webkit, Safari’s rendering engine. But Apple does not allow third-party rendering engines on iOS, so Mozilla and other vendors have to build theirs on top of Webkit. Google has made iOS code available in Chromium repository by supporting both Blink and Webkit. See [1]. Not sure about Mozilla. Note you cannot rea…
Ok, Google, Apple, whatever. When I see the Firefox brand I'm hoping for a product that focuses on privacy. Not an Apple product with a Firefox sticker on top. Apparently this is just my misconception. EDIT: I say "google, apple, whatever", but I should clarify. There's this talking point on HN that Apple is so good for user's privacy. It's not, hence "google, apple, whatever".
Right now, after the Cliqz and remotely installed addon controversies, and the fact that Firefox Focus sends analytics data to a third party (Adjust Inc.), I'd say Apple is more privacy focused than Mozilla.
Re: Firefox Focus: A Fast Private Mobile Browser from Mozilla
#20Wasn't there someone on HN a while ago saying that Focus was built on WebKit which makes it basically a Google thing?
Every browser on iOS has to use WebKit as Apple won’t allow any other rendering engine (they say it’s for security reasons but I doubt this is the main motivation)