A lot of the anger in this case is because Mozilla is once again removing useful functionality from Firefox for very nebulous reasons.
Even if such functionality can be restored by using about:config, or by installing extensions, it becomes a hassle.
They did this with the menu bar, and it hurt Firefox's usability. Now many of us have to waste time and effort reconfiguring it to make the menu bar reappear every time I install Firefox.
They did this with the status bar, and it hurt Firefox's usability. Now many of us have to waste time installing extensions to restore this core functionality.
This case may be even worse, because it's not a one-time fix. Now we'll have to go digging through about:config options each time we want to disable JavaScript, or wait until Firefox 24 so we can disable JavaScript through the developer tools.
Many of us are just plain getting fed up with Mozilla's bad decisions, and very justifiably so.
- disabling javascript via about:config is no harder than through the settings if you know about it
- How does removing the status bar hurt usability? You still see links when you hover over them, and the add-on bar can be toggled instantly with Ctrl+/
- Always displaying the menu bar by default is a waste of space, it can still easily be accessed with Alt or configured to always display.
Honestly you seem to just dislike change, and I'd advise you to simply turn off automatic updates. The rest of us are happy for improvements to be made.
I'm all for change that improves usability, efficiency, and performance, for instance. I'm not for changes that obviously inhibit such things, like the changes that Mozilla has made recently.
about:config is not as convenient to use as a checkbox in the preferences dialog. If what you're suggesting were actually true, then there'd be no need for a preferences dialog at all, and all users would configure Firefox using about:config. But we both know that isn't true. It is not convenient to remember the name of a specific about:config option, especially when the names change periodically. Even filtering by part of the option name isn't convenient, as that requires remembering Mozilla's terminology, and using a general term like "javascript" still leaves many options to sift through manually.
As for the status bar, the URL popup shown when hovering over links is much less usable than the status bar. It is harder to quickly focus on, for instance. Having to remember yet another obscure keyboard shortcut for functionality that should be enable by default, like the addon bar, does not promote usability, as well.
The menu bar is not a "waste of space" because it more than pays back its cost by making a huge amount of commonly-used functionality very easily accessible. It is especially valuable because of the cross-application conventions it embodies, making it take even less effort to perform common tasks.
We shouldn't have to manually enable core functionality like menus or the status bar, for example. Such functionality should already be enabled by default when Firefox is first installed. Anyone who doesn't like the menu bar or the status bar should have the option to disable them, of course. But they should not have been disabled by default, or even removed completely.
Wow, how times change. The smart advice was to never use Javascript. (Years ago pg even wrote, "I would not even use Javascript, if I were you. Most of the Javascript I see on the Web isn't necessary, and much of it breaks." ) Javascript has gone from horribly flaky -> occasionally useful -> necessary -> mandatory.
That's because more people are actually taking the time to understand the browser, dom, markup and language itself, instead of copy/pasting some poorly written image-swapping script. (God I've seen too many of those)... JS has been capable of doing some fairly impressive app-like functionality since the late 90's. I'd say NN4/IE4 was the beginning of that ability, despite dramatically different approaches.
Today, browsers have far more in common (regarding js/dom) with each other (IE8+ too) than at any point pre-2005. And it is about damned time. I still think the likes of jQuery round out a ton of those rough edges, and it still disappoints me to see so many who hate JS because they want it to be (insert preferred language here).
JS is, and has been my favorite language for a very long time.
disabling javascript is the most effective method against XSS, so it's really bad choice to not be able to do it simply.
not that firefox would be that security-minded in other areas regarding to javascript (XSS + form autofill without SecureLogin addon = fun & profit for hackers)
I hope you realize that the users of Gnome and other X11 desktops have already passed a serious level of technical literacy. In the event they haven't, it's because they're the direct family member of some techie.
If Firefox's developers are worried about people not understanding why a page doesn't work, another potential solution would be to provide users with some feedback. For instance, if Javascript is disabled but present in a page, perhaps show a (simplified?) small debugger box showing the next lines of Javascript which would have been executed and some sort of an obvious Run / Play button to start the script.
I'd prefer if browsers treated the Web as less of a black box, and if they erred more toward helping users understand the world they are exploring.
This is a great idea, but should probably be simpler for the average user. Eg "You have JS off, which will break some websites. Click here to turn it on. The simple option you used in the past to toggle this has gone. Click here to find out how to toggle it now"
As a Firefox user, I feel like most of the people complaining are Chrome users just looking to pick a fight.
Hey, Chrome folks, Firefox has this great thing called NoScript. I realize Chrome doesn't have that, so you have to manually disable/enable JavaScript. We just use NoScript, as we have for years, which does a lot more. Firefox users don't rely on the "Disable JavaScript" option, nor ever did.
This is a nonissue, but continue to make it more than it is.
I'm surprised that checkbox hung around as long as it did. I imagine only maybe .001% of browser users actually really cared enough to turn that off, and if they did, they were probably already running something like NoScript since toggling it in the preferences all the time is way too blunt an instrument anyway.
I can't stand engineers who assume that they know better than those who use their products. Not just hiding the ability to easily disable javascript, but RE-ENABLING IT AGAIST THE USERS EXPRESSED DESIRE via an update - seriously, your head is so far up your ass you'd have to shit twice just to see daylight.
This is a heavy-handed solution that could be better solved simply by adding more explanatory tooltips. Something like:
[x] Disable Javascript. This will break or significantly reduce the functionality of many websites, but will also prevent them from gathering marketing and other data on you. [Details](http://www.mozilla.org/javascript)
Make the primary tradeoffs clear, supply a link to a mozilla.org site with a more comprehensive explanation of what you give up and gain.
Programmers like to simplify, abstract, and modularize, but that isn't always the best strategy with language. Sometimes, even with control panel tooltips, it's better to be a little bit more verbose, take up a little more screen real estate, if it saves your users some trial-and-error time or a trip to Google.
I commented on this elsewhere, but to all the people who assume that developers can just build websites and assume that JS is enabled, please Google "Section 508".
FWIW, I don't think we should avoid educating users. Pandering to the dumbest common denominator only makes dumb things in the long run.
Well JS can be disabled with the help of plugins however I find it ominous that you have to be an expert user/programmer to disabled javascript.
There are a lot of websites out there that use javascript for less than reputable purposes so not being able to disable it when you know you might run into them is insecure.
Like say using tor where having JS enabled is like asking to be tracked.
I know disabling JS is not an option on the modern web but then ship with something like noscript instead don't just leave users exposed.
This is not a feature that can just be removed it needs to be replaced instead.
At this point, I'm fine with disabling options if the program is sufficiently scriptable / programmable to allow someone to write a plugin to duplicate the "turn off" behavior. For browsers, we seem to be in a plugin replaces options universe. If a browser plugin cannot duplicate the behavior, then the browser needs to be changed to allow it or the option needs to stay.
Due to the names Java and JavaScript being so similar, users get confused when their technically-minded friend recommends that they disable Java in their browser. Somewhat like ham and hamster, with no prior knowledge the user has no idea that the technologies are entirely different.
I've personally had to help a number of people out who have mistakenly disabled JavaScript. That was the impression I got.
<proselytizing>
Software needs to empower the user. Writing arbitrary limitations in to code to make certain functionality harder to achieve is a seriously repulsive attitude for developers to have.
The current trend in removing features from software seems like a great way to have a dire shortage of engineers in 50 years time. The attitude that "software is a magic and untouchable black box, you can only use it to do the specific thing the developer wants you to" destroys the true power of the computer as a tool, it might as well be a radio or a TV that incessantly produces other peoples ideas.
Write useful, empowering and well tested modular code. Let the user work out what crazy and wonderful ways they arrange those modules. Don't make changes that serve only to glob more functionality up in to impenetrable, monolithic black boxes.
</proselytizing>
Also: Overriding peoples existing preferences during upgrade? Nice work guys :/
Have you ever actually met any normal users? They have work they need to do, and the software is just a means to an end.
They don't want to be 'empowered' by developers, and they definitely don't want to have to deal with arranging a bunch of poorly documented modules that make no sense if you are not familiar with the underlying architecture.
Then have another checkbox, something like "enable advanced settings (warning: if you don't know anything about cars, would you really mess with your car's breaks?)", that toggles the availability of these kinds of settings. Everybody wins.
Your proselytizing reminds me of Alan Kay's idea (at least partly instantiated in Smalltalk) that there should be no fundamental difference between using a computer and programming. This is an interesting idea, but it's incredibly radical - I'm not sure even Kay realises how radical it is. As other people have said, a lot of people want to use a computer simply as a tool, to get on and do their work; that's because they have some definite "work" to do, and that work doesn't include exploring their computing system. Moving to Kay's vision would require abolishing this division of labour, right up to the fundamental division of labour between conception and execution, between means and ends. That is, to realise Kay's ideas of computer use we would have to establish a system with no distinction between work and creative activity: we would have to establish full communism.
Because people now realise that adding features is not necessarily a good thing. It adds complexity to both development and using the product. If there isn't a very good reason for it to be there, then it shouldn't be.
Evidently the firefox developers do not think there is a very good reason for disabling javascript to be in the general options, so they removed it.
I think a fair question to ask is, "If you do not understand the internet, should it be easy to disable javascript in your browser?"
As a person who uses noscript every day in FF, at first I thought this was a bad idea, but the more I think about the support aspect of this, the only time I think you really should turn off JS is when you understand enough to find the advanced options.
I hate javascript with a fiery passion. But I'm sensitive to (possibly real) arguments that people are accidentally disabling it because they start clicking random stuff in the 'content' tab of preferences. So move it to 'advanced' and call it a day.
It makes sense to me. You can't even do Internet banking these days without needing Javascript enabled and to disable it you'll always have the plethora of addons that allow you to disable Javascript anyway. I think this is a welcome removal from Firefox, it's 2013 not 1925, Javascript is everywhere.
Looks like the reason behind the move is that preferences UI has become incomprehensible ... which actually doesn't have anything to do with javascript.
Perhaps a move towards Eclipse-like preferences would be a wiser choice?
Oh, and I didn't post this to bash the sincere concern about discoverable options. They could disable JS, and they still can, using an extension or going through a menu which clearly states that those configurations may break the 99% of the web.
Every change is prone to break someone's workflow. But if there is a good enough alternative and if the change is better for everyone, I think that should be left alone. If there was no way to disable JS after this update, I'd be pretty mad as well. But having an option deep enough to keep away from unsuspecting eyes is only sane.
Look on the bright side. At least we'll never, ever have to hear about the Principle of Least Power again from Mozilla/HTML5 advocates lionising the "Open Web" against smartphone apps, Native Client or what have you.
Not surprised. Mozilla, being an important entity in JavaScript ecosystem, obviously wouldn't disapprove web developers willing to shove JS down everyone's throat.
That spencer guy really sounds like a smartass; I mean, we're too stupid to be around him and not seeing the light that shines through his ass; vent off
I exclusively surf with javascript disabled by default. I only turn javascript on on websites that i trust or the site has to give a good reason to do so. i wont turn on javascript to display your crappy jquery menu or slideshow.
So many pages are totally broken without javascript. You dont need javascript to have a good layout, a complexe menu or display images. Yet some "professional" sites dont even work without javascript on, All you see is a blank page.
And by the way, there is a tag called noscript , but it seems webdesigners that only think about demonstrating their "html5" talents dont know their basics.
Javascript is the new flash. Stupid cheesy animations , heavy pages , memory leaks that kill your browser, javascript intros that you cant skip ,broken parallax scrolling , slow scrollbars so it feels like you are on ipad , it will be worse than flash when designers start abusing Adobe Edge on all their websites.
Javascript, Flash, HTML 5, and virtually all the rest of the HTML "enhancements" are a cancer on the web.
Honestly, the only website that I can think of where using Javascript actually does something useful that I'd have a hard time doing better on a standalone app on my own machine is Google Maps, where it's nice to be able to scroll around by dragging the map with the mouse.
But even there, I'd gladly sacrifice that feature for a standalone mapping app on my own machine, so I don't have to worry about Google spying on me whenever I decide to go somewhere!
Geez. The web has become a gigantic spyware advertising network, and Javascript, Flash, and related garbage are some of the main enablers of it.
May be that works for you. But a significant number of web developers are moving on JS frameworks for web development such Angular, Meteor, Node, etc. Most sites built on these frameworks will break is javascript is disabled. As an end user, that is the worst user experience you can ask for.
"Most sites built on these frameworks will break is javascript is disabled"
You know, there is a solution: the noscript tag. You know, the tag that lets you retain some level of functionality for people who do not have Javascript enabled.
Why should I have to expose myself to various security and privacy problems just because some web development framework cannot keep an old version working? There are a lot of reasons why someone might not have Javascript enabled, and they should not be shut off from large parts of the web. Should vision-impaired users who use TTS systems be shut off because your framework of choice thought that Javascript should be used to replace functionality that is built into the browser?
Yes, the noscript tag can be used. In fact if you see Rails' implementation of unobtrusive javascript, the application defaults to its html behaviour in case javascript is off. However, not all frameworks take this approach.
Moreover these days, developers don't develop for 100% of use cases. they start with implementation of say 80-85% of use cases. Folks not wanting to use javascript never come into that category, which means that noscript approach is almost never taken except may be in the case that the web application developed is targeted at that user category.
> Why should I have to expose myself to various security and privacy problems just because some web development framework cannot keep an old version working?
For a lot of sites and everything else coming up there is no old version. It's a Javascript app. Noscript could at best display an error, but if you're browsing around without Javascript you probably know enough that the error is on your end.
"Should vision-impaired users who use TTS systems be shut off because your framework of choice thought that Javascript should be used to replace functionality that is built into the browser?"
Unfortunately, that's about the scope of options most organizations entertain. If there's any degradation, it tends to lack grace and is on a par with a screenreader.
While I "like" javascript (OK, I like dynamic sites), if my machine seems slow, a cursory look at my running process will show a chrome or safari process that is inevitably getting dry humped by a page using js for a carousel or something equally banal.
So you're not OK with giving a site a fairly narrow range of sandboxed permissions, but you are OK with installing an opaque binary that can read, modify, transmit, and destroy nearly every piece of your data on your computer.
Sure. Do you personally read through every line of source? Maybe you trust the repository managers to do so, and limit yourself to only very-popular projects - do you completely trust the trust-chain that lets them submit new code? Maybe you do - remember when RubyGems.org was hacked? Or when [many sites] lost their private crypto keys? What's to stop the same thing from happening, and pushing a critical update with an exploit? Maybe you reduce the frequency you check for updates to mitigate this kind of vulnerability - oops, now you're more vulnerable to new exploits.
If you're not watching every step, every time, you're gambling the same way you're gambling with malicious code in a browser (though I'll admit it's lower frequency). Your privacy/security is in the hands of whoever is part of the chain you trust, and their security practices, completely aside from new exploits that could affect you directly. Open Source, binary, it's all the same in the end unless you're perfect in your observational skills. Sandboxing limits that trust. I'll even grant that it's technically possible to do the same thing with processes in Unix, which you could be doing - but it's hard, error-prone, and essentially nobody does it except the stragglers who haven't switched to virtualization (which is essentially sandboxing).
You're being paranoid. With perfectly justifiable reasons - everything you listed is possible, plausible, and related things have actually happened. But you're not applying the paranoia evenly.
You are funny. IF you enter the destination in Google Maps, then of course Google knows your destination. JavaScript on or off... if you really want privacy you'll have to host it on your own or use offline navigation tools
I said: "I'd gladly sacrifice that feature for a standalone mapping app on my own machine, so I don't have to worry about Google spying on me whenever I decide to go somewhere!"
What I was trying to say was that I would prefer a standalone mapping application (ie. one that ran on my own machine and did not contact Google or any other site to work).
It just so happens that since I do not have such a standalone mapping application, I do resort to using Google Maps. And when I do, they do happen to have an actual useful use for Javascript, which is to allow the user to scroll the map with the mouse. But I'd gladly sacrifice that feature for a standalone (ie. not browser-based) mapping application that does not phone home to some spyware company like Google in order to work.
yes I've missed the point. but your description wasn't clear enough. It could have also meant standalone in the sense of a native app without the normal javascript spy ad ons..
> It just so happens that since I do not have such a standalone mapping application
feel free to try my open source graphhopper project btw ;)
HN demonstrates good use of JS: AJAX voting. Forcing you to navigate to another page in order to vote is slow, annoying, and disruptive. Plenty of sites make good use of JS. For those who don't use NoScript.
Since I've switched mostly to a browser that doesn't support Javascript, I've stopped voting on HN.
Not voting is also a good way to avoid being tracked and pigeonholed.
It's true that if everybody did that, this site would be a lot less useful. However, I'm not convinced that some sort of anonymous yet secure and transparent voting system can't be implemented.
But, while voting requires enabling technolgy that will help others track and pigeonhole me, as well as make my system less secure, I'm going to avoid it.
Fortunately, HN is still readable without Javascript (even though it annoyingly doesn't indent threaded comments properly without it -- something that Slashdot manages to do just fine without requiring JS).
The Internet is a technology helping others track and pigeonhole you. Will you stop using it? And telephone? And everything? Seriously, everything can be "corrupted" to be used against you...
Youtube's use of Flash and HTML 5 is 100%, completely worthless!
There are a million youtube downloading apps out there that don't require me to even use a web browser to download videos from youtube. And, after they're downloaded (or even during the download), I can use any number of (non-browser-based) video players to watch them.
Youtube could make it even easier to download their videos by simply providing a direct link to the video in mp4 format. No Javascript, Flash, or HTML 5 required!
I fully agree with you, but that's why I use an addon that lets me allow JavaScript per-domain instead of having to allow every shitty social button to use the main functionality of the site, and it can even remember my preference.
Why would you use the global JavaScript disabler when there are much better options?
Honestly stop whinning so much. Javascript is just as important a part of the web as CSS. Would you complain if sites broke because you switched of CSS? Likely not.
I also surf without the Javascript enabled. It's much safer and faster that way. I suggest everybody to try that for a longer period of time before opining.
Most of the pages I visit function without Javascript. The most of sites where it doesn't that I know of are *.blogspot sites managed by Google.
Why wouldn't you use the NoScript extension? Not only does it give you fine grain control over JS but it adds additional security monitoring, such as click jacking.
Javascript is not required to read articles on the web. It's optional. That's why "Reader" mode is so handy, just show me the article so I can read it. Sometimes I don't like waiting for my browser to struggle with poorly written JS.
It sounds like a classic noobie mistake... "Why are users able to turn off Javascript?" "No idea." "Remove the feature!"
If anyone says Javascript is not optional, they are trying to sell you something: probably web apps!
> Javascript is not required to read articles on the web.
Unfortunately, it very much is. Nearly every website on the internet is completely useless without JavaScript.
I visited a large number of links from the HN front page, and many of them had broken navigation or images. You can't actually vote on HN itself either.
Hacker News sans voting is nowhere near completely useless. I strongly suspect that a majority of people who read HN don't even have accounts (and thus are unable to vote). And even if the posts do contain broken links/images, a fair amount of text is often still available; I think a site's textual content is often its most important feature (unless it's a site specifically geared toward images/interactive content).
The "1% Rule"[0] grew out of this idea -- the hypothesis it poses is that 89% of the users of a given internet forum are strictly lurkers. HN has a more tech-oriented population than many forums, so I bet the differences between groups are less extreme, but I also bet that the overall trend still stands.
Right, but the change isn't targeting you, the hacker news reader. There's dozens of mom & pops out there who have no understanding how browsers work and when they disable javascript, they'll complain that firefox can't render pages as well as IE.
Which is two things to me:
1. not a tragedy that can never be fixed, but usually a minor inconvenience
2. one of those random opportunities to learn something, like in this case what Javascript is.
Taking away options from users because they don't know well enough can be kind of a self-full-filling prophecy, too. You cater to newbies, you get more and better newbies, entitled ones.
Stuff should be nice to use, of course, and shouldn't have friendly green buttons that makes it shoot knives at you etc. but it also shouldn't be less complex than it needs to be. If you have nothing left to take away you have perfection; if you still keep taking away stuff, you don't have even more perfection, you're just breaking things.
I never heard anyone complain that this option is there, or that it caused any trouble.. so what is this based on? Where are the petitions to remove this option that causes so much grief?
And why stop there? Imagine all the bad stuff you can do with the printer settings. Why are there options that allow people to waste ink, paper, or even maybe damage their printer? How many people threw away their printer, damaging the environment, because they thought it was broken... when all that happened was their cat walking over the keyboard and misconfiguring it? There might be actual kids choking on toxic fumes from those printers right now, nevermind the environment; and we worry about a website not working.
The Firefox options dialog is still kind of messy, and would be even if half of the options were removed. Take some leads from Opera :) Just taking away things doesn't automatically help, logically ordering them while also putting them in tiers of expertise does.
[By the way, all those keyboard shortcuts? They have to go, "hacker news readers" can get them back by editing an .ini setting -- the risk is just too great that someone might open the dev tools and then complain about weird rectangles on their screen, or to fail to convert because the website isn't as pretty as it could be]
You're a hacker, of course you've never heard anyone complain about the option. Mozilla may choose to differ as they probably have data that shows that a significant number of support emails show that disabling javascript was the root core of the problem. Besides, anyone who runs javascript disabled in a modern browser are either developers, or tin-foil hat wearers. I'm sure the ability to disable javascript was just an old remnant of 2002-era browsers when javascript was far less common. I think it's nearly impossible to find a webpage without a single reference to a javascript file these days.
You're a hacker, of course you've never heard anyone complain about the option.
Well, when people hear I'm good with computers they usually tell me all sorts of random computer troubles, but this one never popped up.
they probably have data that shows that a significant number of support emails show that disabling javascript was the root core of the problem
Are you sure? They seem to have data that most people don't use the option, and that seems to be all.
Besides, anyone who runs javascript disabled in a modern browser are either developers, or tin-foil hat wearers.
Or people who don't like staring at a white screen for several seconds because some ad scripts absolutely has to be loaded first, when they can have the exact same content, instantly, when browsing without Javascript. DSL still exists, you know. And it helps with noticing weight and skill differences where cable users might see none.
I also didn't get the memo that not providing a non-js fallback for normal day to day web stuff is not kind of noobish. Though I could point you to a host of articles pointing out the opposite, and they are fresher than 2002, too, and not from that usability guy with the ugly website either :P
I think it's nearly impossible to find a webpage without a single reference to a javascript file these days.
You will find a million that work without it, and even more that could work without it if they weren't made by [insert random expletive here].
Wikipedia? Works just fine. Search? Works fine. Facebook? I don't use it anymore, but I remember when it worked fine without JS as well, minus chat and instant notifications (oh god, the horror of only hearing about a new message on a page refresh ^^). Twitter? Breaking Twitter sounds like a good plan, not like a problem. But I digress.
You really do not want to be explaining Javascript to my mom and pop, or most others. (And yes, your parenthetical case at the end? It happened to me in just the last two weeks; coincidence, yes, but it did.)
You really do not want to be explaining Javascript to my mom and pop, or most others
Sadly, my mom doesn't go clicking around in the options dialog, no matter how much I encourage her ^^ Hardly in my presence, not ever in my absence.
But even if it was otherwise; explaining that "this needs to stay on or many websites won't properly function" while pointing out the options she might want to change, would be enough? I mean, you don't even have to understand Javascript to code in it, much less to be aware of the toggle... ?
We have roads with cars on them. People can walk into those roads, but don't. For many reasons, but none of them a deep understanding of biology or physics. If we fenced in all roads, we would avoid some of such accidents that are still happening - but would also raise people who need the fence from then on, because they're used to "wherever I can walk, there is no danger of being run over".
And yes, this also means looking someone who lost their child who ran into the road in the eye, and saying "I'm sorry for that, but it's still worth it to not fence everything in." Are we too squeamish for that? Since when are coders so scared of user complaints based on ignorance or using the software wrong? Don't those come with the terroritory?
> Javascript is not required to read articles on the web.
Agreed. However, the web consists of far more than just "articles", and quite a bit of content legitimately uses JavaScript for required functionality. Disabling it needs to have the kinds of huge "this will break things" warnings associated with installing an extension like NoScript; it shouldn't have a checkbox in Firefox's preferences.
Most of the time, the major content of a page doesn't require it. When it does, it is usually either poor design, or good design where the design is intended to display a bunch of crap I don't want and download a hoard of tracking data.
To put it another way, when I'm surfing, Google Analytics isn't doing anything in my interest.
Which is why NoScript is great: you can load the main site functionality without having to enable Analytics. The global enable/disable JS switch is just terrible for this kind of browsing, in my opinion.
That's a terrible idea. The explanation would have to be very long - practically an essay. And the only people that will understand the explanation (or even care) are folks who are competent enough to quickly google how to disable javascript through about:config.
Increased software complexity and no tangible benefit. Lose-Lose.
What? If you can't explain in one sentence the fact that disabling JS will break most websites and it should only be done if you know what you're doing, then you've got bigger problems.
And the 'people that know what they are doing' are the ones that know what about:config is, and how to Google for extensions to disable JavaScript. It's also arguable that an extension that provides an easy 'toggle JavaScript on/off' button is a much better interface than needing to dive into the preferences pane to disable JavaScript (and possibly re-enable it sometimes).
People will still do it without understanding and then complain that Firefox broke. There is no legitimate reason your average user should have access to this checkbox. Especially when if you actually want to disable Javascript it's still very easy.
People will still do it without understanding and then complain that Firefox broke.
If that is true, then point me to all those complaints.
There is no legitimate reason your average user should have access to this checkbox.
That's called kicking away the ladder, and fuck that with a rusty chainsaw. How are people supposed to even get curious about what Javascript is, when they never hear of it?
That's the point, you don't choose when to first come across something you haven't heard of before. You don't wake up one morning and say "I guess I'll go to the library and get a book about Javascript" because you dreamed about it.
There are a million ways to display and to drill down into options that would make the FF options less cluttered, more logical, while having even more options than it does. There are ways to inform users pretty much exhaustively via built-in tooltips and documentation -- all of this has been working great in the 90s and got better since then. Icon > Title/Tooltip > Short Description > Verbose Description, so you learn everything you "stumble over" once when you need it, and from then on just use it, with the option to refresh your knowledge anytime.
Just compare about:config in Opera and Firefox, and simply accept we're dealing with different levels of skill and taste here, not just different choices.
It depends on the type of article. I write a lot of blog posts about math. The most convenient way to do this is using Mathjax. If browsers had native support for mathematical notation then I would be inclined to agree with you, but this is not currently the case.
I don't know how extensive Unicode math symbols are, but it's unclear to me how you would display things like matrices and do alignment of multiline equations.
I'm not sure either. But I know that you can do crazy things with unicode, and I'd bet that if you treated treated unicode as a sort of low-level compile-to target you could then design a high-level language from which to write math text. I'm not sure of the practical benefit and maybe this would be even more inaccessible to people... but still, I think JS is great, but wouldn't pure HTML and encodings be even cooler?
Isn't that what MathML is meant to do? Browser support is incomplete, but it sounds like a perfect use case for a javascript polyfill, so you could make pages that would work with either native browser support or javascript.
I came here to wax rhapsodic about Reader mode too. It's my favorite web browser feature in half a decade.
The fact is that most web sites use JavaScript _and_ CSS in a user-hostile manner. CSS is used to draw the eye towards advertising or other content on the site, with the hope of distracting me from what I came to read. Many sites even use CSS to create a faux-popup overlay "window" that has to be dismissed before the content can be viewed.
And of course, the vast majority of JavaScript is aimed at analytics, tracking cookies, advertisements, and other code that, as a user, I'd really rather not execute.
My ideal solution is something like ClickToPlugin, where a site can request JavaScript, and I can choose to grant it or not. Mozilla's decision is disappointing, because they are working in the interest of web publishers instead of web users.
It's only being removed from the UI
The backend ability is still there.
Extensions like no-script and yes-script (I prefer) will still function.