Firefox Rant Number (Insert Heinously Large Number Here)

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

So, we are confronted by yet another update of Firefox (v89.0), and this one has taken the smeg, as Lister of Red Dwarf would say. It has taken my perfectly functional theme (Glass - Black), which I have been using for years now, and turned it into an elongated, darkened, rounded-edged mess. What gives, Firefox? Why did you have to mess with something that wasn't broken yet again?

If I could transfer my links over to Vivaldi without having to go to an "Imported From Firefox" folder every time I wanted to access them, I'd be gone in a snap. I've just about had it.

[mlooney 3,594]

I migrated to Chromium when I made my Pi-400 my primary machine.  For reasons I don't fully understand Firefox on it is broken.  Displays some pages as it was a mobile page and just fails to render some pages.  I'm less than happy about this turn of events. 

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

I am now experimenting with Vivaldi as my go-to browser. Haven't set it up as my default yet, but I'm getting close. It's snappy, Chrome-compatible, cleaner than Firefox or Chrome, and I haven't had a single problem with it so far. My only concern is transferring all of my login cookies to it for things like banking and so forth. Gotta start from scratch, and I'm not sure I want to do that yet.

[mlooney 3,594]

19 minutes ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

I am now experimenting with Vivaldi as my go-to browser. Haven't set it up as my default yet, but I'm getting close. It's snappy, Chrome-compatible, cleaner than Firefox or Chrome, and I haven't had a single problem with it so far. My only concern is transferring all of my login cookies to it for things like banking and so forth. Gotta start from scratch, and I'm not sure I want to do that yet.

Unfortunately the only browsers that Arm linux for the Raspberry pi has is Chromium and Firefox ESR.  Chromium imported all my logins, book marks, and extensions from my Chrome account and Firefox did the same from my Firefox account.  There are mixed reports about if Chromium "calls home" to Google or not

[mlooney 3,594]

Actually there are a few more, but they are either way out of date with regards to any thing more advanced than frames, they don't block ads, or are text mode only.  I'd rather walk down the street naked than browse the web with out an ad blocker.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

With Firefox, I ran NoScript. I haven't set that up on Vivaldi yet, and I'm tempted not to do it, given all of the trouble it caused me. I've got uBlock Origin running. Isn't that enough?

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

Well, what's done is done. I have taken the final step and made Vivaldi my default browser. I've also installed that pain-in-the-ass NoScript as a safety measure, and I'm already wondering if I shouldn't uninstall it. All it does is make checkouts at web stores nigh on impossible, with me having to approve half a dozen or more scripts that want to run just so I can use a credit card. It's more hindrance than help.

[mlooney 3,594]

I don't use NoScript or Ghostery.  uBlock origins seem to be what I need. 

[Illjwamh 98]

The only real changes I've noticed with Firefox so far are cosmetic.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

14 hours ago, mlooney said:

I don't use NoScript or Ghostery.  uBlock origins seem to be what I need. 

I am going to give NoScript a week. If it keeps making my life hell, I'm going to disable it.

9 hours ago, Illjwamh said:

The only real changes I've noticed with Firefox so far are cosmetic.

The cosmetic changes were bad enough to chase me off when combined with all of the other cumulative crap over the years.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

A little necroposty here, for a four-and-a-half month follow-up. I am living with Vivaldi and loving it. Vivaldi is turning out to be a very strong browser indeed. Nothing seems to faze it. The developers are actively supporting and building it as well, and they're not beholden to Google - they've decided to disable the Idle API that caused many privacy gurus much grief about a month ago.

I'm still using NoScript, although I still curse it every now and then. Web sites do too much shady stuff for me to live without it.

[mlooney 3,594]

20 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

I am living with Vivaldi and loving it

Will it import bookmarks and passwords from either Firefox or Chrome?

[Don Edwards 561]

7 hours ago, mlooney said:

Will it import bookmarks and passwords from either Firefox or Chrome?

And in particular will it import and use tags (on bookmarks) the way browsers in the Firefox family do?

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

7 hours ago, mlooney said:

Will it import bookmarks and passwords from either Firefox or Chrome?

Don't know about passwords, but bookmarks from Firefox, yes. And Vivaldi is a Chrome variant, so I assume it'll do Chrome as well.

4 minutes ago, Don Edwards said:

And in particular will it import and use tags (on bookmarks) the way browsers in the Firefox family do?

Can't say - I don't use tags, so I don't know.

I will say I used it side-by-side with Firefox for a while on my Music Computer, and it coexisted nicely enough that I can recommend that you install it and try it yourself. If my experience was nominal, then you shouldn't experience any negative effects by doing so.

[Don Edwards 561]

Well, neither of the two Chrome-family browsers I have installed allows bookmarks to have tags, and I use them a LOT for certain sorts of bookmarks. So I'm not much interested in Vivaldi.

(In the Firefox family, a bookmark can have any number of tags, and for certain purposes a tag acts somewhat, but not exactly, like a folder. By this means, among other uses, a single bookmark can appear to live in several places on your bookmarks toolbar...)

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

4 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

Well, neither of the two Chrome-family browsers I have installed allows bookmarks to have tags, and I use them a LOT for certain sorts of bookmarks. So I'm not much interested in Vivaldi.

(In the Firefox family, a bookmark can have any number of tags, and for certain purposes a tag acts somewhat, but not exactly, like a folder. By this means, among other uses, a single bookmark can appear to live in several places on your bookmarks toolbar...)

I think the closest thing Vivaldi is going to get for you would be a "nickname" for your bookmark. I don't think that's going to float your boat, though. Sorry.

[mlooney 3,594]

10 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

Don't know about passwords, but bookmarks from Firefox, yes. And Vivaldi is a Chrome variant, so I assume it'll do Chrome as well.

Of course now that I'm back on my Raspberry Pi (aka Pinkie) my choices of browsers is some what limited.

[ProfessorTomoe 1,336]

2 hours ago, mlooney said:

Of course now that I'm back on my Raspberry Pi (aka Pinkie) my choices of browsers is some what limited.

Well, yeah, can't help with that - they only show Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android versions available. Unless their Linux version runs on your hardware, I can't say it's going to work for you. However, you might still want to check - they do show a version for ARM on https://vivaldi.com/download/ .

[mlooney 3,594]

3 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

Well, yeah, can't help with that - they only show Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android versions available. Unless their Linux version runs on your hardware, I can't say it's going to work for you. However, you might still want to check - they do show a version for ARM on https://vivaldi.com/download/ .

I tried the ARM linux version,  It ran but has some issues,  Will poke it with stick later.

 

[mlooney 3,594]

Current version of Chromium rather aggressively doesn't call home to Google.  You can't sync your bookmarks and passwords and it refuses to stay logged into Google over a shut down/restart of Chromium.   I was able to get my bookmarks back by exporting them as a HTML file from another machine, emailing myself that file, then importing it.  This also effects what kind of spell checking you get, as the advanced version calls Google for damn near every word.  Linux version of Chromium seem to just use the aspell dictionaries.   I can more or less live with this. 

[Darth Fluffy 338]

On 6/2/2021 at 6:07 AM, ProfessorTomoe said:

So, we are confronted by yet another update of Firefox (v89.0), and this one has taken the smeg, as Lister of Red Dwarf would say. It has taken my perfectly functional theme (Glass - Black), which I have been using for years now, and turned it into an elongated, darkened, rounded-edged mess. What gives, Firefox? Why did you have to mess with something that wasn't broken yet again?

I had something similar happen, albeit I clicked on an 'upgrade' after the install that in hind sight I should have ignored. It was easy to revert in settings. But yeah, I agree, why 'fix' what ain't broke?

That all said, and I am often less than thrilled with Firefox, it does currently appear to be the most privacy secure among the common browsers, so I am sticking with it for now.

[mlooney 3,594]

45 minutes ago, Darth Fluffy said:

That all said, and I am often less than thrilled with Firefox, it does currently appear to be the most privacy secure among the common browsers, so I am sticking with it for now.

I don't know if it the same on non-Linux platforms, but Chromium (vs Chrome) seem to be more privacy secure than it used to be.  It rather aggressively doesn't "call home" to Google any more, to the extent that it will not let you stay logged in to Google if you shut down the browser and then restart it.  Will not sync and has killed off advanced spellcheck.

[Darth Fluffy 338]

1 hour ago, mlooney said:

I don't know if it the same on non-Linux platforms, but Chromium (vs Chrome) seem to be more privacy secure than it used to be.  It rather aggressively doesn't "call home" to Google any more, to the extent that it will not let you stay logged in to Google if you shut down the browser and then restart it.  Will not sync and has killed off advanced spellcheck.

I saw that in your earlier post. We use Chrome (not Chromium) at work, mandated, no personal choice over software, we have to get permission if we absolutely need something, and I don't hate it, it is very functional; but yes, Goggle knows when you've been sleeping, it knows when you're awake, ... etc. I can see Chromium being an option.

We also have Edge available, and Microsoft is not exactly benign either. Edge is a bit stupid. It will anticipate you an pop up bullshit. Also (I support a non-Microsoft product) will constantly try to sell you the Microsoft alternative to whatever you search. If you wanted an Irish Setter, and Microsoft sold Corgis, guess which is at the top of your damn search. Thus I avoid using Edge as much as possible. It seems to be unavoidable if you have Windows, it will randomly pop up on (thankfully rare) occasions, and our workstations have Windows mandated, so I live with it. I like the unintrusive little weather report on the toolbar, but for some God-awful reason, it will on many occasions pop up an unasked for Edge window.) The few times I've used it by choice, meh, it works, mostly.

But the one I hate the most among the spyware triad is Facebook, which will track you across things that have nothing to do with Facebook, even if you don't have an account. Firefox has an add-on that lets you put Facebook in an isolation box. It appears to work. That is a valuable feature. (Facebook and Google market tracker software to the websites. That's how Firefox gets your data; Google get you both ways.)

I border on paranoid about corporate tracking. They are not looking out for our best interests, they are not using their powers for good, so they are not to be trusted. They can't be trusted to keep the data safe, numerous breaches have highlighted that. The EU has the right answer, "Burn the witches!" - or some such. (Not a fair thing to say. I have a Wiccan friend, and she is way more benign that these ass clowns.)

The AI that uses this data to shove things at you is so f###ing stupid, you'd swear they were going for artificial moron. I bought a gift for my grand daughter, a toddler. For months I saw the results of that search. Do they think she's going to stay the same age? Or possibly I'm a toddler with a credit card who is going to order more of the same? Do you not at some point clue in that I haven't ordered more, thus perhaps the toddler is not in my household? Why are you not at least progressing the age of interest? Are you unaware that us hue'-manz age? Did they farm out the software to a tribe of chimps at the local zoo? No, chimps would be smarter than that, sorry.

Truly, the promise of the Internet was that we could rapidly share information; no one anticipated that the speed of stupid exceeds the speed of information by such a wide margin. 

I will keep your recommendation of Chromium close, for when I finally get fed up with Firefox.

(Perhaps Firefox needs a new name? Flaming Ferret?)

 

[mlooney 3,594]

12 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

The EU has the right answer, "Burn the witches!" - or some such. (Not a fair thing to say. I have a Wiccan friend, and she is way more benign that these ass clowns.)

The major way I know a web site has a market in the EU is the damn popup about cookies.  This really bothers me more than it should, as It adds a button push that I don't need.  I haven't heard of any yet, but I would not be surprised if some form of malware could be attached to that interaction.

[Darth Fluffy 338]

1 hour ago, mlooney said:

The major way I know a web site has a market in the EU is the damn popup about cookies.  This really bothers me more than it should, as It adds a button push that I don't need.  I haven't heard of any yet, but I would not be surprised if some form of malware could be attached to that interaction.

Interesting point. I don't see why it couldn't.