
Mozilla in 2013 - robin_reala
https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2013/12/16/mozilla-in-2013/
======
purephase
I'm really surprised by the naysayers in this thread. Mozilla is a not-for-
profit. The largest and most influential when it comes to action on the web
given their footprint directly in-front of the users.

You're complaining about lack of some edge-css features, silly bugs that have
been open for a long time, and the fact that they may be chasing down some
avenues that yield little fruit.

But, the web I envision without them is one that I do not want any part of.
While I switched and used Chrome (for the tools), lately, the only browser
vendor that I trust is Mozilla. I switched back to FF, donated, and decided to
start dipping into their code/docs to see if I can help out.

While certainly not perfect, they are the company that we should be
supporting. Not necessarily financially, but by being advocates, code/doc
junkies and designers.

Here's to Mozilla and here's to 2014. Congrats!

~~~
nsns
Agreed. Mozilla, Wikipedia and the Internet Archive keep alive the Web as it
used to be, before getting commodified.

------
doe88
Reading this post I wanted to buy a tee-shirt or two because I like Firefox
and wanted to help them a bit (and help them alleviate their dependancy on
Google's $$) but I was unable to find a page with Mozilla products... It's a
shame because I think people would love to contribute by buying a goodie or
something. I know I still can donate money but maybe I'm a bit selfish but I
find it not to be as fun as getting something in return.

~~~
Ygg2
I wanted to give 3$ to Firefox but their form for submitting credit cards is
weird and it needs my address for some reason?! Anyway the address was wrong
and I can't be really bothered to try all the addresses I used in previous 4
years.

If GoG doesn't need my address why would Mozilla? And further more why should
it complain about wrong address.

~~~
vertex-four
GoG doesn't, and a couple of other high-profile sites don't (Amazon for
example), but the vast, vast majority of card payment forms on the Internet
require a full address as for fraud prevention. Do you not often buy things on
the Internet?

~~~
Ygg2
I do buy things often using GoG, or Amazon, or Kickstarter or PayPal. I've
never had to enter my address before.

Hell, smaller companies asked for address but never checked it against my CC
info (which is outdated anyway). I never had to enter the correct address for
one of them.

I want to donate, but this form just bounces me I've so far tried at least 10
different combinations. I have no idea what bank entered as its information.

~~~
vertex-four
PayPal definitely asks for a full address when you sign up or pay by card
directly. And I don't know about Kickstarter, but I just checked Indiegogo
which I regularly use, and they require a full address for billing.

My understanding of the system is that usually the address can be wrong so
long as your card/connection/purchase/etc doesn't look suspicious, but
different payment processors have different fraud profiles, so some might pay
more attention to the address than others.

~~~
Ygg2
Well used PayPal as payment option. Seems to be the easiest.

------
untog
I went to the Mozilla Festival in London this year and was amazed at just how
much does Mozilla does. They're very far from just a browser manufacturer.

------
_random_
Keep up the good work with asm.js! It would be nice to see more apps developed
in C++ for web in 2014.

------
mapgrep
>In 2013 we launched Firefox OS , the first open Web devices based entirely in
Web technologies

This early sentence really derailed me. There is so much going on:

-What is an "open web device", what qualifies? Maybe put a link here?

-Why is Firefox OS called an OS if it is actually devices?

-Is being based IN web technologies the same as being based ON web technologies?

-And there is a weird implication here that there have been open web devices NOT based on web technologies but now we have open web devices that actually ARE based on web technologies. That can't be right, can it?

From what I can tell the sentence should read something like, "In 2013 we
launched Firefox OS, the first [mobile?] operating system based entirely on
Web technologies."

~~~
jaredsohn
My interpretation:

"Web device" implies a device that allows browsing the web (such as a
smartphone or tablet). "open" implies that it is open source to some extent
(similar to Android).

"based entirely on web technologies" differentiates it from Android in that
all apps are web apps and use standardized web APIs to access the hardware
rather than having native apps that use proprietary APIs.

It does seem weird that the sentence use the term "OS" to describe devices,
though.

------
mrschwabe
I would really love to see Mozilla team up (and/or buy) DuckDuckGo. Not only
for a better search experience, but it would just be great to see Mozilla
sever its ties with Google - a company who seems blatantly at odds with the
very principals of trust, privacy, and transparency that Mozilla is boasting
here.

~~~
mfwoods
According to Wikipedia[1] over 80-90% (or $163 million in 2011) of Mozilla's
funding comes from Google. I'd love to see Mozilla be more independent from
Google, but I don't think they're going anywhere without them anytime soon.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Google](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Corporation#Google)

------
lovskogen
I thought about and had to work with Mozilla today. "Seven years have passed
without this bug being fixed."
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259)

~~~
Aldo_MX
You can always submit a patch, remember that the source is Open, and everyone
is welcome to contribute.

My cringe with Firefox are misfeatures like window.onbeforeunload. They
deliberately break the expected behavior due to an unreasonable decision, but
no browser is perfect.

~~~
Skalman
That patch would not be welcome. The patch to make the behavior intuitive is
literally to remove "!important" from one CSS file. They're not changing
because they're afraid to break the web.

~~~
mburns
> They're afraid to break the web.

They tried a fix and it broke YouTube. So it seems like a reasonable fear.
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c54](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c54)

> The patch ... is literally to remove "!important" from one CSS file

It isn't a simple one line fix, as Firefox developer kindly explained.
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c76](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c76)

>That patch would not be welcome.

They describe what work would be required (and where the changes would likely
be) for the patch to be accepted in the bug.
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c80](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=349259#c80)

~~~
Skalman
It's a one-line fix to make it intuitive, but that's not what's needed here.
Ultimately there should be some spec so that browser vendors can converge
towards a single behavior.

------
jdsgfsdf
[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/perspective.png](http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/perspective.png)

------
thisiswrong
Wishes for Mozilla in 2014:

-Accept cryptocurrency donations; -Break free from Google/surveilance as default search; -DDGo as default search; -Firefox OS becomes as adopted as iOS and Android; -Firefox browser regain market share back from Chrome/surveillance.

------
buovjaga
Mozilla also recently helped Eloquent JavaScript 2nd edition reach its funding
goal:
[https://eloquentjavascript.net/2nd_edition/donors.html](https://eloquentjavascript.net/2nd_edition/donors.html)

------
okonomiyaki3000
No mention of Fira? This is a great font! Thanks Mozilla!
[https://github.com/mozilla/Fira](https://github.com/mozilla/Fira)

------
cloudgeekruhil
I am happy ..But I want you people better than chrome in all terms.You are
guys doing well but you need to do hardwork..

------
lcnmrn
In the mean time, everyone just want a better browser.

~~~
owenmarshall
Really? The last time I've thought to myself "gee, my browser is missing a
feature I'd _really like_ " or "all my browser needs to get better is (some
improvement)" was... 2008? 2009? I'm not sure, I just know it's been a while.

And it doesn't really matter what browser I was using at the time. Chrome,
Firefox, even Safari.

What do you want to make your browser better?

~~~
chrismonsanto
css grid support, flex-wrap support

~~~
robin_reala
flex-wrap is in Nightly, CSS Grids don’t have a stable spec yet.

~~~
chrismonsanto
That's awesome about flex-wrap! I have been waiting a long time.

> stable spec

I'd really like to see more vendor prefixes for support. I mean, basic flexbox
support was rolled out quickly, and the spec changed like three times. Mozilla
has a new 'avoid vendor prefixes' thing, which I think is the wrong approach.
I'd rather just use a tool like autoprefixer to generate all of the browser-
incompatible CSS until we can all agree.

I can't believe I am praising IE for being forward thinking! (they have full
CSS grid support, per the draft)

~~~
robin_reala
I believe MS came up with the grid spec, or at least the original draft
editors were three MS employees and glazou: [http://www.w3.org/TR/2011/WD-
css3-grid-layout-20110407/](http://www.w3.org/TR/2011/WD-css3-grid-
layout-20110407/) . This was published five days before the first platform
preview of IE10.

It does seem like a neat spec though, I’d welcome inclusion as another tool in
the box.

~~~
apaprocki
We (Bloomberg) hired Igalia to help put some resources on implementing CSS
Grid. The original MS authors didn't like the initial spec so they've been
working on an improved spec w/ others (Google, Igalia) and Igalia is landing
code for it in both WebKit and Blink. So it is definitely moving forward..

------
koip49
This really resonates with me: "Mozilla is dedicated to offering users privacy
and transparency and we are honored to be an organization that users trust."

Thank god for Mozilla, they are one of the few tech companies I still trust in
these troubled times.

I like to think if the NSA asked for direct access to their servers (such as
Google were revealed to have granted), Mozilla would have no shortage of
whistle-blowers.

~~~
Symmetry
I thought the way the NSA got direct access to Google's servers was by running
taps into Google fiber optics?

~~~
koip49
That's what Google tried to claim once Snowden forced their hand, but the
leaked PRISM documents contradict their official stance. I know which I choose
to believe.

~~~
myko
> but the leaked PRISM documents contradict their official stance.

Mind posting a source confirming this? It's just that I don't believe you is
all.

~~~
koip49
[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/us-tech-
giants-...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/us-tech-giants-nsa-
data)

There are a lot of Google employees on HN who try to suppress information
whenever anyone posts sources. Pretty pitiful.

"Although the presentation claims the program is run with the assistance of
the companies, all those who responded to a Guardian request for comment on
Thursday denied knowledge of any such program."

The PR response from Google is irrelevant, just attempting a cover up.

~~~
mburns
So you come to a conclusion and then ignore any contradictory evidence,
because it all must be part of the conspiracy.

Seems level-headed and reasonable.

------
ffrryuu
Implement CSS grid already

