Disable AI in Firefox(flamedfury.com)
flamedfury.com
Disable AI in Firefox
https://flamedfury.com/posts/disable-ai-in-firefox/
160 comments
Personally, I do not mind it if it's on-device, especially small specialised models (e.g. overview generation, audio generation, etc) with no internet access.
In the long term, on-device won't save us from a biased assistant. It might notice we seem tired and insinuate that we could use Mococoa, all natural beans straight from the upper slopes of Mount Nicaragua.
Or—and this happens—it "summarizes" the same text differently, depending on whether the author's name happens to fit a certain ethnicity.
Or—and this happens—it "summarizes" the same text differently, depending on whether the author's name happens to fit a certain ethnicity.
On the inverse of this, it can also save us from biased content because it can point out all the ways that the article we are reading is trying to manipulate our perspective.
With how inexpensive trainings are starting to get, it will not be long until we can train our own specialized models to fit our specific needs.
With how inexpensive trainings are starting to get, it will not be long until we can train our own specialized models to fit our specific needs.
> it can also save us from biased content
I am pessimistic on that front, since:
1. If LLM's can't detect biases in their own output, why would we expect them to reliably detect it in documents in general?
2. As a general rule, deploying bias/tricks/fallacies/BS is much easier than the job of detecting them and explaining why it's wrong.
I am pessimistic on that front, since:
1. If LLM's can't detect biases in their own output, why would we expect them to reliably detect it in documents in general?
2. As a general rule, deploying bias/tricks/fallacies/BS is much easier than the job of detecting them and explaining why it's wrong.
Modern local models make it pretty easy to imagine a future where this would be useful, but they also make extremely apparent that the future has not arrived.
Maybe in five years they will be useful enough that it would have been worth including these features
Maybe in five years they will be useful enough that it would have been worth including these features
That was the original intent. They only recently added the "chatbot-y" kind of stuff since the infra is all already there. The main uses were for their translation tools and PDF alt-text generation (which I believe disabling ML will disable as they rely on the on-device transformer tools to do).
I disabled browser.ml.enable and local translation was still working. In my case, that's all I need, but it looks like it still allows on-device transformers.
Oh interesting. All the local stuff for a good while was gated under browser.ml.enable but maybe they've finally freed that stuff.
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"If you’d like to turn these features off, open about:config in the Firefox address bar, search for browser.ml.enable, set it to false, and that should disable everything."
This is nice to know but in future versions of Firefox that single config switch (browser.ml.enable) will both change names and split into multiple sub-switches, most likely appearing in different pages of about:config.
These sub-switches will then not remain consistent.
Bank on it.
This is nice to know but in future versions of Firefox that single config switch (browser.ml.enable) will both change names and split into multiple sub-switches, most likely appearing in different pages of about:config.
These sub-switches will then not remain consistent.
Bank on it.
Mozilla's default setting is true. This is the tired, old "opt-out" tactic
Almost no one changes defaults, according to the experts
It's perverse to think about:config is doing favours for anyone except Mozilla and its business partners
Otherwise the defaults would be false, i.e., opt-in
Almost no one changes defaults, according to the experts
It's perverse to think about:config is doing favours for anyone except Mozilla and its business partners
Otherwise the defaults would be false, i.e., opt-in
Its easier to just go to a bfirefox rowser flavor that has better defaults like librewolf or maybe zen browser.
It's already not true. I had browser.ml.enable and browser.ml.chat.enabled set to false but I was still getting an option to ask an AI Chatbot about stuff in my right-click context menu. I had to also set browser.ml.chat.menu to false.
Also pick a lane mozilla. Either use "enable" or "enabled", don't use both.
Also pick a lane mozilla. Either use "enable" or "enabled", don't use both.
Mozilla could have had the no-nonsense, high performance browser backend that everyone uses to build their own browsers (like the recent glut of AI browsers), instead of everyone using Chromium/Blink. In the past, Gecko was really the go-to choice for this. They almost had a second shot with Servo. But they kinda really dropped the ball on the technical capability of the browser while continuing to be distracted by all sorts of random gimmicks like Pocket and then this. Sad!
> Mozilla could have had the no-nonsense, high performance browser backend that everyone uses to build their own browsers
I agree with the sentiment, but you underestimate the level of engineering, coordination, design work, testing it is to do this.
It is admirable that they even have a half-decent browser, but to compete at the top you need soooo much money and motivation.
I agree with the sentiment, but you underestimate the level of engineering, coordination, design work, testing it is to do this.
It is admirable that they even have a half-decent browser, but to compete at the top you need soooo much money and motivation.
> It is admirable that they even have a half-decent browser, but to compete at the top you need soooo much money and motivation.
I’m guessing Ladybird will prove you wrong in due time
I’m guessing Ladybird will prove you wrong in due time
Ladybird will be a Firefox alternative, nothing more. It can't be, by definition. People are not using Chrome, Edge or Safari because they're great browsers.
They use it because it's preinstalled and good enough. They don't care, and they won't care in a future where Ladybird is a thing.
Ask 60% of their (Chrome, Edge, Safari) userbase, and they won't even be able to tell you what their browser is called.
Ask 60% of their (Chrome, Edge, Safari) userbase, and they won't even be able to tell you what their browser is called.
I've never had Chrome preinstalled. I use it because it seems to me a great browser despite some annoyances. I think that goes for most Windows users.
> I’m guessing Ladybird will prove you wrong in due time
It'll be a usable product, but it will be extremely extremely niche, until the dev burns out or just quit it.
I hope I'm wrong, but a browser is a XXL type project and needs proper funding (means = there should be a reason for it to exist, not altruistic as lets have an alternate because reasons ..)
It'll be a usable product, but it will be extremely extremely niche, until the dev burns out or just quit it.
I hope I'm wrong, but a browser is a XXL type project and needs proper funding (means = there should be a reason for it to exist, not altruistic as lets have an alternate because reasons ..)
Modern web browsers are in the range of 30 million LOC, probably 50% of that is just pure implementation of web platform standards and engine work.
Do you just need to advertise stuff among content creators these days with common sense going out of the window? It'll take them a decade to catch up without any engineering funding at the level that Apple/Google/Mozilla have.
Do you just need to advertise stuff among content creators these days with common sense going out of the window? It'll take them a decade to catch up without any engineering funding at the level that Apple/Google/Mozilla have.
> Do you just need to advertise stuff among content creators these days with common sense going out of the window?
I’m not a content creator and I don’t really care about Ladybird. I use Safari.
I’m just pointing out that browsers have decades of legacy cruft from mis-steps deciding what the web even should be and someone smart can carve out a path to covering 90% of use cases in 10% of the effort and code. And there are the huge organizational costs Google and others pay that a small organization doesn’t have to.
Your argument is the same as looking at a large company (say Microsoft) and saying no one can compete without trillions of dollars and tens of thousands of engineers. Ladybird has the benefit of hindsight, as well as a non-idiotic structure (I assume).
The defeatism among engineers is sad
I’m not a content creator and I don’t really care about Ladybird. I use Safari.
I’m just pointing out that browsers have decades of legacy cruft from mis-steps deciding what the web even should be and someone smart can carve out a path to covering 90% of use cases in 10% of the effort and code. And there are the huge organizational costs Google and others pay that a small organization doesn’t have to.
Your argument is the same as looking at a large company (say Microsoft) and saying no one can compete without trillions of dollars and tens of thousands of engineers. Ladybird has the benefit of hindsight, as well as a non-idiotic structure (I assume).
The defeatism among engineers is sad
It's not defeatism at all. I think it's just important to acknowledge that a browser, or software at the scale of Microsoft is real work, these are objectively gigantic engineering efforts and not all of the people at those firms are stupid.
If you're really smart and you say "I can do it with half or a quarter of the resources with hindsight", sure I might give you the benefit of the doubt, but if you're going to claim you can do it with 0.1% of the resources in a volunteer Discord server effort, no. Not because I wouldn't be happy if that was possible, but because that's not how the world works. Linux is being able to compete with Microsoft because there are now large billion dollar companies like RedHat, Steam and others investing into the development. It takes real money and developer time.
And that's the second point, Mozilla has to make these compromises because they are one of the few companies that actually maintains an independent software project at this scale. And if any other competitor ever wants to get there, they'll need to answer these funding questions too. Even if they're ten times as clever, they'll still need tens or hundreds of millions.
If you're really smart and you say "I can do it with half or a quarter of the resources with hindsight", sure I might give you the benefit of the doubt, but if you're going to claim you can do it with 0.1% of the resources in a volunteer Discord server effort, no. Not because I wouldn't be happy if that was possible, but because that's not how the world works. Linux is being able to compete with Microsoft because there are now large billion dollar companies like RedHat, Steam and others investing into the development. It takes real money and developer time.
And that's the second point, Mozilla has to make these compromises because they are one of the few companies that actually maintains an independent software project at this scale. And if any other competitor ever wants to get there, they'll need to answer these funding questions too. Even if they're ten times as clever, they'll still need tens or hundreds of millions.
> It is admirable that they even have a half-decent browser, but to compete at the top you need soooo much money and motivation.
Let's not forget the CEO who paid herself a $6.9m salary in 2022, $5.6m in 2023.
Let's not forget the CEO who paid herself a $6.9m salary in 2022, $5.6m in 2023.
Gecko was always hard to embed, which is why WebKit was developed by Apple and then widespread in open source projects.
More accurately, why WebKit was forked from khtml by Apple.
Sure. KHTML wasn’t embeddable outside KDE either until Apple made that happen.
That was always KHTML's goal, but Apple saw value in it for their business plan, just like it saw value in FreeBSD to reuse as their OS's base.
Sure. I wasn’t trying to say that Apple made WebKit from scratch, merely that they developed it into something easily embeddable. That very much was novel at the time.
The amount of money and research put into Chromium is nuts and it's borderline impossible to compete.
Mozilla is a C-suite vanity organization disguised as software company. I love Firefox (I'm using it write this comment) and I really appreciate the developers who continue to work and improve it -- I just wish they were given far more resources to do it.
I doubt the Mozilla C-suite even uses FF on their macbooks/iPhones.
We had Netscape Navigator which began bloating after version 3 eventually becoming Netscape Communicator with various sorts of useless bullshit. When it became so fat it couldn't even start without causing machines to swap, I remember Phoenix came out - a lightweight, fast Mozilla browser. It was a godsend, an immediate hit. I remember all my friends switching to it when it was, like version 0.x, because it was so much faster. A proper no-bullshit WWW experience. Then Phoenix became Firefird, then Firefox. Now Firefox is the new Netscape. Cycle continues.
I'm not sure that was ever realistic.
It's been 20 years since Apple decided they needed a browser of their own, and even then they chose to throw their weight behind KDE's KHTML, not Gecko.
It's been 20 years since Apple decided they needed a browser of their own, and even then they chose to throw their weight behind KDE's KHTML, not Gecko.
Time to switch to Waterfox, it's basically Firefox with the privacy features that Firefox should have by default:
https://www.waterfox.net/
https://www.waterfox.net/
That doesn’t address the larger complaint your parent commenter is making that Mozilla dropped the ball on Firefox development.
It partially addresses it, because it shows there's a way to save the software Mozilla develops from itself. In other words, I couldn't give a damn if Mozilla keeps misunderstanding it's market if there are open source forks of its software that undoes Mozilla's bad decisions and keeps the parts worth keeping. I'm not sentimental about Mozilla, Mozilla can continue to become irrelevant as long as competition in the browser space continues. New funding models can be developed to support forks of Firefox.
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Apart from the browser.ml.* config the newest update also adds and activates the @perplexity search shortcut.
Deleted it in my config. I'm solely relying on DuckDuckGo.
Deleted it in my config. I'm solely relying on DuckDuckGo.
> I'm solely relying on DuckDuckGo
I've been fully on DDG for years but becoming slowly skeptical & looking for alternatives.
1. They're leaning heavily into "responsible AI", much like Mozilla
2. Might be just me but I feel like their algorithm became significantly worse recently. Over the years they've gone from being worse than Google in the early days to steadily improving & overtaking Google on quality (I made heavy use of !g until I started slowly realising it was no longer giving me better results). But now I feel like they've reversed & regressed again.
I've been fully on DDG for years but becoming slowly skeptical & looking for alternatives.
1. They're leaning heavily into "responsible AI", much like Mozilla
2. Might be just me but I feel like their algorithm became significantly worse recently. Over the years they've gone from being worse than Google in the early days to steadily improving & overtaking Google on quality (I made heavy use of !g until I started slowly realising it was no longer giving me better results). But now I feel like they've reversed & regressed again.
https://startpage.com is a Google proxy instead of a Bing proxy (like DDG).
Pretty sure startpage sold out years ago...
Disable AI, disable targeted ads... What's wrong with you, Firefox ?
In their defense, they're in a bit of a precarious financial situation. Most of their money comes from Google, who happens to also be their largest competitor.
Maybe they shouldn't pay their CEO a sizable fraction of the entire company's income and also stop wasting money on AI bullshit and gimmicks like Pocket or whatever their latest obsession is.
Maybe they'd be in a better position if they focused their resources on building their core product? I know that's a wildly radical concept these days...
Maybe they'd be in a better position if they focused their resources on building their core product? I know that's a wildly radical concept these days...
The amount of money comes from the number of people willing to use and tolerate their defaults. Surely, burning all the good will they've built up can't possibly improve that, can it?
That's why they're launching a FREE VPN?
https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-services/mozilla-is-experi...
https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-services/mozilla-is-experi...
Gotta say I'm super annoyed by getting spoon-fed AI popups in every piece of software I'm using. How about fixing bugs and optimizing mem and perf? Whatever happened to caring for end users. Empathy is aparently dead in the era of VC capital.
Here's the link to the official archives of Firefox browser:
https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/
You're on your own running these in the wild; at least use a few other layers of security protection. Later versions of Firefox will not run unsigned addons unless you're running a development build, without running it from the debugger page. (Maybe someone can chime in with a workaround.)
https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/
You're on your own running these in the wild; at least use a few other layers of security protection. Later versions of Firefox will not run unsigned addons unless you're running a development build, without running it from the debugger page. (Maybe someone can chime in with a workaround.)
It looks like it should be possible to use a local model with a custom prompt.
Selecting text and having a action with a custom prompt/tool without needing a browser extension might be nice. It need not even be a llm.
https://nilsheuman.github.io/TIL/2025-04-17-custom-firefox-a...
Selecting text and having a action with a custom prompt/tool without needing a browser extension might be nice. It need not even be a llm.
https://nilsheuman.github.io/TIL/2025-04-17-custom-firefox-a...
Still, don't forget to install uBlock Origin on Firefox.
If you don't have a Pi-hole, considerer installing one.
If you use Windows (or android/ios/macos), there is no way MicroDollar won't know what you do or go, even if you have a VPN it still goes around the VPN.
But if you use Linux, install OpenSnitch so you can control some other nasty connections.
Can you elaborate on what you're talking about regarding microdollar? Or provide some more information about your claim?
If you want some DNS blocking without running pi-hole or AdGuatd, try something like https://mullvad.net/en/help/dns-over-https-and-dns-over-tls
I found family to do a decent job of not resolving ads and crapware. Other providers are available.
I found family to do a decent job of not resolving ads and crapware. Other providers are available.
I should figure out how to turn off ai in acrobat reader. It offers to summarize my sheet music every time I open it...
Should be a bill of rights that you ask the chatbot how to disable it no it presents you a checkbox to permanently disable it and you click and you are done.
Was shocked last night seeing a quite annoying Acrobat Reader with AI commercial during the NBA game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M1a7zY5iVM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5M1a7zY5iVM
I'm curious to know what the AI does when it encounters sheet music. Does it do anything intelligible?
Just use non-enshittified software, for example SumatraPDF, unless you need some special Adobe stuff that it doesn't support?
The article is actually good. The title is a little click-baity even if that is actually what it covers. It is mostly about tweaking the AI options which is actually helpful as I don't mind some of the new features.
> The title is a little click-baity even if that is actually what it covers.
Your comment is a bit self-contradictory in that it doesn't say what it says.
Your comment is a bit self-contradictory in that it doesn't say what it says.
Didn't entirely work for me. I still had the little popup when I selected text, even after restarting. However, it did go away and stay away when I selected "hide chatbot..." at the bottom of the popup.
about:config, type ".ml." in the search (no quote marks), set everything to false / zero / blank.
I don't want anything even vaguely related to spicy autocomplete on any of my machines, and I go to great lengths to kill anything that even resembles it with fire.
I don't want anything even vaguely related to spicy autocomplete on any of my machines, and I go to great lengths to kill anything that even resembles it with fire.
Good to know. I tried to find an off switch in the settings for the AI junk when it first popped up and didn't find one. It's mostly unobtrusive, so didn't bother me too much, but it's nice to have a way to get rid of a feature I'm not going to use.
Yeah, just searching for "AI" in settings find some choices.
eg "Use AI to suggest tabs and a name for tab groups"
And far more false positives - eg dAIly
The Firefox Chat window doesn't allow running a LLM is a different container. At least I couldn't find a way, tried several plugins but failed. Now running my LLM of choice just like the author inside a pined & containerized tab.
Feels like people making a big deal out of it. You can also just, you know, not use these features. I can't remember the last time I use the "Print" dialog, the "Manage bookmarks" or the "Homepage" button. But these things don't have AI in their name, so people aren't so obsessed with removing them.
IMHO just like many companies are obsessed with adding AI features, some users are obsessed with rejecting them. Both seem mostly senseless to me, especially when it's a local-first AI implementation.
IMHO just like many companies are obsessed with adding AI features, some users are obsessed with rejecting them. Both seem mostly senseless to me, especially when it's a local-first AI implementation.
And honestly it seems ironic that a lot of people on HN want Firefox to be used by everyone but don't want Mozilla to add features that the "normies" want.
A lot of people on HN do not want people to use, or want, a lot of features that “normies” want. In part because they think that “normies” desire for those features is based in substantial part on misunderstanding of the benefits and costs of the features.
I like seeing new features in Firefox even though I won't use nearly any of them. It indicates new ideas and investment into software that I very much want to continue to exist, that I use everyday.
I've started using https://mullvad.net/en/browser for exactly that reason. No AI shibboleth.
It would be nice if there was a one-click "No AI" option, but I appreciate the OP. I have disabled these flags. Firefox is my main browser but AI is my nemesis.
I'm actually not all that opposed to some of these features, but the way it's implemented is so clunky. The UI make it feel like a half baked browser extension.
"automatically group and label your tabs" is the only thing out of those that sound at all interesting to me, though I don't know how AI comes into play here. And is it all local AI?
It’s local and it tries to group the tabs based on what seems to be URL and title, and what seems to be a semantic content of the page (eg it understands to group shopping sites together).
Not using firefox anymore. Uninstalled it few days ago. Switched to qutebrowser. It's not perfect, but hell I love using this browser.
Why do people care? It's nice, been using it since Nightly. And you have to actually hook it up to a service for it to do anything.
The toggle for the popup is in (as you might expect) the settings hamburger menu in the AI Panel. There's even a remove button! Lots of new things have been added to browsers over the years, and these AI features are becoming incredibly popular as more users recognize the utility (and what they actually are).
This just seems like some more anti-AI hysteria.
The toggle for the popup is in (as you might expect) the settings hamburger menu in the AI Panel. There's even a remove button! Lots of new things have been added to browsers over the years, and these AI features are becoming incredibly popular as more users recognize the utility (and what they actually are).
This just seems like some more anti-AI hysteria.
> Why do people care?
It's clutter for a feature that I'm not going to use. I'm not upset it's there for those who want it, but it's also nice to be able to get rid of it.
It's clutter for a feature that I'm not going to use. I'm not upset it's there for those who want it, but it's also nice to be able to get rid of it.
I don’t store passwords in Firefox, nor do I use the ”Save page as”, I have never used the ”Report broken site” feature, and never activated ”Troubleshooting Mode”. I have never needed to configure network settings in my browser, and so on… As far as this discussion is concerned all these are bloat because they are not used. Seems like a strange yardstick to keep, when it cannot be properly applied, no?
I think it'd be cool to be able to remove those from the UI if you're not using them, yeah. For me personally, I find the Firefox UI is pretty streamlined, so suddenly seeing new right-click menu elements that I'm not going to use was a bit jarring and I'm glad there's a setting to remove them.
Funny, the style sheet breaks the text on mobile and a inserts a hyphen so the setting name appears as
brow-ser.ml.enable
brow-ser.ml.enable
Thank you I was literally trying to disable that when I saw this :)
To my surprise, in Librewolf this was also enabled. To how much effect, I wouldn't know (I hadn't noticed any shenanigans, then again, I just updated my librewolf and don't know if that brought it in).
I just checked my Librewolf settings for this and they were already disabled. Not sure why we had different experiences.
After sticking to Firefox since it first came out, I finally switched to Vivaldi. Not happy it's Chromium based but it's the next best option I could find.
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I had to do this in Librewolf too.
it's easier to change browser
This is the last I pressed the update button (I only allow notification, no automation). And will speed up the study of other browsers (like Brave, Orion). This sneaky delivery of unnecessary but questionable privacy nonsense, also pushing on you enabled, is revolting.
I've used Firefox for 15 years and I really don't want to use Chrome. Can Mozilla just, like, make a good browser?
Not defending mozilla adding AI to firefox, but...
If you've tried chrome recently, you'll know that it's jam packed full with even more stuff you don't want. And the article lays out how to easily disable all AI in firefox (which you cant do at all in Chrome)
If you've tried chrome recently, you'll know that it's jam packed full with even more stuff you don't want. And the article lays out how to easily disable all AI in firefox (which you cant do at all in Chrome)
I'm very pleased that disabling browser.ml.enable doesn't disable local translation. I don't need a dedicated UI for chat bots, but I find local translation very useful.
I think they make a pretty good browser. It is performant, supports blocking ads easily, standard compatible, customizable and recently even added support for vertical tabs. What are you missing?
I recently discovered that the sponsored sites on the homepage I had previously removed have reappeared. I've had similar issues with a few of the buttons on the browser chrome I had also removed. I'll still use it because I don't want to deal with the security and privacy nightmare that is ads. But it's a bit annoying to have to play this game of whack 'a mole.
It's poorly customizable, you can't even change keyboard shortcuts (extensions can't do it globally either). Vivaldi is customizable.
I was mainly thinking about userChrome.css changes, which allow you to more or less rebuild the whole UI with code. Can't think of many other browsers that let you do that.
Can you do vertical tabs in userChrome.css? Add tab groups/stacks/side-by-side views/workspaces/custom tab context menus?
(not to diminish the css, it's great for theming and correcting the many usability mistakes in browser defaults, and wish all the browsers used that)
(not to diminish the css, it's great for theming and correcting the many usability mistakes in browser defaults, and wish all the browsers used that)
Vertical tabs are a native feature of Firefox for a few months now, and before that they were supported with an extension. userChrome.css was (then) used for hiding the original tabs.
I'm not sure what you mean with the context menus, but Web Extensions can add things to context menus.
I'm not sure what you mean with the context menus, but Web Extensions can add things to context menus.
Personally (I’m not the person you asked) I’m missing AppleScript support. Firefox is the only major browser without it, and the bug report for it is old enough to drink in every country.
That lack of capability prevents it from being my daily driver, even if the rest were good enough (I’m not saying it isn’t, I’m saying I have no reason to find out).
I am certain I have inadvertently pushed many people away from Firefox for that reason alone, because when they ask for me to add Firefox support for my tools, I have to tell them it’s impossible.
I have tried to talk to Firefox developers about that a few times, at open-source conferences and such, but they think AppleScript is some power-user feature and fail (refuse?) to understand power users drive adoption and create tools that regular users rely on.
I remember whenever a Firefox story was submitted on HN, multiple people commented “I want to use Firefox but it’s missing <whatever>”. Then Mozilla started doing a lot of questionable stuff (all of which they eventually abandoned) outside their core competency and even pulling distasteful marketing stunts, and at some point people started commenting even that. I presume many got tired and gave up on Firefox entirely. I almost have. I now root for them only conceptually, because browser diversity is good.
I also noticed that no matter how politely someone pointed out on HN “Firefox doesn’t fit for me because of <whatever>”, they always got downvoted. If valid polite criticism is buried, no wonder things stay the way they are.
That lack of capability prevents it from being my daily driver, even if the rest were good enough (I’m not saying it isn’t, I’m saying I have no reason to find out).
I am certain I have inadvertently pushed many people away from Firefox for that reason alone, because when they ask for me to add Firefox support for my tools, I have to tell them it’s impossible.
I have tried to talk to Firefox developers about that a few times, at open-source conferences and such, but they think AppleScript is some power-user feature and fail (refuse?) to understand power users drive adoption and create tools that regular users rely on.
I remember whenever a Firefox story was submitted on HN, multiple people commented “I want to use Firefox but it’s missing <whatever>”. Then Mozilla started doing a lot of questionable stuff (all of which they eventually abandoned) outside their core competency and even pulling distasteful marketing stunts, and at some point people started commenting even that. I presume many got tired and gave up on Firefox entirely. I almost have. I now root for them only conceptually, because browser diversity is good.
I also noticed that no matter how politely someone pointed out on HN “Firefox doesn’t fit for me because of <whatever>”, they always got downvoted. If valid polite criticism is buried, no wonder things stay the way they are.
MacOS, Linux, FreeBSD and everything else squeeze into just 15% of Firefox's user base.
https://data.firefox.com/dashboard/hardware
They're really not going to be able to dedicate resources to something as bijou as AppleScript.
https://data.firefox.com/dashboard/hardware
They're really not going to be able to dedicate resources to something as bijou as AppleScript.
> They're really not going to be able to dedicate resources to something as bijou as AppleScript.
They don’t need to do it themselves, they could just not stifle the efforts of third-parties who do want to and have worked on it. Multiple people started on it over the years and were simply ignored by the devs.
They don’t need to do it themselves, they could just not stifle the efforts of third-parties who do want to and have worked on it. Multiple people started on it over the years and were simply ignored by the devs.
Probably because they don't want to take on that maintenance burden. Even just letting someone do that and merging it in is opening up a whooooole can of worms.
Then they should just say so and close the open issues, instead of letting them linger for literal decades and have people waste time on them then ignore them. That’s just bad stewardship.
Anyway, the reasons are irrelevant and I’m frankly tired of explaining this to Firefox defenders. Someone asked “what about Firefox are you missing” and I responded with what it’s missing for me. Plugging your ears and coming up with excuses doesn’t move the needle. Accept it or don’t, it makes no difference. In the meantime I’ll continue being honest with my users that I would like to support Firefox but I can’t, and many of them will keep switching browsers.
Anyway, the reasons are irrelevant and I’m frankly tired of explaining this to Firefox defenders. Someone asked “what about Firefox are you missing” and I responded with what it’s missing for me. Plugging your ears and coming up with excuses doesn’t move the needle. Accept it or don’t, it makes no difference. In the meantime I’ll continue being honest with my users that I would like to support Firefox but I can’t, and many of them will keep switching browsers.
The features that firefox does not support are few and far between, and, IME, usually things you do not necessarily want supported.
As a user, I do not want nor need my browser to support AppleScript. AppleScript is something that should not exist. In somewhat typical apple fashion, it's some NIH platform-specific bullshit that nobody really cares about and is only half-assed supported even on it's native platform. The only way to deter Apple from creating these sisyphus-ian pieces of software is to just stop supporting them and force their hand to use something less bespoke. Although, Apple is not the only culprit of this - nor are they even the worst about it.
If I had my way, Mantle would not exist, iMessage would not exist, and some others. We would live in a perfect utopia and then we'd all hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
As a user, I do not want nor need my browser to support AppleScript. AppleScript is something that should not exist. In somewhat typical apple fashion, it's some NIH platform-specific bullshit that nobody really cares about and is only half-assed supported even on it's native platform. The only way to deter Apple from creating these sisyphus-ian pieces of software is to just stop supporting them and force their hand to use something less bespoke. Although, Apple is not the only culprit of this - nor are they even the worst about it.
If I had my way, Mantle would not exist, iMessage would not exist, and some others. We would live in a perfect utopia and then we'd all hold hands and sing Kumbaya.
So first they didn’t do it because of the maintenance burden, and now it’s because the feature sucks and shouldn’t exist. If you’re going to keep ignoring my points and making up new things while moving the goalposts, I don’t see the point in having a discussion.
I’ll say it again:
> Plugging your ears and coming up with excuses doesn’t move the needle. Accept it or don’t, it makes no difference.
I’ll say it again:
> Plugging your ears and coming up with excuses doesn’t move the needle. Accept it or don’t, it makes no difference.
It's both, obviously. You asked for one reason, I gave it to you, you didn't like it, so I gave another reason. These are all speculative, of course, and just my opinion.
> If you’re going to keep ignoring my points and making up new things while moving the goalposts, I don’t see the point in having a discussion.
I'm not ignoring anything - it's called disagreeing with your points. Because I do disagree with them, to an extent.
I agree that Firefox is missing features. I DO NOT agree that this is generally, keyword generally, a bad thing.
Also, Firefox is not even the most behind browser. Uh, that would be Safari, and it's not even close.
If you don't support Firefox but you DO support Safari, then:
1. You must not give a flying fuck about web standards or features, as Safari is missing the most of both OR
2. You squarely target primarily Apple users so you have no choice but to put up with Apple's subpar software, i.e. you're Stockholm'd in
For option 2, the only way to stop that is to do what I said - stop playing Apple's games and don't target their bespoke barely-functional bullshit.
Also, let me just say: there is absolutely no shame in number 2. You have to make your money. Just a couple years ago, I was maintaining an application that still targeted IE 6. Yes, really. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do to reach the users where they are.
> If you’re going to keep ignoring my points and making up new things while moving the goalposts, I don’t see the point in having a discussion.
I'm not ignoring anything - it's called disagreeing with your points. Because I do disagree with them, to an extent.
I agree that Firefox is missing features. I DO NOT agree that this is generally, keyword generally, a bad thing.
Also, Firefox is not even the most behind browser. Uh, that would be Safari, and it's not even close.
If you don't support Firefox but you DO support Safari, then:
1. You must not give a flying fuck about web standards or features, as Safari is missing the most of both OR
2. You squarely target primarily Apple users so you have no choice but to put up with Apple's subpar software, i.e. you're Stockholm'd in
For option 2, the only way to stop that is to do what I said - stop playing Apple's games and don't target their bespoke barely-functional bullshit.
Also, let me just say: there is absolutely no shame in number 2. You have to make your money. Just a couple years ago, I was maintaining an application that still targeted IE 6. Yes, really. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do to reach the users where they are.
Everything about your answer is wrong and full of assumptions.
> You asked for one reason
No, I did not. I didn’t ask for any reason. I don’t need one, the result is the same.
> I gave it to you
No, you did not, you gave speculation. Which changes nothing.
> you didn't like it
I couldn’t care less about your speculation. I specifically said I don’t care. The only thing I don’t like is how you’re just making up reasons based on what you want and like, as if your tastes and needs are all that matters, instead of what’s the truth for Firefox development.
> I'm not ignoring anything
You moved the goal post without addressing my initial reply to your response, which poked a direct hole in your speculation:
> Then they should just say so and close the open issues, instead of letting them linger for literal decades and have people waste time on them then ignore them. That’s just bad stewardship.
You continue:
> it's called disagreeing with your points.
It makes no sense to disagree with a personal opinion! My reasons are my own. It’s like if you said you disagreed with me for saying I don’t like chocolate. Your opinion is irrelevant to someone else’s taste or needs.
And then the rest is just more speculation. Again, Firefox is the only major browser not supporting AppleScript. And just so you know, Chromium browsers typically support it better than Safari.
> You asked for one reason
No, I did not. I didn’t ask for any reason. I don’t need one, the result is the same.
> I gave it to you
No, you did not, you gave speculation. Which changes nothing.
> you didn't like it
I couldn’t care less about your speculation. I specifically said I don’t care. The only thing I don’t like is how you’re just making up reasons based on what you want and like, as if your tastes and needs are all that matters, instead of what’s the truth for Firefox development.
> I'm not ignoring anything
You moved the goal post without addressing my initial reply to your response, which poked a direct hole in your speculation:
> Then they should just say so and close the open issues, instead of letting them linger for literal decades and have people waste time on them then ignore them. That’s just bad stewardship.
You continue:
> it's called disagreeing with your points.
It makes no sense to disagree with a personal opinion! My reasons are my own. It’s like if you said you disagreed with me for saying I don’t like chocolate. Your opinion is irrelevant to someone else’s taste or needs.
And then the rest is just more speculation. Again, Firefox is the only major browser not supporting AppleScript. And just so you know, Chromium browsers typically support it better than Safari.
Given how much resources they've dedicated to lower %, this is not true
Interesting! The last time I used a Mac was many years ago, so I'm not sure what would you do with AppleScript in the browser. What are some example use cases?
Just so we’re on the same page, you use AppleScript outside the browser, but it interacts with the browser. Some basic use cases:
- Change to first browser tab whose URL or title matches <whatever>.
- Close every browser tab matching <whatever>.
- Grab all your tabs and backup their URLs to a file.
- Join all tabs from all windows into a single window.
- Execute JavaScript on a page and get results back.
- Grab the URL of the current tab and open it in a different browser in a Private window.
- And many more things.
- Change to first browser tab whose URL or title matches <whatever>.
- Close every browser tab matching <whatever>.
- Grab all your tabs and backup their URLs to a file.
- Join all tabs from all windows into a single window.
- Execute JavaScript on a page and get results back.
- Grab the URL of the current tab and open it in a different browser in a Private window.
- And many more things.
Those are browser automation tasks. Most of them can be done with Playwright/Puppeteer/Selenium.
I don't see why a browser should have to support AppleScript specifically. The Chrome DevTools Protocol and WebDriver BiDi are the standard protocols for interacting with browsers programmatically. Firefox supports WebDriver BiDi. Just use any tool that supports it, or talk to it directly. Maybe AppleScript can do that, I wouldn't know.
I don't see why a browser should have to support AppleScript specifically. The Chrome DevTools Protocol and WebDriver BiDi are the standard protocols for interacting with browsers programmatically. Firefox supports WebDriver BiDi. Just use any tool that supports it, or talk to it directly. Maybe AppleScript can do that, I wouldn't know.
No, those are not the same thing. The capabilities and integrations are different, and AppleScript works in a vanilla installation.
Got it. Last time I attempted to do this kind of things, I used TabFS (https://github.com/osnr/TabFS). I think you might like it!
That requires installing a third-party tool which doesn’t look to be under development, and is an entirely different interaction. Thank you, but that’s not adequate.
Just wait until someone has the bright idea to expose Apple Events over an MCP server or something. Then everyone will be scrambling to integrate applescript into their applications so they can cash in on the computer-use model craze.
I'm really surprised no one has done this.
You don't even need an mcp server. Claude Code can just run osascript. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44492369
You don't even need an mcp server. Claude Code can just run osascript. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44492369
Directly writing applescript is kind of terrible syntax (I doubt there is enough high quality data, even humans find it hard to write) and lacks the discoverability portion. The good part of AppleScript is the self-discovery (via scripting dictionary) and the general graphql-RPC-esque nature of apple events.
The ad blocker keeps it viable.
Longtime Firefox user here too. After the new privacy policy terms, I jumped to waterfox. I’m hoping it can last long enough for Ladybird to become stable enough to use as a daily driver. It’s very sad to watch Mozilla’s demise at the hands of advertisers.
Yes, because as we all know, Google would never shove AI or ads in your face.
I disagree with Mozilla here, too - but you can't cast Chrome as a magic spell. Chrome sucks ass. Google sucks ass. It's trivial to suck less ass than Google.
I disagree with Mozilla here, too - but you can't cast Chrome as a magic spell. Chrome sucks ass. Google sucks ass. It's trivial to suck less ass than Google.
Chrome does suck ass, hence why I use Firefox and said I don't want to use Chrome, lol. But I want Firefox to be a good browser in its own right, not just "not Chrome". Firefox is just about over the "acceptable" line for me, as a power user for 15+ years (and under that line for most normal users) so I continue to use it, but they're neglecting it in favor of these useless AI features.
Being good doesn't pay well these days. Being evil, on other hand, does.
Firefox focus
I use focus daily, but it’s not a daily driver.
It doesn’t to tabs, and links that the site forces to open in a new tab often don’t work. It also doesn’t do JS well by design.
I use Firefox focus for throw away links I come across, but for everything else I need a full browser
It doesn’t to tabs, and links that the site forces to open in a new tab often don’t work. It also doesn’t do JS well by design.
I use Firefox focus for throw away links I come across, but for everything else I need a full browser
You can’t open a new tab yourself, but you can open it by long-pressing a link.
If you’re running in a Custom Tab on Android, you need to switch to the full Focus if multiple tabs are involved.
If you’re running in a Custom Tab on Android, you need to switch to the full Focus if multiple tabs are involved.
Use Brave. It’s de-googled, privacy-centric chromium with built-in uBlock-style ad/tracker blocking. Best of both worlds!
There are some good reasons to consider not using Brave: https://www.spacebar.news/stop-using-brave-browser/
So much about Brave raises scammy red flags every time I look at it.
However, my main reason for ditching Chrome years ago was the fact that I think a browser engine monoculture is bad for the web as a whole, especially if that engine is primarily controlled by a single corporate entity.
Manifest v3 and other Google nonsense came later, and are extra reasons to stay away from Chrome, but I still feel strongly that a good alternative needs to use a different engine.
However, my main reason for ditching Chrome years ago was the fact that I think a browser engine monoculture is bad for the web as a whole, especially if that engine is primarily controlled by a single corporate entity.
Manifest v3 and other Google nonsense came later, and are extra reasons to stay away from Chrome, but I still feel strongly that a good alternative needs to use a different engine.
Yeah I'm not at all interested in Brave, that's a dumpster fire of it's own. And that still gives control to Google by owning the defacto implementation of browsing the internet. There needs to be an actual alternative to Chrome.
Brave, The browser that brags about how they ignore consent!
__loam(5)
It's time to fork Firefox
Step 1: Fork Firefox
Step 2: ??
Step 3: Profit
Sometimes HN commenters are so funny.
Step 2: ??
Step 3: Profit
Sometimes HN commenters are so funny.
[flagged]
> I'd rather see slower development if it was moving in the right direction.
What makes you think it'd happen if full-time employees at Firefox cant do it? We can poop on the leadership over at Mozilla, but there are FTEs getting paid to work on Firefox.
You cant just replace with few people running passion project on weekends, and even get the remote success Firefox has.
Browser is extremely complex. HN is underestimating how much work goes into making a browser.
What makes you think it'd happen if full-time employees at Firefox cant do it? We can poop on the leadership over at Mozilla, but there are FTEs getting paid to work on Firefox.
You cant just replace with few people running passion project on weekends, and even get the remote success Firefox has.
Browser is extremely complex. HN is underestimating how much work goes into making a browser.
> What makes you think it'd happen if full-time employees at Firefox cant do it?
The full-time engineers are given work to do by incompetent Mozilla management. It's the management that are driving Mozilla into the ground and setting baffling goals. Remove the management and have work based on features that users want, then you can see Firefox develop in the right direction.
As an example of how to organise this, you could have a bounty system for feature requests. Users define a feature they want to see and in negotiation with developers set acceptance criteria for when it's delivered. Users can then assign money as an incentive to complete the feature request. In this way, users can ensure they support developers to deliver the features they want to see.
> Browser is extremely complex. HN is underestimating how much work goes into making a browser.
Nobody is underestimating this. Firefox is already a mature product that can serve a wide range of user needs. What it lacks is effective leadership. I could live with slower development if the development it had was based around features that users most wanted. I don't need Firefox to support every web feature under the sun, the features it already supports is good enough for the vast majority of websites. Letting the users call the shots about it's future direction will help to guard against irrelevancy.
The full-time engineers are given work to do by incompetent Mozilla management. It's the management that are driving Mozilla into the ground and setting baffling goals. Remove the management and have work based on features that users want, then you can see Firefox develop in the right direction.
As an example of how to organise this, you could have a bounty system for feature requests. Users define a feature they want to see and in negotiation with developers set acceptance criteria for when it's delivered. Users can then assign money as an incentive to complete the feature request. In this way, users can ensure they support developers to deliver the features they want to see.
> Browser is extremely complex. HN is underestimating how much work goes into making a browser.
Nobody is underestimating this. Firefox is already a mature product that can serve a wide range of user needs. What it lacks is effective leadership. I could live with slower development if the development it had was based around features that users most wanted. I don't need Firefox to support every web feature under the sun, the features it already supports is good enough for the vast majority of websites. Letting the users call the shots about it's future direction will help to guard against irrelevancy.
> As an example of how to organise this, you could have a bounty system for feature requests. Users define a feature they want to see and in negotiation with developers set acceptance criteria for when it's delivered. Users can then assign money as an incentive to complete the feature request. In this way, users can ensure they support developers to deliver the features they want to see.
Could you actually provide any examples of large-scale software projects working this way, and not the usual way with coordination being done by special people or w/o any (e.g., by the devs)
Could you actually provide any examples of large-scale software projects working this way, and not the usual way with coordination being done by special people or w/o any (e.g., by the devs)
Large scale? No. However, it has been done before. For example, for open source Amiga development work...
https://power2people.org/projects/overview/
https://power2people.org/projects/overview/
So it hasn't been done before since scale is key here where toy solutions to coordination problems fail
There's nothing stopping the idea from scaling.
Really!? A good idea .. just scales? Is that how you view the world?
A good idea is nothing without good execution. And execution requires patience, coordination, a good amount of luck .. and so much ideas.
It is like what they say - Ideas are infinite. Nobody cares about them.
A good idea is nothing without good execution. And execution requires patience, coordination, a good amount of luck .. and so much ideas.
It is like what they say - Ideas are infinite. Nobody cares about them.
Explain what problems are encountered with 1000 feature requests linked to bounties that aren't encountered with 10 feature requests linked to bounties.