Did Google Sabotage Firefox and IE? (zdnet.com) 231
Firefox's former VP accused Google of sabotaging Firefox -- for example, when Gmail and Google Docs "started to experience selective performance issues and bugs on Firefox" and demo sites "would falsely block Firefox as 'incompatible'... There were dozens of oopses. Hundreds maybe... [W]hen you see a sustained pattern of 'oops' and delays from this organization -- you're being outfoxed."
Now Nightingale's accusations have stirred up some follow-up from technology reporters. An anonymous reader shares a blog post by ZDNet security reporter Catalin Cimpanu: Nightingale is not the first Firefox team member to come forward and make such accusations. In July 2018, Mozilla Program Manager Chris Peterson accused Google of intentionally slowing down YouTube performance on Firefox. He revealed that both Firefox and Edge were superior when loading YouTube content when compared to Chrome, and in order to counteract this performance issue, Google switched to using a JavaScript library for YouTube that they knew wasn't supported by Firefox.
At this point, it's very hard not to believe or take Nightingale's comments seriously. Slowly but surely, Google is becoming the new Microsoft, and Chrome is slowly turning into the new IE, an opinion that more and more users are starting to share. On Twitter, a senior editor at the Verge added "Google did a lot of 'oops' accidents to Windows Phone, too. Same pattern of behavior with its services and Edge. Oopsy this, oopsy that." The site MSPowerUser also shares a similar story from former Microsoft Edge intern, Joshua Bakita. "I very recently worked on the Edge team, and one of the reasons we decided to end EdgeHTML was because Google kept making changes to its sites that broke other browsers, and we couldn't keep up."
Meanwhile, Computerworld argues that data "backs up Nightingale's admission, to a point." [I]f Google monkey business contributed to Firefox's fall, it must have really damaged Microsoft's IE. During the time it took Chrome to replace Firefox as the No. 2 browser, Firefox lost just 9% of its user share, while IE shed 22%. And Chrome's most explosive growth - which began in early 2016 - didn't come at Firefox's expense; instead, it first hollowed out IE, then suppressed any potential enthusiasm for the follow-on Edge.
Chrome didn't reach its current place -- last month capturing nearly 68% of all browser activity -- by raiding Firefox. It did it by destroying IE.
Oops.
Now Nightingale's accusations have stirred up some follow-up from technology reporters. An anonymous reader shares a blog post by ZDNet security reporter Catalin Cimpanu: Nightingale is not the first Firefox team member to come forward and make such accusations. In July 2018, Mozilla Program Manager Chris Peterson accused Google of intentionally slowing down YouTube performance on Firefox. He revealed that both Firefox and Edge were superior when loading YouTube content when compared to Chrome, and in order to counteract this performance issue, Google switched to using a JavaScript library for YouTube that they knew wasn't supported by Firefox.
At this point, it's very hard not to believe or take Nightingale's comments seriously. Slowly but surely, Google is becoming the new Microsoft, and Chrome is slowly turning into the new IE, an opinion that more and more users are starting to share. On Twitter, a senior editor at the Verge added "Google did a lot of 'oops' accidents to Windows Phone, too. Same pattern of behavior with its services and Edge. Oopsy this, oopsy that." The site MSPowerUser also shares a similar story from former Microsoft Edge intern, Joshua Bakita. "I very recently worked on the Edge team, and one of the reasons we decided to end EdgeHTML was because Google kept making changes to its sites that broke other browsers, and we couldn't keep up."
Meanwhile, Computerworld argues that data "backs up Nightingale's admission, to a point." [I]f Google monkey business contributed to Firefox's fall, it must have really damaged Microsoft's IE. During the time it took Chrome to replace Firefox as the No. 2 browser, Firefox lost just 9% of its user share, while IE shed 22%. And Chrome's most explosive growth - which began in early 2016 - didn't come at Firefox's expense; instead, it first hollowed out IE, then suppressed any potential enthusiasm for the follow-on Edge.
Chrome didn't reach its current place -- last month capturing nearly 68% of all browser activity -- by raiding Firefox. It did it by destroying IE.
Oops.
Yes, they did. (Score:1)
Next question?
Re: Yes, Billions (Score:5, Insightful)
European Union should slap Google with another billion in fines.
Re: (Score:2)
Nah, this is Google vs Microsoft, the EU can't claim jurisdiction.
Re: Yes, Billions (Score:5, Informative)
If they do business in EU they are within EU jurisdiction
Re: Yes, Billions (Score:2)
A few billion euro fine wonâ(TM)t help though. And the EU can not break up American companies.
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yes it can, it may force a break up in EU or else keep fine google or block the all company from making business in EU... it may still be one company in the US... its just the same in the opposite way
Re: Yes, Billions (Score:5, Insightful)
Mozilla should sue Google under anti-trust legislation and get them broken up. Like Microsoft should have been, back in the day. These mega-huge corporations are a danger to the basics of our society. They keep on proving it.
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Mozilla should sue Google under anti-trust legislation and get them broken up. Like Microsoft should have been, back in the day. These mega-huge corporations are a danger to the basics of our society. They keep on proving it.
Under whose anti-trust legislation?
- The USA doesn't care at all thanks to the bar being set on direct financial impact to the customer.
- Europe doesn't care due to full functionality being provided to all browsers with complete with backwards compatibility (nothing about anti-trust laws says you can't optimise for your own products). All Europe really cares about is customer impact or b-2-b impact. Even the promotion argument for Chrome is impossible to play here since Google has done a lot to promote and
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> Google has done a lot to promote and even invest in Firefox as well.
Only in the days before Chrome was a viable product, so not relevant.
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Only in the days before Chrome was a viable product, so not relevant.
Untrue. Chrome was released in 2008, and Google was the default search engine in Firefox until 2014, an arrangement that accounted for 93% of the Mozilla Foundation's revenue in that year. It was Mozilla that terminated the arrangement, not Google. And in 2017 it signed up with Google again [techcrunch.com]. I'm sure these facts would not be lost on the antitrust courts.
That won't work without a sea change (Score:4, Interesting)
Hell, Microsoft got sued by Sun, lost, and the terms of their settlement was giving tens of millions of dollars of "free" software to schools. They'd been trying to force schools to take their software for decades when that hit and suddenly they had their way in. Until then the admins kept everything an Apple shop because it was easier to admin.
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European Union should slap Google with another billion in fines.
What for specifically? Wishful thinking? Hopes and dreams? I mean you made the statement so you know the European anti-trust laws clearly so exactly what did they fall afoul of?
Sabotage is such a dirty word! (Score:2)
Why wasn't that modded up? Didn't explicitly mention "profit" or "greed"?
Actually, what I was searching for was some more evasive defenses of the google. Where have all the google partisans gone?
For example, I was expecting some apologist to explain how the google people weren't trying to sabotage anyone, but the google was just trying to avoid IP conflicts by always picking the incompatible way to do things when possible. You know, not to create more incompatibility, but just to be new and different and av
Public masturbation of 622952 (Score:2)
Z^-1
Re: Yes, they did. (Score:1)
We all knew and thought it was funny because M$. We are all hypocrites whose hive mind opinion should now be called into question on every matter involving Microsoft.
Re: Yes, they did. (Score:2)
I never thought it was funny.
Re: Yes, they did. (Score:1)
"Did Google Sabotage Firefox and IE?"
Ya think? Chrome ain't done until Firefox will not run again
What's with everyone acting like retards? (Score:5, Interesting)
"Slowly but surely, Google is becoming the new Microsoft,"
How is it "slowly"? And "becoming"? There is already a total monopoly with these evil scumbags controlling everything. Every damn thing.
Every time I report bugs on websites, I'm told to "just download Chrome". Eat shit and die.
Re:What's with everyone acting like retards? (Score:5, Informative)
and then there's this: rewriting amp URLs by insisting the entire chain has to be Google-tech compliant! What could go wrong when a signed exchange could rewrite your URL to be any other one "for performance"
https://tech.slashdot.org/stor... [slashdot.org]
Plenty of us warned fellow techies... (Score:5, Insightful)
About Google coming bearing gifts a decade or more ago. We had seen it before. We knew where Google's revenue came from. We know that regulation was impotent against it from Microsoft's DOJ case.
And now it is repeating itself all over again.
Kids, younger techies: Learn from our mistakes. Never become a fanboy for anything or anyone, no matter how special or helpful they may seem now. They WILL disappoint you in the future. Maybe if you see them fall on hard times give them a small helping hand if you can afford it, but NEVER do so if they are fine or in a position of economic, social, or political power.
The reason religious texts often talk about purging idolatry is right here in front of you. It's Microsoft, Google, the conduct of organized religions, politicians, and organizations you consider above reproach. Each and every one is susceptible, it is just a matter of time and one to a few of the wrong people becoming involved and rotting out even the best intentioned from within.
Captcha was sandbag: 'Take your licks so you can be one of us.' Don't do that either kids. It's just conditioning you for the herd mentality and organizational capture.
Re: Plenty of us warned fellow techies... (Score:5, Insightful)
Spoken like someone who missed the early "wild west" days of the internet.
Yes im sure its very comfortable once you accept that we're basically cattle and google, microsoft, apple, etc are the ranchers. It did not used to be this way, and I think the younger generation are only so willing to accept it becuae the didnt experiance the alternative.
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Spoken like someone who missed the early "wild west" days of the internet.
No I was there. I remember the wild west. I remember it was slow and painful to use. I remember getting data online required skill and often looked like shit. I remember finding things were difficult. God I don't miss webrings. I remember a plethora of searchengines, each better or worse at a specific topic. I remember wanting a search engine so I could find a search engine which would be best for what I was actually looking for.
I also remember that for all the horrors that the IE mono-culture introduced, i
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It's called asta lavista and MSN and windows phone and zune and MySpace and well, any misbehaved tech company can be brought to hell, the punishment just needs to be appropriate. Drop and block Gmail, if you want Google to fear us and strive to control itself and not try to control us. DROP and BLOCK, GMail.
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Except that web pages load slower thanks to tracking, ads and tons of extraneous content and javascript. Oh, and except it's harder to find non-paywalled information.
I'm actually not sure what has improved on the web in the past decade. Like, Google's search results are worse than they were then, as a trivial example. Hell, it's hard to even use query terms and boolean operations anymore, it's trying so hard to be smarter than me. I
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Except that web pages load slower thanks to tracking
You're looking at the world through rose coloured glasses. I had a T1 line back in the day (thanks dad's company), and we didn't load anything quickly. If your website is loading slowly due to tracking then you should blame the webmaster. Tracking is asynchronous and does not require you to hold up loading the webpage. But then I'm sure you're about to mention how we didn't have bad websites in the past. *cou* Geocities *gh*
and javascript
Our ability to communicate right here, brought to you by all the things you hate. Yo
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A decade ago, T1s were shit. The US national average download speed was 4x that.. You're right that compared to the 1990's, things got faster, even factoring in tracking code, etc.
Re:What's with everyone acting like retards? (Score:5, Interesting)
Google isn't the problem, Webkit is.
Building a standards compliant, decently performing browser is an extremely labour intensive task. The market is already saturated, everyone has a browser and there isn't all that much anyone can offer to tempt them to switch.
That's why almost every current browser is using Webkit, or the fork called Blink. If a web site is built for Webkit/Blink it will work for 90% of users. Every site has stats telling it that supporting Firefox's Gecko isn't worth putting much energy in to, especially since the main reason people use Firefox is to more effectively block their revenue streams (ads, tracking).
Have you tried telling them that their site doesn't work with your screen reader? Accessibility is mandated by law in some places so it might crease a business case for them to fix it.
Re:What's with everyone acting like retards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Google isn't the problem, Webkit is.
No, and you're just trying to confuse the discussion. Google is the problem, not Webkit. It's not a technical issue; it's an issue of money. Specifically, the problem is Google's business model which requires them to infringe on everybody's privacy. Webkit, Android, Gmail, Gmaps, Google DNS, Google Analytics and so on are just the bait they use to fish for your data.
Ignoring this and trying to make it into a technical issue is either naive or intentionally misleading. Technical issues don't explain why Google also gathers [sophos.com] data about you from your off-line credit card transactions, or why they "accidentally" collected [theguardian.com] your WiFi traffic, or "accidentally" backdoored [wired.com] Safari to circumvent the users' privacy settings.
Re: What's with everyone acting like retards? (Score:2)
This. It would be news if FF was becoming the new MS
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It's not just web sites too. :(
Almost a monypoly... (Score:2)
History repeats (Score:5, Insightful)
"DOS isn't done until Lotus doesn't run."
Google Chrome is evil (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Google will become the Standard Oil of the internet and no one will dare try to break it up.
In the USA anyway. Europe has no problem telling Google off.
Re:Google Chrome is evil (Score:4, Insightful)
>"My calls for a truly independent browser has not been answered. The Firefox derivatives have their own issues too. Google will become the Standard Oil of the internet and no one will dare try to break it up."
It may well be that Firefox has some issues. But the most important three: performance, security, and standards compliance aren't. Plus it is as independent as one can reasonable expect at the moment. So even if you want some alternative to Chrome and Firefox, the reality RIGHT NOW is that if you don't start using, supporting, and pushing Firefox and complaining LOUDLY to sites that are Chrome-coded, it will be too late. As long as at least the choice of Firefox vs. Chrome/ChromeEdge/ChromeWhatever exists, there is a hope that other browsers can appear and compete. If Google creates a total monoculture, we ALL lose. The taking over of Edge should be truly alarming to anyone that has lived long enough through browser history.
Re: (Score:2)
>"Isn't it different this time? Chromium is open source. If they get tyrannical, the community can just abandon (fork) it like they did Open Office."
It is true that Chromium is open source. But Chrome is not. It is a proprietary, binary blob. And that is what 99.99% of Google-browser-users are using. We already know Google puts additional/different stuff in Chrome. If Google becomes more tyrannical, they will put MORE stuff in Chrome that isn't in Chromium, ensuring they still have the upper hand.
The author has clearly never used IE (Score:5, Insightful)
No IE did that without any help from Google.
Re: The author has clearly never used IE (Score:2)
IE11 is woefully out of date and Edge was too little too late plus it had the negative connotations of the blue e. The fact that it was crap for a while didn't help either.
Only use the crappy Chrome on Google sites (Score:5, Interesting)
and use a working browser on other sites, not only does it help with having a working web experience, but will help a bit in separating your data from google.
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and use a working browser on other sites, not only does it help with having a working web experience, but will help a bit in separating your data from google.
I'd also advise you to use chrome if for some legal or job-related reason, you need to use BookFace. Let Google and Bookface AI fight over what ads to offebd you with.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: Only use the crappy Chrome on Google sites (Score:2)
That just as childish as writing M$.
Re: Only use the crappy Chrome on Google sites (Score:2)
I prefer "Faceboot". People immediately understand it when used in a sentence like this:
"I don't want a boot on my face, so I don't use Faceboot."
Don't use Google sites. Problem solved. (Score:1)
Startpage.com uses Google's search internally, so you don't have to.
For everything else, a $1-$5 virtual server at a good company that does encapsulatiom right, with a pre-made image including e-mail, www, file server, and even Android "cloud" services, will do a better job than Google's sites.
Please share that server with your tech-illiterate relatives, when you have installed them for you.
For YouTube there are programs that directly access the API, so you don't need to open the browser at all.
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For YouTube there are programs that directly access the API, so you don't need to open the browser at all.
You still need to sign up for YouTube in order to upload your videos to YouTube. The difference between YouTube and hosting your video on your VPS is that the latter doesn't help recommend your videos to viewers of other videos with similar subject matter.
Blur and no audience (Score:2)
I would like to see what gives if you host AV1 240p to 360p low birate video
What gives are two things:
Re:Only use the crappy Chrome on Google sites (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is that installing Chrome on my Mac installs a whole bunch of other things deep in the bowels of my system. Things like updaters that can install anything they want in the background. I can't keep a copy of Chrome for certain sites, because even just sitting there it's a security threat.
Re: (Score:2)
Things like updaters that can install anything they want
Alright stop right there. You have already chosen to arbitrarily execute completely unverifiable code from a 3rd party. Why do you suddenly not trust them? Your complaint about the updater became invalid when you executed your download from some random server somewhere on the other side of the internet.
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When you open Safari or Firefox it runs in your own user account, and it stops running when you quit. The Google updater runs as root, and runs constantly. It can make any change it wants to anything that isn't a protected system file. Also, software from the App Store runs sandboxed and can only access files you explicitly open. (Disclaimer: former Mac user, my last MBP died last year.)
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and use a working browser on other sites, not only does it help with having a working web experience, but will help a bit in separating your data from google.
Just avoid logging in to do a Google search when you use your other browser.
Or ever. Logging in to do a Google search has no benefits to you. None.
Firefox's "fall"? ... Is this a US thing? (Score:5, Interesting)
Here in Germany, Firefox is a popular as ever. What "fall" are you talking about? Using Chrome is nuts. Everybody knows it's spyware!
Is this like back in the times, where the US clinged to IE, while over here Firefox and Opera had much bigger popularity already? And Netscape Navigator 4.x before that.
I guess the concept of using Joe "stupid" Sixpack as an argument to justify stupid things, and act like thst somehow means we must adapt to them (idiots) instead of them to us, is not really a known concept.
Just like the customer isn't always right, and a moron isn't entitled to getting his wishes fulfilled. Loudly proclaiming his demands will only get him thrown out of the store here. No pushovers falling to their knees to kiss his feet, like I'm told US shops handle such clients.
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Re:Firefox's "fall"? ... Is this a US thing? (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
UK here - Firefox or Opera in fact anything that's not associated with Google/MS/Facebook or any other plundering bastard. The US via its egregious tech companies is building a groundswell of negative karma that will eventually come back and bite it!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Using Chrome is nuts. Everybody knows it's spyware!
Just because everyone believes something doesn't make it true.
I ask this every time, and every time Firefox zealots mod it as "troll", but fuck them. I want some evidence that Chrome is spyware. I want to be the one who files the GDPR complaint that costs them billions.
So far the closest anyone has got was when someone, who I won't name and shame, incorrectly claimed that the search suggestions send everything you search for to Google, even if you change search engine. In fact Chrome uses your selected sear
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Done that. The only data Chrome ever sends without user interaction is a periodic check for updates, which includes a randomly generated installation ID. You can check for yourself.
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I know. For the 6.1% of people who use Firefox globally, a whole 7.1% use it in Germany! How amazing!
Unless you can point to some other statistics that I wasn't able to find by searching to backup your completely unsubstantiated claim.
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Because I don't trust mine either. But the burden of proof isn't on me. But since you're being fussy the numbers are from statscounter and netmarketshare.
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Here in Germany, Firefox is a popular as ever. What "fall" are you talking about? Using Chrome is nuts. Everybody knows it's spyware!
Going by web stats there are more people in Canada using Safari then there are of people in Germany using Firefox. Give you bonus points if you figure out why, and just how much government waste has happened in the last 3.5 years federally.
Re: Firefox's "fall"? ... Is this a US thing? (Score:2)
âoeUsing Chrome is nuts. Everybody knows it's spyware!â
I keep saying that here but people donâ(TM)t seem to want to listen.
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According to gs.statcounter.com, Chrome's market share is 49% in the US and 60% in Europe, so I tuned out the rest of your BS European superiority complex rant.
What really made Firefox lost users... (Score:2)
People wonder why I still use Firefox. (Score:1)
This is one of many reasons why I will *never* switch to Chrome. Firefox's development team doesn't play dirty, they're just interested in making a damn web browser. By this point, me switching to Chrome would be like marrying the guy who shot my kids.
Still don't understand why you suckers use Chrome (Score:1)
in your head you're convinced that the other browsers are completely unusable and broken, and that internet only works with the amazing Chrome. It's wrong. It's not faster in practice, only in specialized benchmarks, it's not more memory efficient, in fact it's quite the opposite as it's a real memory hog. And it's definitely not secure. Everything you click on and visit is recorded and sent back to Google.
If you haven't yet become a grumpy old browser-connoiseur, just switch to Firefox.
An ad company (Score:2)
Different browsers that don't allow the approved ads to flow to the user are sinful.
Google Hangouts doesn't work on Safari anymore (Score:1)
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I don't buy it (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't buy it, for lots of reasons, all related to Google's culture and processes.
For one, different groups in Google don't cooperate that well. There's relatively little top-down direction in the company, and most cross-team collaboration is done at the level of engineers reaching out to other engineers. What's being alleged would require a lot more than that.
For another, the concept of sabotaging users of another product (one that lots of Google employees know and like, no less!) goes strongly against the way most Googlers think. It would be really strange for any request to sabotage Firefox not to generate a great deal of pushback which would turn into a big controversy, and leak. Google doesn't run a particularly tight ship with respect to controversy.
But most important, it's much easier to see how the "oopses" would really happen accidentally (apply Hanlon's Law). Google moves fast; stuff is constantly changing. Internally stuff changes at least 10X as fast as what users see. This is in large part due to the "single tree, run from HEAD" approach. Any change in internal infrastructure requires that all client code be updated, and Google has incredibly good tools and processes for making these massive changes, including outstanding automated test systems. BUT, those test systems work much better at testing compatibility with other internal tools, because it's easier to instrument internal tools for testing. With respect to browsers, Google has test infrastructure that runs various browsers in a sort of headless mode and verifies that they act in the ways expected. This is easy for Chrome, because Google has and controls all of the source. I'd guess that it's somewhat tougher for Firefox, since although source is available it probably can't be instrumented too deeply without generating a constant integration headache. It's harder still for IE, which is closed source. Oh, it probably also helps that Chrome and Firefox run on Linux, where you can easily run them in a fake X session, making it easy to run them headless and examine their output. I'm not sure how hard that would be in Windows.
Plus Chrome likely also has the advantage that the latest version of Chrome is the tool the engineers use for hand-testing while they work. There's probably some level of manual QA for other browsers but given all the various versions, automated testing is heavily relied upon.
Also, the summary's claim that Chrome's big surge in market share started in 2016 is weird. If you look at the market shares over time [w3counter.com], you see that Chrome's share trajectory is almost a straight line (with some jags, but always returning to mean) since 2009. It did take a 10% jump between Feb and May of 2016, but that seems to mostly have been at the expense of Safari, not IE/Edge, and Chrome subsequently regressed back to its straight line path.
Re: I don't buy it (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't require cooperation. It works perfectly well in a top-down fashion without explaining anything to the rank and file engineers and PMs:
* First drive hard to release often without enough time or incentive for testing on all browsers. If it works in the latest Chrome it's good enough to release.
* Second, drive the engineers to adopt the bleeding edge Chrome features ("dog food culture").
That's it. It will break competing browsers not because engineers intentionally introduced bugs but because the process is designed to break them.
Re: I don't buy it (Score:5, Insightful)
This is exactly right.
No-one at Google ever has to intentionally break other browsers. They just have to adopt a "Chrome first" policy, which is defensible in its own right ("it's our product", "most people are using Chrome anyway"). The results are inevitable.
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They just have to adopt a "Chrome first" policy, which is defensible in its own right
its defensible in it's own right... if you're not big enough for that to be monopoly abuse. If you are it's not defensible, and they KNOW they're in that position.
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Describing it as "defensible" doesn't mean I think it's right. I actually agree with you.
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This is exactly right.
No-one at Google ever has to intentionally break other browsers. They just have to adopt a "Chrome first" policy, which is defensible in its own right ("it's our product", "most people are using Chrome anyway"). The results are inevitable.
I think this is quite possibly the case, with no malice, indeed no intention by anyone at Google to make this happen. And, as I pointed out, this is especially true for IE/Edge, which because of their closed-source target platform and closed-source nature, are much harder to test in an automated fashion.
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It doesn't require cooperation. It works perfectly well in a top-down fashion without explaining anything to the rank and file engineers and PMs:
That sort of top-down control doesn't really exist in Google.
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Re: Blah blah blah, evil google dev excuses (Score:1)
Microsoft was more evil, and FB was and is fat more evil.
This entire threats is one big exercise in trolling.
Hate to defend google. (Score:3, Interesting)
I hate that I feel the need to defend Google here, but Microsoft edge was never remotely a good browser. It lacked half the features used by many sites not just Googles own sites, and had a tiny team that simply could not keep up with new features added to chromium that were quickly adopted by Web developers.
I have no problem with chromium being the "only" html/javascript engine.
I do have a problem with Google services not working with chromium.
Firefox simply lost the plot. For years. You would never know if a new update would fail things that worked in the last update. And after literally years of horrific memory leaks, even die hard Google haters gave up and switched to a chromium based browser.
Re:Hate to defend google. (Score:4, Interesting)
>"I hate that I feel the need to defend Google here, but Microsoft edge was never remotely a good browser."
That is 100% entirely true. But at least it and Firefox (and to a lesser degree, Safari) put a barrier from Google from completely taking over. It kept the CONCEPT of "compatibility" in the minds and hearts of web designers. That is quickly disappearing. The taker of Edge might be the last defense- it is dangerous and alarming. Designers are now starting to code ONLY to Chrome/Webkit quirks rather than to open standards. Once this transformation is complete- WE WILL ALL LOSE. Google will be able to single-handedly do anything they want. Set anything as a standard; and make no mistake, those "de-facto" standards will benefit Google far more than the user. The exact same type of S*** that MS did earlier with IE.
>"I have no problem with chromium being the "only" html/javascript engine."
You say that now- but be careful what you wish for...
>"I do have a problem with Google services not working with chromium."
And doesn't that little bit show just how dangerous this all is? They don't even keep Chromium fully compatible and able as their secret, binary-only Chrome browser. And the idea that Chromium is "open source" is true only in such that the source is there. The development of it is far from open. And what they then do to it to turn it into Chrome is absolutely not open at all (and that is what 99.9% of Google-browser-users are using).
>"Firefox simply lost the plot. For years. You would never know if a new update would fail things that worked in the last update. And after literally years of horrific memory leaks, even die hard Google haters gave up and switched to a chromium based browser"
I have used Firefox the whole time and have rarely experienced any such horrific issues. And even the worse of times is certainly in the past- for years now, Firefox performs similarly to Chrome and often uses fewer resources in the process. So I wouldn't focus on the WORST time of Firefox, but the CURRENT time of Firefox. And if you haven't used it in the past year, you are in for a pleasant surprise.
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->You say that now- but be careful what you wish for...
What more could we ask for than for internet browsing be founded on:
"Chromium is an open-source browser project that aims to build a safer, faster, and more stable way for all Internet users to experience the web. This site contains design documents, architecture overviews, testing information, and more to help you learn to build and work with the Chromium source code."
?
Chromium != Chrome.
Even Microsoft have now switched their Edge codebase over to C
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> What more could we ask for than for internet browsing be founded on:
We could ask for multiple Web browsers with significant market share so that Web developers test in multiple browsers, so their sites don't depend on the bugs and quirks of just one browser codebase, and the Web isn't effectively controlled by the company that controls that code. In the other words, the Web we've had up till now.
Chromium doesn't even pretend to have an open governance model.
> Firefox ruined their code 10 years ago a
Re: Hate to defend google. (Score:2)
->We could ask for multiple Web browsers with significant market share so that Web developers test in multiple browsers
What's wrong with chrome/brave/vivaldi/edge all using V8 and chromium and developers only having to test on chromium and v8, with a high level of confidence it will work on every device under the sun?
We had "testing on multiple incompatible browsers" back in the ie6 days. It was an absolute nightmare.
Most of the crappy developers these days still can't even test for the full range of scr
Tons of better options (Score:3)
Better options include, but are not limited to: (A) Open Standards slavishly adhered to by many browsers (B) Open source browsers, not bro
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Firefox died when they brought us the Australis interface and features no one asked for. Pocket? Screenshot tool? Video chat? It didn't help that the CEO was giving money to political groups instead of worrying about their market share.
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I have no problem with chromium being the "only" html/javascript engine.
Then you're not a software architect.
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True, Definitely not a bit flipper, or a burger flipper, or any such bloated title the young ones use to make themselves feel good about their crap pay these days.
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Edge had a huge team for a long time. These things fluctuate but for a long time (since the Blink fork) it's been true that a) Chrome has the largest team b) Webkit has the smallest team c) Firefox is in the middle and d) Edge for a while had significantly more than Firefox, though it probably declined to be less than Firefox.
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If you think I'm talking about memory used to display a page ten seconds after you start the application you are very sorely mistaken.
I'm not saying they didn't... (Score:5, Informative)
...but IE was a shitty browser before there was a Google, certainly before there was a Chrome. It was the only reason Netscape flourished back in the day, despite MS shoving IE down everyone's throats constantly.
Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
>"Did Google Sabotage Firefox and IE?"
Yes.
Every person that buys into using Chrome is giving Google more control and more power. Install and use Firefox and encourage others to do the same. There is really is no reason not to. In all reasonable metrics, it performs the same and uses the same or fewer resources. It is available for all modern operating systems, including mobile. It is true open-source. It adheres to actual standards. And it is community-driven.
We need to support and use Firefox (and complain LOUDLY to any entity which creates 'broken' websites), or the alternative is that Google will completely take over the browser space, the web, and our privacy and leave us with a monobrowser based on Google's whims and desires instead of based on actual standards. It seems like a no-brainer.
As much as I hate IE/Edge, its takeover by Google/Chrome should be an extremely loud and clear alarm for anyone who understands history and what this can and will mean for us all.I nstall and use Firefox. Tell everyone you know to do the same. Do so because you value freedom, privacy, and standards. Do it while most web-sites are still standards-based and their owners care about compatibility. Do it before it is too late. We are reaching a threshold where there may never be any return if action is not taken NOW.
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>"Simply untrue. But I recommend people try and see for themselves."
It isn't untrue, at least not under Linux. But I agree- try and see.
Don't Be Evil, right? (Score:2)
But if Google had to be evil at least they helped rid the 'Net of the IE browser. I'm sure a huge number of web site designers are relieved that they now have little reason to take IE's quirks into account when putting up a web site. Only lazy corporate web programmers who long relied on "it's our standard browser" will miss IE.
I have noticed the "throttling" (Score:2)
install more than one browser (Score:2)
When all competitors complain (Score:2)
Maybe it's just an indication that Google is optimising for their own platform given they know the complete capabilities (including potentially non-standard / incompatible ones) of their own browser.
Competitor's aren't being slowed down, they are not being sped up, and the fact is that Google seems to go out of its way to maintain as wide of a compatibility as possible with all other browsers, serving custom and fully maintained content depending on capabilities. If they wanted to pull an IE they could just
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So your argument that they broke a website is that they took a 100% Google owned and written app (which is still available) and turned it into a Chrome App?
So the ability for e.g. Firefox users to use it went from 0 to 0. Sounds like they maintained 100% functionality between the new version and the old version to me.
Kill by the sword, die by the sword, Microsoft (Score:2)
One browser to rule them all. (Score:2)
Google has to protect their precious. I wonder how that will turn out...
Maybe asking the wrong question... (Score:2)
The folks at Google don't need to actively target FIrefox, they can get the same result just by not bothering to test as much on Firefox.