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Firefox 68.0

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Re: Firefox 68.0

#181

Post by SilasX »

callahad wrote: post #142
kevin_b_er wrote: post #47

This marks the last Android release with extensions/add-on support. There will not be a 69 release of this edition of Firefox for Android ("Fennec"). The new remake of the mobile browser ("Fenix") does not have extensions support and it is on an indefinite and easily ignorable backlog. It is explicitly not being worked on this quarter. At the end of this quarter is the scheduled release of Firefox 69. Unless there's…

Hi. I work for Mozilla. Firefox for Android is not dead. You are free to continue using it. It will continue to support add-ons, and it will receive regular security updates and bugfixes for at least the next year. We are focusing all new feature development in Firefox Preview, but we're continuing to support Firefox for Android as an Extended Support Release while we build Preview. And, for what it's worth, we do un…

I haven’t been able to customize keyboard shortcuts[1] on desktop since 2016, which extensions allowed then. Doesn’t look like a priority to me, or that you understand the importance.

[1] I mean in a fully general sense, not “oh it’ll take effect after each tab fully loads”.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#182

Post by kevin_b_er »

jtgeibel wrote: post #124
kevin_b_er wrote: post #47

This marks the last Android release with extensions/add-on support. There will not be a 69 release of this edition of Firefox for Android ("Fennec"). The new remake of the mobile browser ("Fenix") does not have extensions support and it is on an indefinite and easily ignorable backlog. It is explicitly not being worked on this quarter. At the end of this quarter is the scheduled release of Firefox 69. Unless there's…

I don't understand why this comment is currently ranked so highly. It is based on pure conjecture, goes against what Mozilla has publicly stated, and assumes Mozilla is working in bad faith to deceptively drop add-on support.

Oh, I admit it is a good bit of conjecture considering the lack of public information Mozilla has provided.

What has Mozilla publicly stated about extensions and their rewrite of android firefox? I'd love to see something clear they've stated.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#183

Post by iokanuon »

ProAm wrote: post #156
gruez wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chromium fork with closed source patches? No thanks.

You do you [1] [1] https://github.com/kiwibrowser

This is just for show. [1]

>No. The browser is not fully open source like open in open source. It is a common myth and misconception about Kiwi Browser.

>Damn, 1 commit and nothing else but keeps updating and releasing apks? Looked into the issues and scarcely seen replies.

>I think this repo is just to show that "hey, I provided the so-called source code (even though not fully open-source as said above) so trust me and install me" thing.

[1]: https://github.com/kiwibrowser/android/issues/30

Re: Firefox 68.0

#184

Post by acrispino »

callahad wrote: post #177
kevin_b_er wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've made no commitment to extensions, but clearly are targeting this new replacement browser for version 69 in a few months. What they haven't done is given a clear statement. Nothing about if their replacement is going to drop extension support. But every response from Mozilla has been a sidestep and that I cannot overlook.

> clearly are targeting this new replacement browser for version 69 in a few months. That is incorrect, and stems from a misunderstanding of our release model. > What they haven't done is given a clear statement. The clearest statement is this dev-platform post from April, https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/mozilla.dev.platform... , which includes a link to a much more detailed project planning document. > Nothi…

Speaking generally, in development, some features are considered must-have even though much of roadmap may be unclear, right?

So why isn't extension support considered a must-have?

Re: Firefox 68.0

#185

Post by coldpie »

callahad wrote: post #163
icebraining wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will Preview be guaranteed to support extensions before Firefox for Android goes EOL?

I can't make any specific commitment, but there's a lot of time between now and Firefox for Android going EOL (and we haven't committed to specific timing for that, either.) However, we do have concrete plans for supporting adblocking as a built-in feature in the near future ( https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/96 ), which should make Preview more palatable to folks who rely on add-ons for that, even if o…

> However, we do have concrete plans for supporting adblocking as a built-in feature in the near future

I also work on an open-source project, and I understand where you're coming from WRT decisions that are unpopular on the outside, but make sense when viewed from the inside. But as a user of Firefox, having already gone through one round of breaking extensions I quite liked with no apparent benefit to me as a user, I'm really not enthused about going through another round of this. Adding a built-in ad-blocker is fine, I guess, but I also use NoScript on mobile. Is that going to die when Firefox for Android goes EOL? What benefit am I going to gain by giving up another one of my core add-ons?

I know you can't answer that here and now, but please, seriously consider how this looks from the user's perspective. I love Firefox and I would like to continue to do so.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#186

Post by jsgo »

ulfw wrote: post #131
coldpie wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there was a viable competitor, I would consider using it. There isn't.

There is. You just don't want to spend the money or use the phones/tablets from said competitor.

I'm personally a big fan of iOS, but coldpie's (and others in this thread) needs seem to be in third party browser capability that doesn't exist in iOS so with that, I wouldn't recommend it to them. I don't think it is a matter of spending money on competitor's devices so much as competitor's devices don't meet their needs.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#187

Post by smileybarry »

benologist wrote: post #7
whatshisface wrote: post #5

> Local files can no longer access other files in the same directory. What impact will this have on web development without a web server? It sounds like you won't be able to load CSS or JS.

You can use software like https://serveo.net to assign a temporary domain to access your local files through a web server.

Currently blocked by Microsoft Defender SmartScreen, probably because the temporary (sub)domains were used as malware domains at some point.

Either way, exposing local files to an internet proxy just to open them in a browser is overkill. Lots of script runtimes come with their own lightweight HTTP servers nowadays. For example, I use Python's with "py -m http.server".

Re: Firefox 68.0

#188

Post by checktheorder »

bovine3dom wrote: post #168
sp332 wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vimium-FF, Tridactyl, and Vim Vixen adapted. It's true the APIs that allow this kind of thing lagged behind for a while, but there was enough interest to eventually develop those APIs. P.S. Vimperator had 15,000 users according to https://web.archive.org/web/20171016205807/https://addons.mo... Vimium-FF alone has 26,000 now.

FWIW, there are quite a few things that haven't been added to the API, most importantly the ability to accept key events from pages where our content script isn't running. In fact, very little has been added that has made our life easier (the main one being the search API) since we first started developing Tridactyl. Features have actually been taken away from us - notably the ability to operate on PDFs. Not to detra…

>FWIW, there are quite a few things that haven't been added to the API, most importantly the ability to accept key events from pages where our content script isn't running.

Speaking as an end-user, I find the eagerness with which web developers re-purpose key events to be extremely aggravating. If I hit ctrl-F, I want to use Firefox's native full page text search, not jump to the in-site search box.

I'd like to see Mozilla start treating key event capture as an opt-in-required permission like site notifications, location, camera, and microphone. Currently the only way to blanket-deny permission to capture key events is by disabling javascript. That's not ideal.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#189

Post by stonogo »

callahad wrote: post #142
kevin_b_er wrote: post #47

This marks the last Android release with extensions/add-on support. There will not be a 69 release of this edition of Firefox for Android ("Fennec"). The new remake of the mobile browser ("Fenix") does not have extensions support and it is on an indefinite and easily ignorable backlog. It is explicitly not being worked on this quarter. At the end of this quarter is the scheduled release of Firefox 69. Unless there's…

Hi. I work for Mozilla. Firefox for Android is not dead. You are free to continue using it. It will continue to support add-ons, and it will receive regular security updates and bugfixes for at least the next year. We are focusing all new feature development in Firefox Preview, but we're continuing to support Firefox for Android as an Extended Support Release while we build Preview. And, for what it's worth, we do un…

> It will continue to support add-ons, and it will receive regular security updates and bugfixes for at least the next year.

This is indeed what "dead" looks like.

Re: Firefox 68.0

#190

Post by iggldiggl »

rustyminnow wrote: post #166
jdlyga wrote: post #17

I've been running Firefox full time on all my computers for a few months now. It's been really good. I've tried to switch away from Chrome in the past, but I've always had to come back due to performance issues or incompatibility with something. But it's basically 95% on par with Chrome now (missing a few things like syncing search engines, etc)

What is "syncing search engines"?

Meaning the search engines that appear at the bottom of the URL bar (respectively the separate search bar in case) and of course also the default search engine that is used when you load something that isn't an URL in the URL bar.
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