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4 browsers that will continue to support uBlock Origin and other ad blockers with Manifest V2
(www.xda-developers.com)
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this post was submitted on 16 Aug 2024
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I wish someone could explain to me how it is firefox, which is not chromium based but larely dependent on google for funding, has the ability and manpower to maintain not just the manifest v2+all the other stuff, while every single chromium fork has no choice but to use v3. Why can't they just fork the last usable version of chromium and go from there as an independent fork? Is it just that no one wants to?
Like firefox has lots of ports, some of the follow the main branch but then others like waterfox forked off older versions at some point and just kept going, why can't chrome based browsers do a fork like that? How is it there are people making new browsers from scratch like ladybird, but this manifest stuff is just out of reach for everyone, except mozilla (and i guess other firefox forks).
Not having control of the core codebase, and branching/tracking based on 1 (declared) legacy feature could lead to huge amounts of work and issue in the future.
Manifest V2 spec is defined, manifest V3 spec is defined... They can be developed against.
JS-whatever-spec is defined, CSS-whatever-spec is defined, HTML-whatever-spec is defined... They have industry standard approved specs (even if they can be vague in areas). They can be developed against.
They have defined spec documents that can be developed against.
Firefox has control and experience of how they implement those specs.
Chrome forks do not have control of how those specs are implemented.
So if chrome changes how things are implemented, forks might not be able to "backport" for manifest V2 compatibility, and might find themselves implementing more and more of the core browser functionality. Browsers are NOT easy to develop for the modern fuckery of the web.
Firefox hopefully does have that knowledge and ability to include V2 manifest backwards compatibility in future development without impacting further spec implementations.... It seems like Google is depreciating V2 to combat ad-blockers (ads being their major funding revenue)
There are already very slight differences how Firefox and Chrome interpret all these specs. I've noticed a few sites & plugins that just work better (or just work) in Chrome. Which is why I still have (unfortunately) an install of Chrome.
You could also just stop using sites that don't work in Firefox. Also https://webcompat.com/
Absolutely.
And casually, that's exactly what I do. To be honest, casually I haven't encountered any (I don't think...).
But for work stuff, sometimes I don't have a choice. I guess I'm just thankful it doesn't require edge IE compat mode, or even IE itself
A port of a browser is relatively minimal effort. Typically, the changes are largely cosmetic, and occasionally skin deep.
There's a reason none of the ports of Chrome caught the recent snafu with Google having its own special addon that fucks your privacy.
Developing a browser, Firefox or Chrome, takes a huge amount of effort, and are on a similar scale to both Windows and Linux. It's a lot. There are a lot of places to hide things. Taking all of that, and making V2 continue to work... well it'll be alright to start with. It's probably a flag somewhere currently. But in 2 years time? 5 years time? It will take a lot to keep V2 working, let alone back porting V3 features that people may actually want.
Just use Firefox instead.
But firefox is funded by google and has been making questionable decisions for years, LibreWolf is the only fork I would use at this point but I think waterfox really proves my point though that its not really the impossible undertaking people seem to be making it out to be. Waterfox even support BOTH chrome and firefox addons somehow and they have no where near the amount of funding or manpower Mozilla does.
No LibreWolf IS the only fork of Firefox I'll use (meaning i dont use mozilla's branded firefox). Although I guess there is one other firefox fork i use now that i think about it: Tor Browser.
I also use Vivaldi, which doesn't depend on Google for funding and has its own built in adblock that isn't based on either manifest version. In terms of UI vivaldi is completly unmatched, There's a japanese firefox fork that attempts to copy it, but its nowhere near as good.
Creating or even just maintaining a web browser is an insurmountable amount of work. With constantly changing and new specs coming out all the time, it's an unwinnable amount of work. Not to mention, browsers and the Internet in general is so complex it's like web browsers are an operating system themselves.
A web browser is likely the most complex software on your PC outside of the operating system itself.
It is not insurmountable, new browsers made by single or small dev teams exist. If there is enough demand and motivated people to make something like ladybird there is people who could handle maintaining a fork that works, Chrome wasn't always the only game in town and in the IE there was even at least one sort of engine agnostic browser that you could switch between Trident (IE) or Gecko rendering. Its not an easy thing but its very much possible.
Funny you mention Ladybird.. It's a commendable project and I hope they succeed. But until it renders 99% of websites, plays Netflix videos, has all the modern features people expect of a web browser and is an actual viable option for non techies.. It is really proving the opposite of your point. The fact that an alpha is still years away speaks to how hard this really is.
How about Konqeror which uses KHTML the engine both Chrome and Apple's webkit are forked from which has only been getting maintenance updates for a while now, it renders youtube fine, I dont have netflix but i tried Pluto.tv and that also works fine, another browser that works is SeaMonkey, the predecessor to firefox (sort of), if these projects which have both been just maintained for the past decade can keep up with rendering the basics then I see no reason why doing it with a more updated version of Chromium would be any more difficult, but i suppose if it is falling back to KHTML should still work for 99% of websites.
Web browser made by a single or small dev tends to not support nearly as much of the web standards, which are many. Using the web today with partial support for some stuff is the nightmare we escaped when IE got deprecated, and some still have with Safari.
waterfox ftw