Octopus Overlords

Ok, I've been a long time Firefox user - I really like all the extensions that you can add. However, surprise to me, I just read that FF is only about 5% of the market and that Chrome and MS Edge have largely displaced it. So what is everyone using and why? Do Chrome and Edge have extensions like FF to enhance them?

PS, I'm also ticked that the last couple of times that FF has updated itself, it lost my bookmarks, saved passwords, etc. So I've sort of lost patience with that recurring problem.

Chrome and Brave.

Brave when I can, Chrome the rest of the time.

I don't use apps/enhancents/extensions. Just vanilla.

Firefox, with the privacy add-ons and settings adjusted per PrivacyTools.io's recommendations, remains the safest desktop browser IMHO.

BTW, if you follow their privacy add-ons recommendation and use xBrowserSync, you'll never have to worry about losing your bookmarks again. And you're much better off using a dedicated secure password manager, such as Bitwarden or KeePass, instead of having your browser manage passwords, which should also eliminate the risk of losing them.

Grifman wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 8:34 pm Ok, I've been a long time Firefox user - I really like all the extensions that you can add. However, surprise to me, I just read that FF is only about 5% of the market and that Chrome and MS Edge have largely displaced it. So what is everyone using and why? Do Chrome and Edge have extensions like FF to enhance them?

Edge is a tracker/scraper for Microsoft and Chrome is a tracker/scraper for Google, so no, i won't be using those, ever

(and why would you want to take away from FF's existing market share? they're one of the few browsers that are trustable.)

PS, I'm also ticked that the last couple of times that FF has updated itself, it lost my bookmarks, saved passwords, etc. So I've sort of lost patience with that recurring problem.

that should not be happening. in addition to AB's advice above, do a reset on the browser...something is not working correctly.

hitbyambulance wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 9:17 pm that should not be happening. in addition to AB's advice above, do a reset on the browser...something is not working correctly.

It's very annoying. I start my PC and I find out that Firefox has updated automatically, and it wants to create a new profile, which makes no sense because I already have one, duh, which for whatever reason it no longer recognizes. I am going to follow AB's advice re XBrowserSynch.

I’ve used them all over the years. Most for several years at a time before something annoyed me enough to make the often painful switch.

Probably used FF for the longest run, but got annoyed with speed issues, having to ‘reset’ for too many issues, and other stuff I can’t remember. Then it was on to Chrome for years (until I realized how they use it for scraping tool as mentioned above).

Now I use Duck Duck Go on mobile, even though I abhor the name, and a privacy beefed up (extensions) version of Vivaldi on desktop.

When I switched from Chrome, I had a ‘tryout’ using three or four browsers at one time, to see which I preferred. Tried FF again, Edge, Brave and Vivaldi. Might have even tried Opera again (which I did use for at least a couple years previously, but the incompatibility was just too annoying).

I really love Opera, but my biggest pet peave of a browser is incompatibility issues.

I saw the same stats a couple of days ago and had the same reaction. It's important to note, I think, that Safari is included in those stats, and Apple goes to great lengths to ensure that people don't use it. I also find it interesting that Edge is more or less tied with Firefox, which is good - it's the one most people are handed right off the bat, and yet very few of them bother with it.

I think, more than anything, that it has more to do with how ubiquitous Google is in our lives. YouTube is the go-to for video, Android is on 3/4 of mobile devices (which means that ~65% of Americans are running a Google OS and using Google Play), Gmail is the go-to for emails, Google is the go-to for searching, Google Earth/maps for navigation, Google Classroom is all the my kids' school uses, Google docs was the basis of my kids' typing classes, Google Calendar is what everybody I know uses, and that doesn't even touch on the reach of Google as an ad service. And if you slice these things from your life, you're going to have a hard time getting much done when the rest of the world is organizing with Calendar and sharing with Docs. With Google so integrated into every aspect of most peoples', it isn't much of a surprise that many of them use Chrome to tie them all together.

I'm also a Firefox user, FWIW. And an android/gmail/calendar/maps user. And YouTube, of course. If I didn't have half of the internet tied into my gmail accounts, I'd likely drop a good chunk of those. But the idea of going through hundreds of accounts and changing each and every one of them to some new service is a brick wall, especially if the new service may not have Google's stability. I've considered things like Invidious/Freetube, and will continue to do so, but it would still be a messy change.

Anonymous Bosch wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 8:52 pm Firefox, with the privacy add-ons and settings adjusted per PrivacyTools.io's recommendations, remains the safest desktop browser IMHO.

BTW, if you follow their privacy add-ons recommendation and use xBrowserSync, you'll never have to worry about losing your bookmarks again. And you're much better off using a dedicated secure password manager, such as Bitwarden or KeePass, instead of having your browser manage passwords, which should also eliminate the risk of losing them.

Thanks. I added a couple of the add-ons from that first link that I wasn't using before. I'll see how they behave.

I still use Firefox Sync on my bookmarks, and I've used a couple of third-party options in the past. All three have, at one point or another, lost, scrambled, or duplicated my bookmarks. These days I've taken just doing a manual local backup from time to time.

hitbyambulance wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 9:17 pm Edge is a tracker/scraper for Microsoft and Chrome is a tracker/scraper for Google, so no, i won't be using those, ever

I keep running into folks who proclaim they'd "never use Edge" and then sing the praises of Chrome even though they're using the same engine. I assume it's based on the poor performance of the previous version of Edge which was garbage.

I stopped using Chrome a few years ago, around the time I also stopped using Facebook in an effort to stop giving so much personal information away for free. I'm using Firefox for now and it seems adequate.

Firefox is still my main browser. I've had no reason to switch. I can still even get the add on for a search bar in the menu bar and change it to whatever search engine I want to use. I hate typing in the address bar for my searches like Chrome.

I too use FF on both of my machines, with Chrome as an occasional backup. If you have to attend a (shudder) Google Meet session, you need Chrome for full functionality. Once in a blue moon, MS insists on Edge for something, so I use it when required.

Exodor wrote: ↑Fri Jul 09, 2021 10:37 am
I keep running into folks who proclaim they'd "never use Edge" and then sing the praises of Chrome even though they're using the same engine.

current summary of the most-used browser engines. Blink is used in almost every major browser except Firefox and Safari - it's in Chrome, Edge, Opera, Vivaldi...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compariso ... er_engines

I also use FF as my primary browser, partly out of habit, partly out of privacy/security blinders. I don't do much in the way of extension or enhancements. Pretty much nothing really. The one thing I hate about FF is that is a resource hog. It sucks down the memory and then just leaks it more and more the longer you leave it open. They used to be the worst about this but I honestly have used them so much over the years that I can't really benchmark to know if the others are doing anything similar.

Vivaldi all the way. It's Chrome but with the Google tracking crap ripped out and the UI customizability of old-school Opera (Vivaldi is essentially the OG Opera folks). Initially Vivaldi had some hiccups with compatibility & bugs, but the 4.0+ release is extremely reliable for me. I run it on my home, work, and mobile machines and it's been flawless for the past year or so.

I use it for its customizability, but really it's worth it just for tab stack and tiling options. More on privacy in Vivaldi, as well as an example of how they think about things like usage tracking.

Bitwarden for password management (sleeker than Lastpass while also being cheaper and open-source).

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 9:41 am Bitwarden for password management (sleeker than Lastpass while also being cheaper and open-source).

And less skeezy. I used LP for years before switching, largely because the things they were doing didn't feel great, especially when it was discovered recently that it has built-in trackers.

Today I had to replace the OS drive in my laptop, so I reinstalled Firefox. Apparently I changed the Firefox Sync password six months ago from what I've used for years, and I have no clue what the new one is.

It turns out that if you reset your password on Firefox, it wipes all data from your account, including every last bookmark, setting, addon, form, or anything else you've ever saved. What a huge pain in the ass they've made this.

What a perfect time to switch browsers.

I have enough trouble getting pages to work right in mainstream browsers.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 1:59 pm I have enough trouble getting pages to work right in mainstream browsers.

Firefox is the non-mainstream rendering engine at this point, since it doesn't use Chromium.

Vivaldi puts his damned 16th notes all over the bleeping staff. How the hell does he expect my fingers to keep up with his hyperactive nonsense!

(I may try it for a few days and see if it's less frustrating.)

And that's without even discussing the 32nds.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 1:55 pm Today I had to replace the OS drive in my laptop, so I reinstalled Firefox. Apparently I changed the Firefox Sync password six months ago from what I've used for years, and I have no clue what the new one is.

It turns out that if you reset your password on Firefox, it wipes all data from your account, including every last bookmark, setting, addon, form, or anything else you've ever saved. What a huge pain in the ass they've made this.

it's a security feature. better than stupid DoorDash, which, if you lose access to your phone number, you can never use it again (even if you have your email for 2FA) and need to set up a new account.

I know - the data is encrypted with your password. They already have the means to restore access to the data through other means (but only if you set it up in advance.) They just won't use that mechanism for a password recovery. They failed to achieve the necessary balance between security and usability.

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 9:41 am Vivaldi all the way.

So, Boss, let's say I forgive him for Gloria and were considering his browser. Your post tells me it works with Bitwarden. That's a plus. How well does it handle automatically syncing bookmarks across multiple devices, including PC and Android? And I read that it gives access to Chrome web store addons. Does that mean it also has Google's limitations for addons - say, blocking YouTube addons that hurt Google's bottom line the way Chrome does?

hitbyambulance wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 9:17 pm

Grifman wrote: ↑Thu Jul 08, 2021 8:34 pm Ok, I've been a long time Firefox user - I really like all the extensions that you can add. However, surprise to me, I just read that FF is only about 5% of the market and that Chrome and MS Edge have largely displaced it. So what is everyone using and why? Do Chrome and Edge have extensions like FF to enhance them?

Edge is a tracker/scraper for Microsoft and Chrome is a tracker/scraper for Google, so no, i won't be using those, ever

(and why would you want to take away from FF's existing market share? they're one of the few browsers that are trustable.)

PS, I'm also ticked that the last couple of times that FF has updated itself, it lost my bookmarks, saved passwords, etc. So I've sort of lost patience with that recurring problem.

that should not be happening. in addition to AB's advice above, do a reset on the browser...something is not working correctly.

I would rate MS Edge as being less evil than Google Chrome

Edge Tracking Prevention:

The tracking prevention feature in Microsoft Edge protects users from online tracking by restricting the ability of trackers to access browser-based storage as well as the network. It is built to uphold the Microsoft Edge browser privacy promise while also ensuring that there is no impact by default to website compatibility or the economic viability of the web.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 3:43 pm

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 9:41 am Vivaldi all the way.

So, Boss, let's say I forgive him for Gloria and were considering his browser. Your post tells me it works with Bitwarden. That's a plus. How well does it handle automatically syncing bookmarks across multiple devices, including PC and Android? And I read that it gives access to Chrome web store addons. Does that mean it also has Google's limitations for addons - say, blocking YouTube addons that hurt Google's bottom line the way Chrome does?

Syncing is nice--you just sign up for a Vivaldi account and select what you want to sync, select an encryption PW (so Vivaldi can't actually see your data), and you're set. From then on your bookmarks (and, if you want, your open tabs, settings, autofill, extensions, notes, etc) will be available on all PCs/Android installations.

I don't know the answer to the 2nd question, but the built-in extensions source is literally the Chrome web store, so I would guess it's going to have the same limitations as Chrome. I don't know whether it's possible to sideload extensions from another source.

Hm. Ok. I may need to keep Firefox around for that functionality if I do switch.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 3:59 pm Hm. Ok. I may need to keep Firefox around for that functionality if I do switch.

Yeah, I can see how that'd be a showstopper if you have bunch of extensions you can't use.

There were only a couple that Chrome doesn't offer directly, and I was able to sideload those without issue. Bypass Paywalls was one (judge away), plus an extension that can download YouTube videos - I don't use it for that, but Google doesn't like that functionality regardless. Funny, though - the Chrome web store actually hosts it, but it won't show up in the search results. I had to come at it with a direct link to find it.

Still, some of those I can't live without (like Stylize) were available, as are the security extensions I've gotten used to (Privacy Badger, Decentraleyes, Ublock Origin.)

I'll give it a whirl. In fact, I am giving it a whirl. Right now. As I type this, in fact.

One thing to mention since you mentioned Ublock--Vivaldi has a built-in capability to block trackers and ads (Settings --> Privacy). I've switched away from a separate extension to using that, but YMMV.

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:36 pm One thing to mention since you mentioned Ublock--Vivaldi has a built-in capability to block trackers and ads (Settings --> Privacy). I've switched away from a separate extension to using that, but YMMV.

Is there a mobile (android) version of vivaldi? I've been using FF mobile with uBlock, noscript (I miss my javascript toggle mobile extension - noscript is definitely more cumbersome), etc.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 1:55 pm Today I had to replace the OS drive in my laptop, so I reinstalled Firefox. Apparently I changed the Firefox Sync password six months ago from what I've used for years, and I have no clue what the new one is.

This is what Bitwarden or Keepass is for. But alas, even the most secure password manager cannot protect you from PEBKAC gremlins.

Pyperkub wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:54 pm

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:36 pm One thing to mention since you mentioned Ublock--Vivaldi has a built-in capability to block trackers and ads (Settings --> Privacy). I've switched away from a separate extension to using that, but YMMV.

Is there a mobile (android) version of vivaldi? I've been using FF mobile with uBlock, noscript (I miss my javascript toggle mobile extension - noscript is definitely more cumbersome), etc.

Yes.

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:55 pm

Pyperkub wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:54 pm

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:36 pm One thing to mention since you mentioned Ublock--Vivaldi has a built-in capability to block trackers and ads (Settings --> Privacy). I've switched away from a separate extension to using that, but YMMV.

Is there a mobile (android) version of vivaldi? I've been using FF mobile with uBlock, noscript (I miss my javascript toggle mobile extension - noscript is definitely more cumbersome), etc.

Yes.

Hmmm, now vivaldi mobile has been added to my backlog

Anonymous Bosch wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 4:54 pm

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 1:55 pm Today I had to replace the OS drive in my laptop, so I reinstalled Firefox. Apparently I changed the Firefox Sync password six months ago from what I've used for years, and I have no clue what the new one is.

This is what Bitwarden or Keepass is for. But alas, even the most secure password manager cannot protect you from PEBKAC gremlins.

I never bothered - Firefox blocks password managers on its system login pages. I normally have a separate log of passwords for those that are either particularly important, or those that I can't use a manager for, but was in the middle of fighting with three PCs while in a rush that night and didn't write it down, either.

When I reset it I saved it to BW anyway. It can't fill it in for me, but it's a safe place to find it later.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Aug 04, 2021 7:01 pm I never bothered - Firefox blocks password managers on its system login pages. I normally have a separate log of passwords for those that are either particularly important, or those that I can't use a manager for, but was in the middle of fighting with three PCs while in a rush that night and didn't write it down, either.

When I reset it I saved it to BW anyway. It can't fill it in for me, but it's a safe place to find it later.

Amen.

In my experience, it's almost invariably best to get into the habit of saving each and every updated password -- along with any other vital info -- in your chosen secure password manager, regardless of whether an app happens to block your password manager from autofilling.

Keep in mind, you needn't limit yourself to simply storing passwords-only in a secure password manager. For example, I keep digital copies of the front & back of each and every card I have in my physical wallet in my Keepass Vault, which is fully encrypted and also secured with 2FA. This provides a simple 'digital backup' I can refer to if the worst should happen. So even if my wallet is lost or stolen, I can easily access all of my important cards, details, and relevant contact info to ease the process of reporting them as lost or stolen.

So far I'm mostly liking Vivaldi. It has a few annoyances, but every browser does. The tab behavior is... odd, and I haven't been able to figure out quite why it feels off, but I frequently find myself moving tabs around when that wasn't my intention. I think the biggest annoyance so far is that it has some sort of security feature (that's apparently baked into Chrome and can't be disabled) that tries to protect you from being stupid. It is essentially Windows UAC, blackening your screen and taking away control of your system any time you download a file type it considers 'uncommon'. It does this after the download, not before, so if it is a large download, it will happen when you're in the middle of doing something else.

In the middle of a new OS install that involves many, many downloads, it is effing infuriating, and I've twice been typing and hit enter as it popped up, resulting in it kindly deleting the file I just downloaded.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Thu Aug 05, 2021 11:27 am So far I'm mostly liking Vivaldi. It has a few annoyances, but every browser does. The tab behavior is... odd, and I haven't been able to figure out quite why it feels off, but I frequently find myself moving tabs around when that wasn't my intention.

Yeah, the tab options are... a lot. Spend some time in the Tab section of settings and you'll be able to tweak it to your liking. But there are so many options that it can take some trial and error, or at least it does for me.

A few of the major ones I recommend:
-Tabs --> Tab Features --> Tab Stacking --> Two-Level
Tab Stack Options --> Open Tabs in Current Tab Stack, Allow Stacking by Drag/Drop
Pinned Tabs --> Don't close

I think the biggest annoyance so far is that it has some sort of security feature (that's apparently baked into Chrome and can't be disabled) that tries to protect you from being stupid. It is essentially Windows UAC, blackening your screen and taking away control of your system any time you download a file type it considers 'uncommon'. It does this after the download, not before, so if it is a large download, it will happen when you're in the middle of doing something else.

Can't say I've run into that.

In the Privacy section, maybe un-check Google Services --> Phishing/Malware Protection?

That isn't it. I've seen other people griping about the issue, and that is usually suggested, but it doesn't turn it off. I'm just going to complain and hope it gets fixed at some point.

Given that I'm downloading piles of drivers and apps, and it triggers for every .exe, it's annoying.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Thu Aug 05, 2021 11:57 am That isn't it. I've seen other people griping about the issue, and that is usually suggested, but it doesn't turn it off. I'm just going to complain and hope it gets fixed at some point.

Given that I'm downloading piles of drivers and apps, and it triggers for every .exe, it's annoying.

Can you elaborate on this? I just downloaded a driver EXE from Dell and received nothing but the download. Double-clicked it from the Vivaldi DL manager and it launched normally.