Slashdot Mirror
Firefox Losing Its Way?
An anonymous reader writes "NeoSmart Technologies has a recap on Firefox 2.0 and its shortcomings. Aside from the technical aspects, the article raises some good questions about the Firefox 'community,' it's future, and what it's goals are at the end of the day. Their conclusion? Firefox 1.5 was a much better open-source project/community model than 2.0 ever will be, and that 'It seems Firefox has lost its way somewhere along the passage to fame.'"
Last time I checked, Firefox was still open source software. If they're not fixing bugs fast enough for your liking, by all means, download the source and fix them yourself.
We hear that reasoning a lot from open source advocates. But when it comes to Firefox and Mozilla in general, it just isn't a case. Their code is a mess, regardless of whether it's C++ code, or whether it's JavaScript code. Look for yourself: http://lxr.mozilla.org/seamonkey/source/.
I don't follow the project closely enough to know why the quality of their code is so low. It may be due to inexperienced or untalented developers. It may be due to rushed development. It may be due to a lack of refactoring. But the end result is that it's very difficult for most programmers to come up to speed with the code even just to fix a small bug, let alone implement entirely new functionality.
The poor quality of the Firefox and Gecko codebases could be indicative of why we've seen to many quality and security problems with Firefox as of late. Firefox does suffer from pretty horrendous memory leaks, even when not using any non-default extensions. The number of serious 0-day security glitches has increased dramatically, as anyone on any notable security bulletin mailing list can attest to.
Quality software builds upon a quality codebase. And until the Mozilla project can obtain that quality codebase, we will continue to see them produce poor-performing applications that suffer from frequent security flaws.
> I must say, I'm having a feeling akin to the one I had when Netscape went over the 3.0
> version number: things feel somewhat slower and buggier, with more bling that I don't
> really need.
I don't know what you/need expect from a browser but from my point of view Fx 2.0 *is* faster and uses less memory. Also I find that few new features (improved tabbed browsing, closed tab history, more polished interface) simply nice and usefull to me.
What bloat you are reffering to exactly? Since Fx 2.0 comes with very few new visible features and all of them are usefull for some people. And what bling?
> One of the most irritating "features" I keep hitting is whenever I open something with an extension,
> be it a pdf with Acrobat reader, a flash animation, a video with mplayer or a java applet:
These are not extensions but plugins. Plugin is binary platform specific library that you load up into the browser. Extension is multiplatform XUL code running on top of Gecko/Fx engine.
> about 1 out of 10 times, the cpu goes to 100% and FF is dead in the water.
I can not confirm that. Have you tried your Linux (I assume Linux since you've mentioned mplayer) distribution's Bugzilla? I use Linux, I use features you mentioned and Fx does not crash on me. Neither I've seen reports similar to yours so.
(...)
> I don't know, perhaps there's a pattern with very large, popular
> open-source projects: the more popular they grow, the more developers
> tend to focus on adding features instead of correcting bugs...
To cut the bullshit. Have you filled a bug report about your problem?
I noticed our library hasn't upgraded to Firefox 2.0 at Umass Boston. I thought it was interesting and asked the reference librarian why. She said the IT people didn't think it was significant enough to bother upgrading and people also didn't like the way it looked. Interesting, I thought to myself.
n t=c_linuxseafox.php and add an extension to enhance the UI like MonkeyMenu http://markbokil.org/index.php?section=tech&conten t=c_linuxmonkeymenu.php and you have a better browser than Firefox 2.0
This is one of the reasons I switched back to the Mozilla Seamonkey Suite. It uses less memory when you run Mail and the Browser together than Firefox and Thunderbird. I like the more community orientation of the development also. All you need to do is throw on a good theme like SeaFox http://markbokil.org/index.php?section=tech&conte
Last time I checked, Firefox was still open source software. If they're not fixing bugs fast enough for your liking, by all means, download the source and fix them yourself. That's not meant as a smart-ass excuse for not fixing a bug, but the article's author says:
This is such an elitist position and really hurts both opensource in general and Firefox specifically. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that a large marjority of Firefox users, myself included, don't have either the chops nor the time to gain the chops to fix bugs. Also, even if I had the chops to fix bugs, I don't have the time to get familiar with the source tree to be effective. It's not like debuging is a 5 minute deal.
I updated to FF 2.0 and downgraded to 1.5 wihtin a few days because 2.0 kept freezing and crashing and to be honest, I didn't seem any new features that made upgrading compelling.
Now I think FF is a GREAT browser, I use it all the time and only revert to IE when I have to. And I have themed it and added extensions. I reccomend it to friends and spread the word. But, yeah, I have to agree, 2.0 was less than I had hoped for.
However, I also want to sincerly thank for Mozilla Foundation and any volunteers working on the Mozilla projects for all their effort because people like me can't build this stuff.
I have experienced the same browser locks with FireFox for as long as I can remember (definitely goes back beyond the 1.0 mark). Usually what occurs is that the entire browser locks while the content is loading (be it a video, or pdf, or whatever) and you are unable to switch tabs. Sometimes the browser simply stays unresponsive.
For me, this is the only severe issue I encounter with FireFox on a regular basis. If I am loading a video, pdf, or sometimes even a web page that is slow to respond or is unable to contact the server/resolve dns; I need to be able to open a new tab or switch to an already open tab and view something else while I wait.
What I find so interesting about this post is that it's exactly why companies are nervous about using open source for mission critical projects. You're absolutely right - since people pay nothing for the software then they can make no demands of it. I've even posted bug reports on open source projects that start out saying something like "I know that I haven't paid anything for this so I have no right to complain, but..." So give me one good reason, after reading this post, that any IT manager would want to bet their future or the future of their company on open source? At least with proprietary software you have the right to demand that things get fixed, and if you don't get what you want then you can find an alternative.
If you don't want crime to pay, let the government run it.
That's right they volunteered. The volunteered to dot a job. Now apparently some didn't realize that when you volunteer, you have to actually support the project instead of just call yourself a "developer" and shuffle deck chairs around. When the user base wants something fixed, then it should be fixed. That's called "being responsible" and "taking pride in your work." Volunteering is not a one way street, and some would have you believe. It's work and it doesn't mean that only have to do the the easy things that you like to do. That's why people don't volunteer. This is doubly so, when the group, like mozilla, has placed high barriers to entry. Specifically, the code is a poorly documented bizzare mishmash of multiple languages spread out among directories that don't have obvious names. Also, the review process effectively eliminates all external development, as the the codebase moves faster than the review process, and the sheer arrogance of the developers that "I own this." I'm sorry, you can't say you "own" it in one breath, and in the very next breath say "fix it yourself."
The argument that if something is provided at no cost, it's somehow above reproach is an absurd intellectual cop out. The cost of something is completely irrelevant to its merits. Let's take your soup kitchen analogy. Suppose you walked into a soup kitchen and was served a soup consisting broken glass in a fine urine base. Would you honestly say, "Oh. Well this sucks, but I shouldn't complain. Afterall, it's free." Bullshit. Incompetence is incompetence at any price.