7 ms·

Firefox isn't doomed. Not only is it still a good web browser that many (myself included) continue to use daily, inertia will keep it installed on millions of P

by Bo102010 15y ago

Firefox isn't doomed. Not only is it still a good web browser that many (myself included) continue to use daily, inertia will keep it installed on millions of PCs. As far as I know, Mozilla and Google maintain good relations. Even if the deal that provides money from Google to Mozilla isn't renewed, I doubt they will entirely disentangle themselves from each other.

rjd 15y ago
Firefox is doomed because its lost its developer foot hold, anecdotally most devs I know refer to it as a joke and use Chrome instead. Its a browser that relies on recommendation to exist, and it no longer is getting recommendation. On a technical note each version isn't really getting any better, historical problems have never been addressed, version fragmentation is occurring, on several matters its in direct conflict on the w3c standards with other major players. The UI is polarising (its the major complaint I actually here next to 'laggy behavior'), the options to change it rely on 3rd party modules which are often bugging and not supported between versions. It's never nailed OSX, it just doesn't 'feel' the same as the rest of the operating system and is slightly jarring at times. Personally if you take a base install of Opera 11 it is exactly how I want FF to be set up, everything works smoothly, fast, and 'clicky'. I'd recommend any FF user to try the new version of Opera for a few days, then go back to FF and see just how different it feels even though they are aesthetically quite similar.
- sounds 15y ago
  Developer here, and I prefer firefox over chrome.
  - rjd 15y ago
    For developing I do as well, I think it may be a comfort thing for myself mainly. As far as I'm aware all the tools I use are available on most if not all other browsers. The opinion of people calling it a joke isn't my opinion its what I keep encountering now, and opinions aren't truth, but a exaggerated emotions. So taking that onboard theres a feeling out there amongst a lot of people (although exaggerated) that FF has seen its peak. I see the over the last few minutes my other post has been in the negatives and positives, so I guess its quite contentious probably for that reason. Opinions aren't fact but give an impression of what may be true. As its not a bundled browser for the big OS's, anyone asking what other browser to use is only going to go off recommendation. Most people probably aren't even aware theres multiple browsers or simply do not care. So another thing against FF will be the chrome ads on TV are probably a huge boon for its usage here. At a very least it will start conversation, and often lead to a recommendation.
    - redthrowaway 15y ago
      Again, you're missing the point. It's not about technological advancement (although speed and stability is huge), it's about how many tech-savvy people are recommending it to their mothers and IT managers. By that metric, Firefox is losing ground quickly to Chrome. Chrome is nicer to use and easier to recommend. Yes, those are subjective beliefs, but they're widely-held ones and that's what matters.
      - bad_user 15y ago
        it's about how many tech-savvy people are recommending it to their mothers and IT managers I know a lot of IT managers that aren't touching Google's products for fear of privacy issues. It's not always rational to think that way, however Google has a trust problem lately - which is also why Google Apps is not as successful as it should be, even though it freaking rocks - the thought that Google reads your emails is a terrifying thought for some. I'll grant you that for a period of time I also started recommending Chrome - it was before Firefox version 4 got released, as for a moment I lost faith in Mozilla's ability to innovate. However, now I'm back on Firefox because it is much better for me as a developer. And I also recommend it to normal people because I remember quite well what happened during the IExplorer's glory days and I don't want to help another monopoly on mobile browsers. To me it is irrelevant if Chrome is better right now (although it isn't) - what is relevant is that I have more trust in Mozilla to guard my interests as a user. Google may be one heck of a company that did a lot of good things for our industry, however their interests do not necessarily align with those of the people.
        gujk 15y ago
        Google Apps are quite effective at losing on their own demerits in a business environment, even without privacy concerns, though that is a big one. The main win over say MS suite is price and hosting, if you have a very small operation that doesn't have a large scale document base or mail base.
  - damncabbage 15y ago
    Same here. I use Chrome as well, but not as much as I do Firefox. I think the Dev Tools have reached parity, but I often keep groups of tabs open for reference, and Chrome seems to grind to a halt a lot more quickly when used like this. (To make matters worse, Chrome doesn't seem to "scroll" the list of tabs left and right when the list gets long. It just smooshes them all into one row, leaving you with 10px-wide tabs to click.)
- FrankBooth 15y ago
  Most of your post is emotion and opinion, so I thought I'd address the part that is factually incorrect: > On a technical note each version isn't really getting any better That's simply not true. To take a single example, the type inference engine added to the JS engine in FF9 significantly improved performance. With the new high frequency release strategy, it's not guaranteed that there will be huge new features or improvements in any given release, but the features and improvements are coming as fast as ever. > historical problems have never been addressed You can find ancient pet bugs for any project that either take a long time to get fixed or are never fixed. Do you have something specific in mind? > version fragmentation is occurring That's more-or-less false. There's some adjustment going on due to the switch to the high frequency release schedule, but the fact is the vast majority of Firefox users are on a small number of versions, almost all that have been offered an upgrade are on the latest stable release. > on several matters its in direct conflict on the w3c standards with other major players. Can you point to anything specific to back up your claim? If you pick and choose specs, this is true for all browsers. Nobody implements everything completely and correctly. The specs are being developed as fast as ever, and it's common for one browser to be ahead in certain areas. It's also common for competing implementations to differ as the standard develops. This is not confined to Firefox.
  - mattmanser 15y ago
    You're not addressing his key point, I'm recommending Chrome to anyone I speak to, many other developers I know are too. Firefox is slow, sluggish to use and confusing compared to Chrome. The edge it had over IE was that it was a better user experience. It's not compared to Chrome anymore. Even IE is better than FF apart from the weird crash like blank screen glitch when opening a new tab that IE has.
    - gkoberger 15y ago
      I don't have a problem with you recommending Chrome (and I work at Mozilla). However, it's not fair to say Firefox is sluggish. With a new profile, it's just as fast as Chrome. Try it. Chrome has an advantage because it's relatively new. It doesn't have to deal with over a decade of add-ons and browser history and cookies. Much like how a computer gets slow and needs to be reformatted, people who are browser power users need to clean out Firefox every few years. Try vacuuming your Firefox database [1], syncing everything [2] and/or create a new profile [3] with only the extensions you actually use. Oh, and be careful of Firebug. That's why most developers laugh at Firefox for being so slow; they use Firebug, which slows Firefox down to a grinding halt. We're working on our own dev tools, which are slowly coming together. They're not a Firebug replacement yet, but they're getting there. [4] 1 http://mozillalinks.org/2009/08/vacuum-firefox-databases-for-better-performance-now-with-no-restart/ http://mozillalinks.org/2009/08/vacuum-firefox-databases-for... 2 http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/mobile/sync/ http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/mobile/sync/ 3 http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing-profiles http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing-profiles 4 http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/11/developer-tools-in-firefox-aurora-10/ http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/11/developer-tools-in-firefox-...
- theshadow 15y ago
  "anecdotally most devs I know refer to it as a joke and use Chrome instead." Ahh the world of cargo cult browser fanboyism. All I can say is that the devs you are hanging out with aren't very good, any dev who would write off and "laugh at" a browser which boasts the widest and the most mature array of development tools is probably not very good to begin with.
  - erikpukinskis 15y ago
    I'm a developer who uses Chrome. I've already forgiven you for calling me "not very good" at my job, so no worries about that. I would, however, love to know what the development tools in Firefox are that you find less mature or nonexistent in Chrome. There were some omissions in the first year or so of Chrome's development, but I find myself quite happy with it these days. I'd gladly switch, though, if there are things I don't know about that could make me more productive.
- grannyg00se 15y ago
  "The UI is polarising" What exactly do you mean by that? The UI in a browser shouldn't do anything but get out of the way and display the web page's UI. Personally, I don't even want to see a menu bar unless I hit the ALT key - which is working nicely for me in Firefox right now. And I don't notice any "laggy behaviour". Although I haven't run any comparison tests so maybe I'm missing out.
  - rjd 15y ago
    What I mean is I haven't heard a positive thing said about it myself. As far as I'm aware everyone I know hates it and has negative things to say about it, most of these where the changes between FF 3 & FF 4. A common complaint I've heard is "its trying to hard to be chrome". However I can assume by the positive comments I read online that myself and my friends probably aren't the standard, and may be unjustly noicsey as people who don't like somethign are generally mroe vocal than people that do. So what I'm hearing/reading is lots of people who really like it, and around me people who vocally don't. Thats what I consider polarising, its drawing out harsh criticism and favourable reviews. The modern laggy behaviour complaint I think is unfair and a marketing lie. What I think is that its a combination of historical problems with FF still in peoples memories and comparisons to Chromes 'snappiness'. Chrome feels like it loads pages faster, so does Opera, and Safari, I doubt that it really does, but thats the bench mark people are expecting now. Like I said its unfair, people are now expecting speed everywhere as thats whats been marketed to them. Its the little things that count, for a quick test I just fired up an aurora firefox build, it took roughly 15 seconds to load, chrome took 10 seconds (I stopped counting with safari when I got to 30 seconds but its loading probably the last 10 pages I left open at once). Thats the sort of thing people remember and sticks in there minds, and often takes alot for them to unforget.
- knewter 15y ago
  > Its a browser that relies on recommendation to exist, and it no longer is getting recommendation. I agree with the first part of your statement, and partially agree with the second. I personally recommend it to everyone over chrome, because firebug is better than chrome's dev tools...well, chrome's js tool is perhaps as good now, but firebug's better for everything else.

rjd 15y ago

Firefox is doomed because its lost its developer foot hold, anecdotally most devs I know refer to it as a joke and use Chrome instead. Its a browser that relies on recommendation to exist, and it no longer is getting recommendation. On a technical note each version isn't really getting any better, historical problems have never been addressed, version fragmentation is occurring, on several matters its in direct conflict on the w3c standards with other major players. The UI is polarising (its the major complaint I actually here next to 'laggy behavior'), the options to change it rely on 3rd party modules which are often bugging and not supported between versions. It's never nailed OSX, it just doesn't 'feel' the same as the rest of the operating system and is slightly jarring at times. Personally if you take a base install of Opera 11 it is exactly how I want FF to be set up, everything works smoothly, fast, and 'clicky'. I'd recommend any FF user to try the new version of Opera for a few days, then go back to FF and see just how different it feels even though they are aesthetically quite similar.

sounds 15y ago
Developer here, and I prefer firefox over chrome.
- rjd 15y ago
  For developing I do as well, I think it may be a comfort thing for myself mainly. As far as I'm aware all the tools I use are available on most if not all other browsers. The opinion of people calling it a joke isn't my opinion its what I keep encountering now, and opinions aren't truth, but a exaggerated emotions. So taking that onboard theres a feeling out there amongst a lot of people (although exaggerated) that FF has seen its peak. I see the over the last few minutes my other post has been in the negatives and positives, so I guess its quite contentious probably for that reason. Opinions aren't fact but give an impression of what may be true. As its not a bundled browser for the big OS's, anyone asking what other browser to use is only going to go off recommendation. Most people probably aren't even aware theres multiple browsers or simply do not care. So another thing against FF will be the chrome ads on TV are probably a huge boon for its usage here. At a very least it will start conversation, and often lead to a recommendation.
  - redthrowaway 15y ago
    Again, you're missing the point. It's not about technological advancement (although speed and stability is huge), it's about how many tech-savvy people are recommending it to their mothers and IT managers. By that metric, Firefox is losing ground quickly to Chrome. Chrome is nicer to use and easier to recommend. Yes, those are subjective beliefs, but they're widely-held ones and that's what matters.
    - bad_user 15y ago
      it's about how many tech-savvy people are recommending it to their mothers and IT managers I know a lot of IT managers that aren't touching Google's products for fear of privacy issues. It's not always rational to think that way, however Google has a trust problem lately - which is also why Google Apps is not as successful as it should be, even though it freaking rocks - the thought that Google reads your emails is a terrifying thought for some. I'll grant you that for a period of time I also started recommending Chrome - it was before Firefox version 4 got released, as for a moment I lost faith in Mozilla's ability to innovate. However, now I'm back on Firefox because it is much better for me as a developer. And I also recommend it to normal people because I remember quite well what happened during the IExplorer's glory days and I don't want to help another monopoly on mobile browsers. To me it is irrelevant if Chrome is better right now (although it isn't) - what is relevant is that I have more trust in Mozilla to guard my interests as a user. Google may be one heck of a company that did a lot of good things for our industry, however their interests do not necessarily align with those of the people.
      - gujk 15y ago
        Google Apps are quite effective at losing on their own demerits in a business environment, even without privacy concerns, though that is a big one. The main win over say MS suite is price and hosting, if you have a very small operation that doesn't have a large scale document base or mail base.
- damncabbage 15y ago
  Same here. I use Chrome as well, but not as much as I do Firefox. I think the Dev Tools have reached parity, but I often keep groups of tabs open for reference, and Chrome seems to grind to a halt a lot more quickly when used like this. (To make matters worse, Chrome doesn't seem to "scroll" the list of tabs left and right when the list gets long. It just smooshes them all into one row, leaving you with 10px-wide tabs to click.)
FrankBooth 15y ago
Most of your post is emotion and opinion, so I thought I'd address the part that is factually incorrect: > On a technical note each version isn't really getting any better That's simply not true. To take a single example, the type inference engine added to the JS engine in FF9 significantly improved performance. With the new high frequency release strategy, it's not guaranteed that there will be huge new features or improvements in any given release, but the features and improvements are coming as fast as ever. > historical problems have never been addressed You can find ancient pet bugs for any project that either take a long time to get fixed or are never fixed. Do you have something specific in mind? > version fragmentation is occurring That's more-or-less false. There's some adjustment going on due to the switch to the high frequency release schedule, but the fact is the vast majority of Firefox users are on a small number of versions, almost all that have been offered an upgrade are on the latest stable release. > on several matters its in direct conflict on the w3c standards with other major players. Can you point to anything specific to back up your claim? If you pick and choose specs, this is true for all browsers. Nobody implements everything completely and correctly. The specs are being developed as fast as ever, and it's common for one browser to be ahead in certain areas. It's also common for competing implementations to differ as the standard develops. This is not confined to Firefox.
- mattmanser 15y ago
  You're not addressing his key point, I'm recommending Chrome to anyone I speak to, many other developers I know are too. Firefox is slow, sluggish to use and confusing compared to Chrome. The edge it had over IE was that it was a better user experience. It's not compared to Chrome anymore. Even IE is better than FF apart from the weird crash like blank screen glitch when opening a new tab that IE has.
  - gkoberger 15y ago
    I don't have a problem with you recommending Chrome (and I work at Mozilla). However, it's not fair to say Firefox is sluggish. With a new profile, it's just as fast as Chrome. Try it. Chrome has an advantage because it's relatively new. It doesn't have to deal with over a decade of add-ons and browser history and cookies. Much like how a computer gets slow and needs to be reformatted, people who are browser power users need to clean out Firefox every few years. Try vacuuming your Firefox database [1], syncing everything [2] and/or create a new profile [3] with only the extensions you actually use. Oh, and be careful of Firebug. That's why most developers laugh at Firefox for being so slow; they use Firebug, which slows Firefox down to a grinding halt. We're working on our own dev tools, which are slowly coming together. They're not a Firebug replacement yet, but they're getting there. [4] 1 http://mozillalinks.org/2009/08/vacuum-firefox-databases-for-better-performance-now-with-no-restart/ http://mozillalinks.org/2009/08/vacuum-firefox-databases-for... 2 http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/mobile/sync/ http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/mobile/sync/ 3 http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing-profiles http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing-profiles 4 http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/11/developer-tools-in-firefox-aurora-10/ http://hacks.mozilla.org/2011/11/developer-tools-in-firefox-...
theshadow 15y ago
"anecdotally most devs I know refer to it as a joke and use Chrome instead." Ahh the world of cargo cult browser fanboyism. All I can say is that the devs you are hanging out with aren't very good, any dev who would write off and "laugh at" a browser which boasts the widest and the most mature array of development tools is probably not very good to begin with.
- erikpukinskis 15y ago
  I'm a developer who uses Chrome. I've already forgiven you for calling me "not very good" at my job, so no worries about that. I would, however, love to know what the development tools in Firefox are that you find less mature or nonexistent in Chrome. There were some omissions in the first year or so of Chrome's development, but I find myself quite happy with it these days. I'd gladly switch, though, if there are things I don't know about that could make me more productive.
grannyg00se 15y ago
"The UI is polarising" What exactly do you mean by that? The UI in a browser shouldn't do anything but get out of the way and display the web page's UI. Personally, I don't even want to see a menu bar unless I hit the ALT key - which is working nicely for me in Firefox right now. And I don't notice any "laggy behaviour". Although I haven't run any comparison tests so maybe I'm missing out.
- rjd 15y ago
  What I mean is I haven't heard a positive thing said about it myself. As far as I'm aware everyone I know hates it and has negative things to say about it, most of these where the changes between FF 3 & FF 4. A common complaint I've heard is "its trying to hard to be chrome". However I can assume by the positive comments I read online that myself and my friends probably aren't the standard, and may be unjustly noicsey as people who don't like somethign are generally mroe vocal than people that do. So what I'm hearing/reading is lots of people who really like it, and around me people who vocally don't. Thats what I consider polarising, its drawing out harsh criticism and favourable reviews. The modern laggy behaviour complaint I think is unfair and a marketing lie. What I think is that its a combination of historical problems with FF still in peoples memories and comparisons to Chromes 'snappiness'. Chrome feels like it loads pages faster, so does Opera, and Safari, I doubt that it really does, but thats the bench mark people are expecting now. Like I said its unfair, people are now expecting speed everywhere as thats whats been marketed to them. Its the little things that count, for a quick test I just fired up an aurora firefox build, it took roughly 15 seconds to load, chrome took 10 seconds (I stopped counting with safari when I got to 30 seconds but its loading probably the last 10 pages I left open at once). Thats the sort of thing people remember and sticks in there minds, and often takes alot for them to unforget.
knewter 15y ago
> Its a browser that relies on recommendation to exist, and it no longer is getting recommendation. I agree with the first part of your statement, and partially agree with the second. I personally recommend it to everyone over chrome, because firebug is better than chrome's dev tools...well, chrome's js tool is perhaps as good now, but firebug's better for everything else.