Why you SHOULD be using Firefox

Bit of a weird one, but when I click the address bar I get a list of sites I frequently visit. One of these is shown as:
Amazon.co.uk: Low Prices in Electronics, Books, Sports Equipment & more - amazon.com

When I click on it, I am taken to Amazon.com. So I thought maybe if I delete all the .com addresses it will show me the .co.uk address - but no, the above line still remains. :confused:

Any ideas?
 
darael said:
Bit of a weird one, but when I click the address bar I get a list of sites I frequently visit. One of these is shown as:
Amazon.co.uk: Low Prices in Electronics, Books, Sports Equipment & more - amazon.com

When I click on it, I am taken to Amazon.com. So I thought maybe if I delete all the .com addresses it will show me the .co.uk address - but no, the above line still remains. :confused:

Any ideas?
Click to expand...

It might be the sponsored links. Under Settings -> Home make sure sponsored shortcuts are disabled.
 
Glanza said:
The default search engines come back after every update annoyingly
Click to expand...
Do you do a manual install with custom settings or just let it run default? I've not noticed my search engines change with updates but I do manual download of exe installer and run it that way. I never let it install its "update service"or whatever they call it
 
ik9000 said:
Do you do a manual install with custom settings or just let it run default? I've not noticed my search engines change with updates but I do manual download of exe installer and run it that way. I never let it install its "update service"or whatever they call it
Click to expand...

Auto update when they push one, might be why I get them back.
 
Might be speaking too soon but latest update seems to have solved the problem where sometimes a new tab/window wouldn't initially load a web-site and/or the browser would get into a state where it wouldn't load new sites unless you opened the new tab in certain ways such as from a link in an already loaded site then changing the URL.

EDIT: Speaking too soon still happens just less often.
 
Last edited:
I've had a lot of browser tab crashes (that nuke the whole session) recently. Ever since r79esr. I've actually jumped out of the ESR channel for now to try and get away from them. Things are more stable atm. Really frustrating though as it seems completely random, and no obvious reason why.
 
v91 is out and it's basically more of the usual 'dev's know best'.....seriously it's like they're trying to lose old users just to try and lure in a few new users by trying to be 'just like chrome'.

I was using the 'edge theme' to get some sort of contrast along with the compact menu so had nice simple rectangle tabs that sat right next to each other.... after loading v91 I'm now being FORCED to use the 'new and improved' photon UI for the tabs that the dev's think is 'better' which has padding on all sides taking up more of my screen estate (even on the unsupported compact density). I want to see more or the website(s) I'm on not more of the tabs.... I really don't want to have to delve into userchrome.css but this is getting stupid.


I'm actually going to be actively looking for alternatives now I think so any suggestions? Obviously we have the firefox forks, edge, vivaldi and opera but is there anything else I should be considering?
 
lsg1r said:
v91 is out and it's basically more of the usual 'dev's know best'.....seriously it's like they're trying to lose old users just to try and lure in a few new users by trying to be 'just like chrome'.

I was using the 'edge theme' to get some sort of contrast along with the compact menu so had nice simple rectangle tabs that sat right next to each other.... after loading v91 I'm now being FORCED to use the 'new and improved' photon UI for the tabs that the dev's think is 'better' which has padding on all sides taking up more of my screen estate (even on the unsupported compact density). I want to see more or the website(s) I'm on not more of the tabs.... I really don't want to have to delve into userchrome.css but this is getting stupid.


I'm actually going to be actively looking for alternatives now I think so any suggestions? Obviously we have the firefox forks, edge, vivaldi and opera but is there anything else I should be considering?
Click to expand...

I'm in a similar boat as you are. I'm using something called WindowBlinds which changes the look of Win10, including Firefox, or used to before v91 when as you said, the Proton looks being forced on us and can no longer be turned off, which you could in v90. So now it is like Firefox has a frame and what's in it is photon. I found WaterFox which is quiet like FireFox .. It is presently based on Firefox V78 ESR.

There are also someone that have made their own extensive rewrite of Firefox which they been working on since V60, but it might be a bit to extended rework. You can read more about it here: Custom JS Scripts for Firefox 60+ and Thunderbird 68+. And the general discussion over here.

There is one user that using the Custom JS Scrip, who posted about it over at Windows TenForums, Firefox... Taming the beast ! and they have linked it to a version he has created using the Custom JS scripts, so you could end up with a very ancient looking Firefox if you so wish, where you can also see a few screenshots of that users changes. He do say if you want to craft your own interface to use the Chrome folder from GithHub, but it do show you how you can use the Custom JS Script and make Firefox look more or less anyway you want it, but would mean a lot of fiddling, but it's an option if still wanting to use Firefox as the base.

Got to admit it is the first time I am seriously considering switching browser since I definitely not liking the flat withe look they going for with Proton, with minimal chance to customize the look of it now, unless you do something like the person over GithHub done but that's should not be needed really.
 
Sadly if Proton is forced on us I'll likely be looking to switch as well - it goes against many of the reasons I moved to Firefox in the first place though I don't find the alternatives particularly attractive either.
 
Orcvader said:
Firefox Lepton is also another thing to look at, a CSS rewrite on Proton and tries to make it much more compact and returning things from Photon: https://github.com/black7375/Firefox-UI-Fix
Click to expand...

That is... very nice. I actually don't mind Proton. As I said above (somewhere) I'd used Firefox since before it was even Firefox, and I was compact mode gang for life. The new Proton UI isn't 'that' bad once you get used to it, and I did like the extra info the spacing gave (eg audio playing on tabs). The Firefox-UI-Fix just puts the cherry on the cake for me. Very nice middle ground. Thanks for posting.
 
BTW, since nobody expanded on it, outside of the usual UI complaints Firefox 91 did bring a number of very nice improvements. They include:

* HTTPS first.
Until now, if you typed in the URL bar or clicked a bookmark for 'overclockers.co.uk', Firefox would initially attempt to visit the domain with plain http. You would then rely on the web server at the other end to either have HSTS implemented to upgrade the connection to HTTPS, or else an extension in the user's installation to do similar (HTTPS Everywhere, HTTPS-only mode). This leaves you vulnerable to MITM attacks, with a malicious actor intercepting the plaintext exchange and serving you their own certificate in reply. With Firefox's new HTTPS first policy, any typed URL or bookmark will always try to connect over HTTPS/TLS first, and only then downgrade to plain http if no encryption is available. Nice. :)

* Cookie improvements with 'enhanced cookie cleaning'.
Following on from the non-global 'cookie jar per domain, not per user' improvements of recent versions of Firefox. With Firefox 91, deleting or forgetting a site from History now removes all cookies, service workers, cache etc from all domains embedded in that site, not just the site itself. Previously, deleting/forgetting website.com would only remove the cookies and other data for website.com. Now it deletes the data for website.com, plus facebook.com, twitter.com, doubleclick.net and any other domains embedded in/used by that website. In other, simpler words, the cookie jars are now stored 'per website' rather than strictly 'per domain'. This cuts down even more on potential cross-site tracking vectors.

* Faster paints. Users will see 10-20% faster UI interactions throughout Firefox.

Don't forget to switch the Enhanced Tracking Protection (Settings > Privacy & Security) to Strict for these and more benefits.
 
I think it's time for me to find a alternative to Firefox. I am fed up with being forced to run things the way the devs want and not the way I want. The new UI is terrible and bookmark lists now have huge spaces between each entry making the list over twice as long as it used to be. Apparently the changes cannot be undone this time so I need to find a new browser. Change is ok as long as it's not just for the sake of it and if they need to change stuff they could at least listen to the people who use it instead of forcing it on us because they think they know best. I thought Microsoft was bad enough, now the Firefox team is rapidly catching up.
 
I've just tried that Lepton CSS rewrite and I like it. Got it working on Windows after a manual install as the script didn't seem to want to work. Script didn't work on Debian either but I haven't yet tried to fix that.

I didn't notice anything different about my bookmark lists beforehand though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom