- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
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- [email protected]
Reminder to switch browsers if you haven’t already!
- Google Chrome is starting to phase out older, more capable ad blocking extensions in favor of the more limited Manifest V3 system.
- The Manifest V3 system has been criticized by groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation for restricting the capabilities of web extensions.
- Google has made concessions to Manifest V3, but limitations on content filtering remain a source of skepticism and concern.
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Now we gotta have websites developing for all web browsers instead of Google Chrome like it’s Internet Explorer 2.0.
There are effectively only two web browsers: Chrome and Firefox. Literally everything else, aside from some really niche things that can’t render modern webpages, is a fork of one of those two that uses the same rendering engine.
What about Apple’s WebKit? Does it count?
Nope, it doesn’t count. The only reason Safari/WebKit isn’t considered a fork of Chrome/Blink is that Chrome/Blink is a fork of Safari/WebKit instead.
So it wasn’t, like, forked hard enough that now after the years it counts as a different browser? Expect it to render pages ‘n’ stuff pretty much like Chrome?
I admit, I haven’t really looked into it. It’s possible Apple implemented new HTML/CSS/JS standards independently, but it’s also possible that Apple continued to backport Google’s changes. Unless they had a business goal of being independent (or NIH syndrome) I would guess that they’d do mostly the latter, but you’d have to go read the code to know for sure.
They are definitely still more related to each other than either is to Gecko (which is to say, not related at all), though.
They’ve been separate for over a decade, and even before that they were heavily customizing it. They’re cousins, but absolutely not close enough at this point to be considered the same.
I’m sure they’ve diverged enough for it to be pretty significant compared to the Chromium browsers
You mean KHMTL, born in KDE’s Konqueror. That spawned WebKit (Safari), that spawned Blink (Chrome, Edge, Opera, etc). The whole thing then finally came full-circle when Konqueror dropped KHTML due to lack of development, now you have the choice between WebKit and Blink (via Qt WebEngine).
Then there’s Gecko (Firefox) and Servo which had a near-death experience after Mozilla integrated half of it into Gecko but by now development is alive and kicking again. Oh and then there’s lynx, using libwww, tracing its lineage back straight to Tim Berners Lee.
No, they don’t mean KHTML. KHTML is an ancestor of WebKit and Blink, but WebKit forked from it over 2 decades ago. They meant WebKit.
They also didn’t mean lynx and yet I mentioned it. How come? Might the distinct possibility exist that I used the opportunity to draw a wider picture, and “you mean X” has to be understood as internet brain-rot rhetorics, not literally?
Just a suggestion.
Not to toot the kagi Horn, but they are talking about releasing thier webkit based Orion Browser on Linux. Ive been following that one closely since it has firefox extension support.
I’ve become very skeptical of anything Kagi, wishing they’d just focused on making one thing good instead of getting distracted by mediocre AI and a browser they can’t realistically support while their search is still subpar. Illusions of grandeur.
Iirc the browser is older than their search engine. If anything that is their og product
Subpar Search?
Yeah, wtf is he/she talking about there :)
I mean, if folks really want something like that, I’d say they shouldn’t have let KDE’s KHTML (which is what WebKit was forked from) die. But as I’ve said elsewhere in this thread, KHTML→WebKit→Blink are related and thus fail to combat Google’s web hegemony the way that Gecko (Firefox) does.
haha Safari would like a word.
What word? I spoke the truth: there are only two rendering engines. The only reason Safari/WebKit isn’t considered a fork of Chrome/Blink is that Chrome/Blink is a fork of Safari/WebKit instead.
I deleted my original comment before you replied because I am not really in the mood to defend this but the OP was talking about the pain of developing for different browsers and I don’t care what is a fork of what, this is a fact: Chrome, Firefox and Safari all render differently and have to be catered to individually.
Also, Safari, between desktop and mobile, has 30% of the market to Firefox’s 8%.
I don’t LIKE it, but there are “effectively” three, not two, rendering engines.
It’s about browser architecture and not silly names (“Safari”, “Firefox”, “Chrome”). The point is that there are only two actual variants.
No, you still have three rendering engines. WebKit and Blink are different. Since the second is an (old) fork of the other one, they are similar but far from being the same. They are pages that work in one but not the other, even if you change the user agent.
That’s…not true at all.
Not when you have to make a web app render identically in them, which is what the OP was about.
And safari, although it’s a cousin/uncle to Chrome at this point.
Not that I use it, but still.
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I used firefox back in the day because it was better than IE, switched to chrome because of the convenience and features. I recently switched to brave because chrome became such a pain. If brave shits the bed because of this, I’m going back to firefox.
Brave Chads keep on winning
Are they going to do this on Edge? Please don’t judge me. I love the “Continue on Mobile” feature.
Looks like they will follow Chromium so as with Chrome you have till 2025 June if you use ExtensionManifestV2Availability policy
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not the ios app unfortunately, due to webkit
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I overall love Edge. But when the ads come running, I’ll have to switch :/
Firefox has this feature too, just saying
Good thing I exclusively use Firefox.
So maybe my experience is unique but websites don’t always test with Firefox now and some simply don’t work with it. I use it anyway out of principle but occasionally I need to open Chrome.
On mobile it’s even worse. Firefox is stuttery on my Pixel 8 Pro and doesn’t handle more than ~20 open tabs well. The nightly version fixes the stutter but crashes all the time (it’s a nightly build after all so this is expected).
netscape was the standard back then when expolorer was crap…fast forward today,firefox(netscape’s successor) is still the standard when other browsers are still crap.
edit: spelling firefox and netscape…god damn butter fingers…
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They expect most users to not care, and sadly they’re right.
I think people just genuinely don’t know that firefox (and I suppose Safari) is the only true alternative browser i.e. Not based on chromium.
I do my best to transition people I know across, but people are retty comfortable on chrome. If ad blockers stop working, I think there will be people who care just enough to switch.
Used Firefox on and off since it came around, not a fan. But if chromium blocks ad-blockers, I’m switching instantly. I doubt many people know or care enough to switch.
I’ve been on Firefox almost exclusively for about a decade and I can’t really tell the difference between them honestly in terms of performance of normal web browsing.
I’m having some weird graphical issues with my NAS frontend Web portal display on Firefox atm though, so keep chromium installed for that.
I honestly don’t understand why anyone would refuse to switch from away Chrome. It’s not like the other browsers lack functionality or are slow. The only problem they might encounter is some rare incompatibility which is the result of Firefox (and its forks) small market share and web devs not caring enough.
I’ve never used Chrome as my primary browser and I don’t think I missed anything. I started using Opera years before Chrome was even a thing (back when everyone was using IE) and then when the old Opera died, I didn’t think even for a second about switching to Chrome and went straight to Firefox. Which could at least be highly customized to bring some Opera exclusive features (eg. mouse gestures, tab grouping) back.
I think people just genuinely don’t know that firefox (and I suppose Safari) is the only true alternative browser i.e. Not based on chromium.
Safari is only “not based on Chromium” in the sense that the heredity goes in the other direction (Chromium is based on it).
Firefox is the only browser that maintains a rendering engine codebase fully separate from Chrome. That’s why using Firefox, and evangelizing it to help keep up its marketshare, is so vitally important for the health of the web.
Huh, I didn’t know that about Safari/Chromium. Absolutely agree that having a Google-controlled browser monopoly would be catastrophic.
I think, they just stopped caring about users instead. They’ve got enough market share. Might as well internet-explorer it for a while.
What does google expect users to do once they realize they get better extensions with firefox?
If that happens en masse, which is extremely unlikely, Google can just pull its funding for Mozilla and cripple them
The entire sector is fucked because of lack of regulation
80% of people I know does not use an ad block, even the ones more tech savvy. I have no clue how brainwashed they are for eating ad garbage all day long.
To be fair, let’s be glad that 80% of people don’t use an ad block. If it were the opposite and 80% did use ad block, web services would be much more aggressive in combating ad blockers and many more of them would end up pay-walled (although it seems we’re heading there anyway).
On one hand, I feel kinda bad that my ad-free experience is only supported thanks to those who do undergo the torture of ads, on the other hand, the companies have only themselves to blame. If web ads were decent, only limited to sides and headers or even between paragraphs of web pages and didn’t cover the content you’re trying to view, didn’t try to trick you into thinking it’s part of the content, didn’t lead to malicious websites, didn’t autoplay videos with sound or didn’t put unskippable ads before and inside videos, I would have never felt the need to install an ad block.
I am the only person at my work that even knows what an ad blocker is. My boss, director of IT, doesn’t use one. Uses chrome with no extensions like everyone else.
Long live Firefox.
hear ye
Pretty great outcome for firefox really.
I don’t think firefox numbers will get a huge & immediate bump, but I think that over time it will support a reputation for firefox as being cool different and just plain better.
I can’t imagine raw-dogging the internet without an ad blocker in 2024. I’m aware that most people aren’t bothered by ads, but surely… surely some people might be interested in blocking them if they become aware that it’s possible and easy.
I’ve long ago stopped using Chrome on my computer because it was getting too bloated.
since people here are more tech savvy than i could ever be if like to ask what you guys think of Vivaldi, because i like it a lot. super customizable, has quick command search, side panel lets me use some websites like extensions, and workspaces help me organize especially with work… has anyone used it and can anyone tell me if waterfox or other forks are better and how?
- another chromium
- GUI looks good
- Cross platform
- Highdpi kind of sucks on plasma 5
- Fast
- Not Firefox
I tried it for a week, but eventually left back for Firefox.
As a long time user of Opera (from before they went with Chromium), I’ve been using Vivaldi as my primary browser since they first released a public preview. It has its downsides (i.e. the UI is slightly slower than that of Chrome), but at the same time it’s the thing that feels most “at home” for me after migrating away from the joke Opera has become. The developers seem to hold a strong anti-manifest-v3 stance, but unfortunately at one point they might have to comply. I just tried the built-in blocker instead of uBlock Origin I normally use and it seems to do a pretty good job.
I get the whole “switch to Firefox” thing; for me the major blocker is that it doesn’t have global mouse gestures and this messes up with my muscle memory. If they add that, I might give Firefox another chance.
Vivaldi is cool af and I used it for a few years but ditched it for firefox the minute i read about manifest v3(2 years ago? don’t remember). Not the devs’ fault but I’ll be damned if i allow ads on my devices.
is that guaranteed to force all chromium browsers regardless? like, does that ban the ublock origin extension (or something to the effect of rendering it useless)?
Yeah, all chromium-based browsers will be affected, sadly.
It does! However, uBlock Origin has a “Lite” version that works with Manifest v3.
wow. ok. time to experiment with Firefox forks.
If Vivaldi were free and open source, it would make an interesting alternative to Ungoogled Chromium. But it’s not, so I’ll stick with extensions on Firefox (and Ungoogled Chromium as a backup).
It is source-available though, so that’s a plus.
According to Vivaldi’s blog post “Why isn’t Vivaldi’s browser open-source?”, all of Vivaldi’s UI is closed source and not source-available:
Note that, of the three layers above, only the UI layer is closed-source. Roughly 92% of the browser’s code is open source coming from Chromium, 3% is open source coming from us, which leaves only 5% for our UI closed-source code.
Keeping Vivaldi’s UI layer closed-source and obfuscated allows us to set these worries aside, so we can focus on the job at hand. It may not be a perfect solution, but as a business, we have to make decisions that minimize uncertainty, if only for our self respect as employees – and employee-owners.
The UI is the main thing that differentiates Vivaldi from Chromium, and Vivaldi chose to keep it closed source and obfuscated for business reasons. That’s a negative compared to Firefox and Ungoogled Chromium.
Huh, hadn’t seen that bit before, thanks for that. Ok, well that is disappointing. I did notice this bit in there too though:
What about security benefits? Even though most of the security-relevant code for Vivaldi browser is in Chromium, there is also some security-relevant code in the UI. If you think that specific security-relevant parts of the UI should be open-sourced to make Vivaldi more trustworthy, let us know, and we’ll consider putting it out as part of our code bundles, so you can check it for yourselves.
It not much consolation, but it’s better than nothing. As it stands though, FF still has too many problems for me. I’ll have to see how this ad blocking thing shakes out though, might have to revisit my decision then.
Vivaldi is the new Opera, right?
If by Opera you mean as it was back in version 12 before it got sold to some chinese company and completely changed, then yes. Nothing to do with what opera is now.
I’d be glad to switch back to Firefox, but websites straight up don’t work on it anymore. That was the only reason I went to Chrome.
I’ve yet to find a single website that doesn’t work in Firefox.
There are some sites out there that won’t work. ESC Configurator won’t work in Firefox because it needs web serial to program an ESC connected over a serial port. That’s the only site I use that I have to run in chrome. I’m sure there are more out there, but they are not very common.
Which sites? Been using Firefox since forever and all is well.
Last I tried, I had serious issues using it on Comcast’s billing pages and Quest Diagnostic’s site, among others. The pages would not load at all until I went to Chrome.
What websites? I use Firefox as my daily driver on desktop and mobile, and I rarely run into problems. Like so infrequently that I don’t even remember the last time.
Same. My Dark Reader doesn’t always show websites properly but Firefox hasn’t let me down in ages.
Some websites display warnings even though everything works fine, like web.skype.com. But that’s the closest thing to doesn’t work I’ve ever seen on Firefox.
They are around…
Try this one: (https://www.starbirdchicken.com/starbird-chicken-menu)I was curious of what their menu looked like as I have one by my work. Haven’t checked it on desktop, but on Android, the menu items never get loaded. ($10-12 for an á la carte chicken sandwich from a fast casual place is a ripoff anyway)Edit: It looks like it’s the mobile site/formatting that is broken. Using desktop mode lets the menu items come onto screen. (Firefox 126.01 on a pixel8pro with Android 14) The same issue seems to also be present with chrome under my work account.
I still argue that they are present, as I had to with it doing taxes a couple months ago. (Just not going to give those sites away)
No problems loading that page on Firefox for Android or desktop for me. Are you using Firefox or a fork of Firefox? Do you have any extensions or about:config changes that may be affecting the page rendering?
works flawless here on Android 14 with Firefox 126.0.1. not tested desktop yet.
Works perfectly for me on desktop with firefox
How do we combat Google Chrome being Internet Explorer 2.0?
I have never encountered this… Do you have an example, just curious
I encourage those in this situation to do their small, small part in fighting for the future of the open web by only switching to Chrome when necessary.
Which is almost never in my daily life!
That’s a reason to insist on Firefox even harder. Fuck those websites!
what chrome? haven’t used that in ages
Thank fuck I switched to mozilla
