
Firefox 79 - caution
https://hacks.mozilla.org/2020/07/firefox-79/
======
shantara
Android version comes with a completely new design, and empty "What's new"
section in Google Play gave no indication it's going be such a major change.

Even more importantly, it has overridden data collection preferences after the
update. Check "Settings > Data collection". I had to disable "Marketing data"
and "Experiments" toggles. Not cool!

~~~
coldpie
I suspect that approximately no one reads that "What's new" section, and they
know it. Even Google just leaves it with whatever happened to be in the field
in summer of 2018 when they stopped updating it.

~~~
phreack
It's infuriating! Netflix even goes as far as condescendingly saying "don't
you worry about this kind of stuff, you worry about what to watch next". It's
ridiculous, if you're gonna require patch notes they must either be part of
the app review, or be optional from the start!

~~~
rurp
I strongly agree, especially since I hate 95% of the changes they make.
Netflix has the most user hostile design of any media app that I use. I'm
still a subscriber for now, but it will be the first one I cut.

~~~
FridgeSeal
> Netflix has the most user hostile design of any media app that I use

Personally I give that award to Spotify.

~~~
aksss
Yeah, Spotify feels like a really cluttered small shed in the backyard; like I
have to step over all sorts of crap to get what I’m after, and every day the
stuff is cluttered up in a slightly different way and somebody randomly hangs
a big Michelle Obama poster or some other crap from the ceiling once in a
while. Very annoying. Desktop app is mildly more tolerable than mobile.

------
jpdus
For me, Fenix on Android is the worst update ever. I use Firefox as my main
browser on Android since almost 10 years and my whole mobile workflow depends
on the awesome Tab Queue-feature (new tabs from other Apps like
Twitter/Slack/Mails are opened in the background).

With Fenix, Mozilla decided to just abandon that feature. Issues are closed,
it got removed from the feature list [1] and further questions are ignored. I
fully understand that you can't keep every feature everywhere, but this was
THE main benefit of Firefox (besides ublock) for me and if you look at
GitHub/Reddit/Twitter I am not the only one.

Now I have to stick to an outdated browser because of an (for me) completely
unnecessary, degrading update :/.

[1] [https://github.com/mozilla-
mobile/fenix/issues/470](https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/470)

~~~
iggldiggl
More missing features:

\- Recently closed tabs (AFAIK "Undo close tab" currently fakes it by not
actually closing the tab until the "Undo close tab" popup has disappeared)

\- The Firefox share target that actually gave you a choice whether you'd like
to open the page in Firefox directly, merely bookmark it or use Sync to send
it to some other Firefox instance without having to actually open the page in
Firefox first

\- Add-on support that isn't limited to a few blessed "Recommended extensions"

\- viewing local HTML files is not possible (although admittedly Google hasn't
helped there, either, by vastly complicating file system access in recent
Android versions, and their purported replacement method is absolutely
unsuitable for HTML files that depend on additional resources such as images,
styles, scripts, other HTML files etc., but in the end it was still Mozilla's
decision to disallow it completely right now)

\- about:config

\- View source

\- bfcache is broken

\- cannot force-refresh a page

\- the tab import from the previous versions drops all the session history of
those tabs, i.e. it only imports the currently viewed page, but you can no
longer go back or forward

------
agurk
For Wayland users DMA-BUF video textures are now used when the Video
Acceleration API (VA-API) is enabled.

I personally saw a number of regressions[0] on Debian testing for video
playback on the beta releases for 79, but it largely seems to have settled
down now.

[0] particularly this one:
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1643855](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1643855)

(Copied from my comment on the submission for the official release notes)

------
sp332
Firefox releases come out every 6 weeks. It helps to put something in the
title that explains what's interesting about this one.

~~~
ProAm
Hopefully they changed the address bar back to be non-Chromeified.

~~~
boogies
Haven't used it in a while, but when I did it was always easy to switch the
behavior (for a power user, and I think the omnibar is much more appealing to
non power users as it's visually simpler, big, and easier to click — unifying
the search and address bar _is_ what you're talking about, right?).

~~~
ProAm
Its not easy to switch back anymore and breaks a lot of functionality if you
do. But its crazy that you have to accept serious UI/UX changes to get
security fixes too.

~~~
boogies
What functionality does it break?

> But its crazy that you have to accept serious UI/UX changes to get security
> fixes too.

It is sad, but it basically seems par for the course for big, semi-commercial
software. I don't like Mozilla, but I appreciate them making an alternative to
the massive Chrome near-monopoly that's not only just as fast and lighter but
competitively easy to use for normal people. I personally switched to Waterfox
years ago, and Pale Moon not long after that. It receives some security fixes
slightly after FF (they're fixed after Mozilla publishes the issue), but some
of them are not applicable
([http://www.palemoon.org/releasenotes.shtml](http://www.palemoon.org/releasenotes.shtml))
. Overall, to me then Pentadactyl is worth worse than that, and I think you
might love the UI.

~~~
ProAm
> It is sad, but it basically seems par for the course for big, semi-
> commercial software

I totally get why they do it too, Im a big Mozilla fan and have been for a
long time. Im glad there is browser competition, I love their take on Add-ons
and allowing the user to make decisions for themselves. They are fighting the
good fight, Im just expressing my opinions on things I don't like, but Im
still going to use FF. I did stop upgrading with version 76 because it was
just too much change and disruptive enough for me to downgrade and turn off
the installer.

Ive never seen Pentadactyl, Ill check it out.

------
nine_k
Highlights:

\- Return of shared memory between parts of the same page (including web
workers). Parallel processing becomes more efficient, good for complex apps
and games.

\- Time-traveling debugger of sorts: search for "restart frame".

~~~
inetknght
See also
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23910775](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23910775)

~~~
lilyball
Or not, because that's just FUD.

`dom.workers.serialized-sab-access` is the flag they've put in so that way
they can disable concurrent execution of JS threads that share memory in case
a novel cross-process attack shows up. Spectre is purely an in-process attack
and the whole article that comment is attached to is about the work they did
to enable shared memory while defending against Spectre.
`dom.workers.serialized-sab-access` does not affect Spectre. It appears to be
intended for preventing a novel cross-process attack from leveraging shared
memory in other processes into becoming a high-resolution timer.

Also note that threads that have access to shared memory in Firefox 79 also
have access to the full high-resolution performance.now(), and flipping
dom.workers.serialized-sab-access doesn't affect that.

------
marcopolo
"The reference-types proposal is now supported. It provides a new type,
externref, which can hold any JavaScript value, for example strings, DOM
references, or objects."

This is exciting! It opens up faster possibilities for wasm apps

------
saagarjha
I wonder if we could try something new and have all discussion related to
Mozilla or Firefox as a whole, including comparisons to other browsers,
privacy, and how much battery it uses on macOS in just one thread so people
can collapse it.

~~~
AnonHP
Post an “Ask HN” on this, perhaps, and request those who know more or have
direct experiences across versions and browsers to weigh in?

~~~
saagarjha
No need, it comes up every time anyways. Just looking to find a more
productive outlet for that discussion.

------
freediver
Every few versions I would check Firefox on macOS just to see if they make any
progress with battery drain.

And... Firefox 79 with one active tab is taking 6x more energy than Safari
with 20+ tabs.

[https://imgur.com/a/LyhnbKZ](https://imgur.com/a/LyhnbKZ)

Maybe it is better on other OSes, but on macOS nothing beats Webkit in terms
of performance.

Not to mention the home page bloat - Firefox is starting to look like cnn of
browsers.

~~~
sleepless
home page bloat? person woman man camera tv?

Care to share more details?

~~~
freediver
I mean this:

[https://imgur.com/a/aYutjsO](https://imgur.com/a/aYutjsO)

Having to see mentions of Nazi camps on my home page or seeing a notification
for Facebook containers although I don't use Facebook. All that bloat being
enabled by default is troublesome and goes against very principles Mozilla
advocates.

~~~
roca
It is two clicks to remove that entire "Highlights" section.

~~~
freediver
I think you missed the point of “behavior enabled by design”. Of course I can
remove it, as can someone who just stepped into a pile of poo clean their
shoes. We’d just prefer that the pile of poo didn’t exist by default.

~~~
roca
No "principle Mozilla advocates" says that the start page should default to
blank.

~~~
bzb3
It should not default to ads, at least.

~~~
roca
Very little of the content on the default start page is ever paid advertising.
AFAIK it's a few of the Highlights, sometimes.

~~~
bzb3
So they look like ads, which erode trust from users, and they don't even get
paid for them. That just makes it more stupid.

~~~
roca
They're mostly thumbnails of Web sites people have recently visited or visited
frequently, i.e. they look familiar. I don't think they look like ads to most
people, and I certainly wouldn't conclude they do without actual data.

------
shultays
Thumbnails are buggy. Auto complete doesnt work in some cases. No tab
reordering, open in new tab order is weird. Home page is worse. No addons...
lots of other small annoyances.

And worst of it, no about config. I dont like the direction mozilla is taking.
Do they have any reasoning for no abour config.

This is quite a downgrade, I think I am switching to another browser on
mobile.

------
matsemann
Completely rewamped Android.

Feels very snappy. Upgrade was a breeze. Only one addon that didn't work, hope
full addon support is back soon.

~~~
tallanvor
All of the add-ons I use are now unsupported. It's extremely frustrating and
unwelcome for them to break things like this.

~~~
0x49d1
Eh.. They had to: probably they will add more robust support of extensions in
the future, but for now they had to re-implement some basic browser functions
+ add something new to attract new customers (like "Collections").

------
recursive
For me, "Restart stack frame" is probably the biggest impact I've seen in a
while.

------
adrian17
Same question as the last time [0]: I see the benefit of wasm extensions and I
see how to enable them in "manual" compilation (for rustc, -C target-
feature=+bulk-memory), but I didn't yet find a documented way of using them in
wider used setups like wasm-pack. I'd love to try recompiling a full project
with these features, but I just can't find out how to do it.

The release notes say "The wasm-bindgen documentation includes guidance for
taking advantage of externref from Rust", but I didn't yet find anything about
it there either.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23690406](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23690406)

------
jknz
I would hope the key presses required to use the native search among opened
tabs had changed.

\- Ctrl-L to go to the address bar

\- release Ctrl (otherwise, the next keypress fail)

\- Shift-6 to type "%" in the address bar

\- space

\- [your query and hit tab/enter to navigate results]

The last bullet is a close to ideal, native search among open tabs and make it
so smooth to find an opened tab among dozens. But the key presses necessary to
get there? Who can use that without weekly hospital stays for finger RSIs?

I love firefox. If someone, somewhere reads this, please please please think
of simpler key presses to use this nice, already built functionality.

(I know non-native extensions provide similar feature. But native would be so
cool and stable, especially that it's already built).

~~~
sbierwagen
What keyboard layout are you on that puts % on 6?

~~~
jknz
That was Shift+5, not 6. Thanks for pointing that out :)

------
ComodoHacker
In 78 they've added a persistent Google search as a top line in URL bar drop-
down list. I couldn't find it documented anywhere neither in release notes nor
in help topics.

Does anyone by chance knows how to remove it?

~~~
infogulch
about:preferences#search

aka Menu > Options | Search | Search Suggestions > Provide Search Suggestions

~~~
ComodoHacker
No, it's not suggestions. Suggestions are disabled.

------
hackcasual
A lot of good WebAssembly stuff in there. WASM threads, bulk memory ops are
big performance wins, and reference types huge for DOM interoperation.

------
tumblewit
Firefox 80 is scheduled to come with vaapi for X11 which will be a major
release for those with distro like PopOS or those that use i3wm

------
lytefm
This update has, for the first time in over 10 years, rendered Firefox pretty
much unusable for me on Ubuntu: Both the URL and the search bar are completely
broken - neither autocomplete nor searching via google/DDG works. The only way
to open a URL is to type it in full. Not cool. I guess I should move to ESR.

------
The_rationalist
does "better source map for SCSS" means that devtools will show scss variables
? big if true

------
formerly_proven
Doesn't contain a fix for the tearing on Windows 10 with Hardware Graphics
Scheduling.

------
sam_goody
It's a small thing, but I have found the usage of the logical and/or/null to
be much cleaner.

a ??= 3;

(It would be even nicer if it could mean the same thing in PHP.)

------
50
Sweet! This update fixes the issue where you weren't able to play videos on
Firefox 78 with the MacOS Big Sur Beta.

------
lrnStats
Anyone using something other than Firefox or chrome?

~~~
bradgessler
Safari. Works great.

~~~
lrnStats
Meh, that requires trusting Apple. No thanks.

------
potiuper
The summary section could use work.

------
johnisgood
> Firefox 79.0 released with master password renamed to primary password

Jeez...

------
robotmay
Have they reverted the godawful address bar change yet?

------
grezql
Firefox, current, is really slow on video rendering. Youtube on 1080p kinda
freezes at times. Same video works perfectly in Chrome

Im on Win10, this happenened on win8.1 aswell.

~~~
boogies
Are you sure it's not just YouTube? Alphabet's arbitrarily changed YT's
behaviour based on the browser's UA string in the past, and used deprecated
APIs only implemented in Chrome.

~~~
konart
Youtube was updated to the v1 quite some time ago with a fresh Polymer version

>Polymer.version

3.4.1

------
The_rationalist
meanwhile chromium has async stack traces since 2017
[https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/05/devtools-r...](https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2017/05/devtools-
release-notes)

~~~
hu3
TIL. Thanks for sharing.

I also didn't know Chrome could emulate different levels of slow network.

------
marcrosoft
I’ve tried Firefox about once a year for the past five years and always
immediately go back to chromium. Scrolling is always broken out of the box on
all platforms I’ve tried (Linux and macOS).

Edit: trying again, the macOS track pad seems ok but scroll wheel behavior is
different. Firefox requires 2-3 times the scrolling distance and transitions
slowly to the final scroll destination. Chrome does not.

Edit 2: I’m almost positive it’s smooth scrolling. Some people hate it and
some like it. This reddit thread sums up:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/5zoa1t/do_you_use_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/5zoa1t/do_you_use_smooth_scrolling/)

~~~
confounded
Never encountered this, same platforms. What do you mean by broken?

~~~
marcrosoft
If I were to guess I think it has something to do with “smooth scrolling”. The
behavior is scroll the mouse wheel three clicks/times to move the page.

Expected behavior is move the wheel at all and the page moves.

Also on a track pad the page should move in sync with your fingers. It doesn’t
in Firefox.

~~~
acdha
That’s what happens on a clean install on Windows or MacOS. You might want to
reset any custom settings and remove any extensions to see if it still
reproduced.

