Hey man, thanks for Buster. I donated. You deserve it.
Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
11–20 of 195 posts
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#12Chrome and Google not caring or supporting these kind of things I get but Firefox's recent efforts seem to be either gross negligence or targeted moved to destroy their addon ecosystem.
I thought Firefox was going to get better with their redesign but it seems like it just resulted in lost functionality. Their misguided quest to get more market share has been a completely failure and pushed anyone who valued their customizable experience away.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#13On the one hand, this seems like a real missed opportunity by Mozilla. As Chrome reigns in extensions that conflict with Google's business model, this is a reason to use Firefox.
BUT - extensions are also often the cause of a slow and frustrating Firefox experience, which then leads folks to talk about how Chrome is better-performing/faster (I've been guilty of this myself in the past). Mozilla needs to make sure Firefox is keeping pace with Chrome, which they've presumably decided means de-emphasizing extensions.
That said, not sure why Mozilla needs to de-emphasize donation buttons.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#14Redesign reducing visibility of donation button, and no real support for selling / monetizing your extensions in the stores: totally agreed, they can and likely should do better there. I'd be curious to see if the change had any effect tho, and how much. Above-the-fold is valuable real-estate, it's possible that it's better-utilized after the change, just along a different set of priorities. Direct payment from brows…
Direct payment from browser vendor to useful devs: not sure where that money would come from.
Web browsers are insanely profitable thanks to search referrals.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#15They're also failing users. The Chrome Web Store is a cesspool of malware and other abusive extensions - Mozilla is doing better though.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#16I know this is tangential-- I would like to write a FF extension -- can anyone point out some good resources for that? Beyond what's on Moz's official site of course.
I just started working on an extension recently with no experience and have found it to be pleasantly unchallenging. If you are familiar with web development already, it's actually a pretty easy transition. Primarily you have the option of injecting some JS into every page, and also running a page in the background. So you just need to design your extension to work that way. Then you have access to some extension-spe…
Thank you! I'm not a web dev precisely, but I think I can muddle through that :-)
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#17Chrome and Google not caring or supporting these kind of things I get but Firefox's recent efforts seem to be either gross negligence or targeted moved to destroy their addon ecosystem. I thought Firefox was going to get better with their redesign but it seems like it just resulted in lost functionality. Their misguided quest to get more market share has been a completely failure and pushed anyone who valued their cu…
I feel you. I absolutely think that Firefox needs to not follow Chrome's footsteps but instead continue to be the Emacs of the web versus being a gedit.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
I just started working on an extension recently with no experience and have found it to be pleasantly unchallenging. If you are familiar with web development already, it's actually a pretty easy transition. Primarily you have the option of injecting some JS into every page, and also running a page in the background. So you just need to design your extension to work that way. Then you have access to some extension-spe…
Thank you! I'm not a web dev precisely, but I think I can muddle through that :-)
It's essentially the same as a Chrome extension now. Tutorials and documentation for either should work fine.
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#19Personally I think this is sort of missing the forest for the trees. The big picture is, Mozilla and Google don't like extensions or extension developers. They don't like people customizing their browsers. We see feature after feature drop from being a button in the menu, to being an option in the about:config, to requiring an extension, to requiring manual modification of files, to being entirely disabled.
Look at something as simple as putting the tabs below the address bar. If Mozilla respected their users, it would be as simple as hitting the Customize button and then dragging the tab bar to the bottom. Then they stuck it in an about:config option. Then they required you to make a custom userChrome.css. Now guess what, in the newest version userChrome.css loading is disabled by default and you have to manually turn it back on. How long it will take before it's entirely disabled? I have no idea, but the message from Mozilla is clear: "You can use it the way we want you to or you can go to hell".
Re: Google and Mozilla are failing to support browser extension developers
#20>The Chrome Web Store and the Microsoft Store do not offer features for supporting extension developers.
That doesn't seem right - doesn't Google let developers monetize extensions in the chrome web store?
You can publish Hosted Apps, Chrome Apps, Chrome
Extensions, and Themes in the Chrome Web Store.
Collectively these are called simply "Items". You have
many choices when it comes to making money from items
that you publish in the Chrome Web Store. This page
covers just a few ways to monetize your store item:
- In-app payments
- One-time charge
- Subscription
- Offering a limited trial version of your item
The issue of developers selling out their chrome extensions to 3P (that the author references) probably has more to do with the fact that bad actors get better money for harvesting user PII than the developer would if they maintained the extension as it was originally meant to be. This is a real privacy issue, but it's also why Chrome cracked down on extension APIs recently by restricting what is shared with the extension.