Pocket is what comes to mind immediately absolutely, but there's a long and growing list of things I have to disable every time I install Firefox including:
- Their entire ad filled start pages / Snippets / Activity Stream / Suggested sites
Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan. It's still the most customizable browser available and with a lot of work (and a few add-ons) the most secure and private by far, but lean browsers don't require all this to prevent unsolicited network connections : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-stop-firefox-making...
That was a longer list than I expected, thanks for putting in the effort and also for your nuanced position.
I'm one of those who enjoy the PDF reader FWIW, same with push notifications. The PDF reader in particular because I almost haven't used Adobe since it came.
Test pilot is fine with me as long as it is voluntary and opt in - but the robot extension - that I literally felt in my body when I saw it.
Again, thanks.
I think most of this should have been created using an extension API and should been voluntary to install. Back in the days this would absolutely have been possible I think.
No problem! I know a lot of people love the PDF reader, it really is convenient, and I'm a big fan of avoiding adobe's reader whenever possible but after so many years of issues the file format is tainted to me. Too many exploitable features and having popular browsers include that functionality makes those readers an attractive target.
I don't think Mozilla has done a comparatively terrible job with it (they all end up with vulnerabilities, and it would take a lot to steal that crown from acrobat) but I do feel better downloading PDFs and using something a little less common to view them. I've bounced around between using Open/LibreOffice, Foxit (before they went bad), and even converting PDFs into saner formats prior to viewing, but these days I'm liking Sumatra for windows
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Agree to a large degree, but this:
Except Pocket, what particular new bloat has Firefox added over the last decade?
I am not too fond of Mozilla myself, but if anything I feel like Firefox has been stripped down way to far.
Pocket is what comes to mind immediately absolutely, but there's a long and growing list of things I have to disable every time I install Firefox including:
- Their entire ad filled start pages / Snippets / Activity Stream / Suggested sites
- Normandy
- safebrowsing
- Push notifications
- Firefox Feature Recommendations
- Firefox Hello
- Firefox Accounts / Sync / Firefox Monitor / CloudServices
- Shield opt-out studies / Test Pilot / Experiments
- pre-installed 3rd party search engines
- PDF reader
- screenshots@mozilla.org.xpi, pictureinpicture@mozilla.org.xpi
- Password generator
Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan. It's still the most customizable browser available and with a lot of work (and a few add-ons) the most secure and private by far, but lean browsers don't require all this to prevent unsolicited network connections : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-stop-firefox-making...
That was a longer list than I expected, thanks for putting in the effort and also for your nuanced position.
I'm one of those who enjoy the PDF reader FWIW, same with push notifications. The PDF reader in particular because I almost haven't used Adobe since it came.
Test pilot is fine with me as long as it is voluntary and opt in - but the robot extension - that I literally felt in my body when I saw it.
Again, thanks.
I think most of this should have been created using an extension API and should been voluntary to install. Back in the days this would absolutely have been possible I think.
No problem! I know a lot of people love the PDF reader, it really is convenient, and I'm a big fan of avoiding adobe's reader whenever possible but after so many years of issues the file format is tainted to me. Too many exploitable features and having popular browsers include that functionality makes those readers an attractive target.
I don't think Mozilla has done a comparatively terrible job with it (they all end up with vulnerabilities, and it would take a lot to steal that crown from acrobat) but I do feel better downloading PDFs and using something a little less common to view them. I've bounced around between using Open/LibreOffice, Foxit (before they went bad), and even converting PDFs into saner formats prior to viewing, but these days I'm liking Sumatra for windows
I totally agree. I have had a LOT of complaints about Firefox in the past five years and all of them fall into one of two buckets.
A) Useful functionality being removed. Firefox on Android has been crippled to the point of ruin.
B) Pointless UX changes for the worse. This can be bearable, but are a regular source of annoyance and wasted time.