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Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

blog.mozilla.org

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Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#161

Post by Zak »

sgift wrote: post #159
Zak wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My follow-up question then is why treat mobile significantly differently from desktop? Stable desktop Firefox has about:config and access to horribly broken extensions. Perhaps some would argue that it should not.

I cannot speak for Mozilla, but just from my gut feeling: That probably got grandfathered in and since people are used to it for a "long time" no one would change it. But if Firefox was rereleased today I wouldn't bet on it being there. Expectations have changed.

Firefox for Android was around for 8 or 9 years with full support for extensions and access to about:config. I think that's a long time in this context.

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#162

Post by pentagrama »

ixmerof wrote: post #121
pentagrama wrote: post #92

Great! Now I can finally install an extension to autodelete cookies for certain domains. This feature is available on stock Firefox Desktop but not Mobile.

Can you please link the extension you use for that purpose?

I was testing some, and this one works like a charm! https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/forget_me_not...

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#164

Post by KennyBlanken »

st3fan wrote: post #139
mod50ack wrote: post #9

This is good. Now, all extensions marked by the developer as being compatible with Android are shown on AMO. (If you toggle to Desktop mode, you can actually install any other extension on AMO, too.) The baffling thing is why this took so damn long. FF for Android supported add-ons from the beginning. That's the best thing about Firefox for Android! They decided to rewrite the UI in 2020, and there were fair reasons…

I managed the team that did a lot of the integration of web extension support in Fenix, the new Firefox for Android. We were all on the brink of burnout. There was too much work. Unrealistic deadlines. And high expectations. So we decided to only support a limited set of APIs tuned for the most popular web extension. Which were basically all ad blockers if I remember correctly. Proud of the team to have finally gotte…

It sounds like they intentionally under-provisioned you all to draw it out, which isn't surprising given their biggest source of funding is Google, and the last thing Google wants is ad/tracker blocking, privacy extensions, and, well, a major reason for people to set their default browser to 'not chrome'.

Lord knows there's enough money floating around that place.

What a shame - but thank you. Hopefully plugins come to Firefox for iOS some time.

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#166

Post by KennyBlanken »

Groxx wrote: post #151
dopa42365 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox android extension support went from "all" to like "5 chosen ones, but we'll enable all of them very soon" in mid 2019. How and why those were handpicked, who knows, clearly extensions weren't enabled by supported functions at the time. In the usual mozilla fashion that "very soon" turned out to be multiple years.

Importantly, during this entire multi-year gap, nearly all of them worked just fine but it was gated behind an AMO account for... I don't know what reason. If it was just an experience issue because like 5% failed weirdly or had bad performance but they couldn't validate them all: that's basically fine! Hide it behind an about:config flag! The AMO requirement was a privacy-invading piece of nonsense that had no busin…

Privacy-invading requirements that delay implementation of plugins that would enable plugins providing better privacy and ad-blocking functionality?

Hmmmmmmm, now what major Mozilla sugar daddy would be interested in that /s

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#167

Post by phreack »

Ridj48dhsnsh wrote: post #105
troyvit wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was about to be like, "Yah well is Kiwi a 'major' browser?" Then I looked at android browser share[1] and realized that Firefox certainly isn't either. [1] https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/mobile/world...

How does Opera have 3-4x the market share of Firefox? Is it installed by default anywhere?

Personally speaking, I would love to switch to Firefox just to use uBlock Origin, but this picture[1] shows Opera's killer feature.

It's a screenshot of today's old.reddit.com/r/all. You can see how you're able to read all of the text vertically, without having to scroll sideways, because it wraps perfectly to the current pinched zoom level. No other browser works this good on Android, and reading stuff is my main internet use case. Try seeing how that website looks on any other browser, it's ridiculous how unusable they are.

[1] https://files.catbox.moe/5t853c.png

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#168

Post by figmert »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #164
st3fan wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I managed the team that did a lot of the integration of web extension support in Fenix, the new Firefox for Android. We were all on the brink of burnout. There was too much work. Unrealistic deadlines. And high expectations. So we decided to only support a limited set of APIs tuned for the most popular web extension. Which were basically all ad blockers if I remember correctly. Proud of the team to have finally gotte…

It sounds like they intentionally under-provisioned you all to draw it out, which isn't surprising given their biggest source of funding is Google, and the last thing Google wants is ad/tracker blocking, privacy extensions, and, well, a major reason for people to set their default browser to 'not chrome'. Lord knows there's enough money floating around that place. What a shame - but thank you. Hopefully plugins come…

Considering uBlock Origin was the first extension to work (and, from what I understand, they worked extra hard to ensure it works), I doubt that's the reason.

Re: Mozilla expands extension support for Firefox for Android

#170

Post by 2Gkashmiri »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #164
st3fan wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I managed the team that did a lot of the integration of web extension support in Fenix, the new Firefox for Android. We were all on the brink of burnout. There was too much work. Unrealistic deadlines. And high expectations. So we decided to only support a limited set of APIs tuned for the most popular web extension. Which were basically all ad blockers if I remember correctly. Proud of the team to have finally gotte…

It sounds like they intentionally under-provisioned you all to draw it out, which isn't surprising given their biggest source of funding is Google, and the last thing Google wants is ad/tracker blocking, privacy extensions, and, well, a major reason for people to set their default browser to 'not chrome'. Lord knows there's enough money floating around that place. What a shame - but thank you. Hopefully plugins come…

I am desperately looking for an extension that takes over godawful js video players and gives something standard. Some have click to pause, some forward backward, all don't have volume control.
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