Weave... Mozilla Is Trying To Be More Social

Cassanova writes "Weave is the newest Mozilla Labs project. It allows the user to save browser settings on Mozilla servers (Favorites, sessions, passwords, etc.) and load them from anywhere. With this project, Mozilla is trying to be an online services provider, which is an important step. But can Mozilla labs get over the privacy issues?"

Comments

so use encryption.

[gbjbaanb]

anyone can get over the privacy issues, Mozilla just needs to encrypt the user's settings with a strong key and store the encrypted data to the server. Only the user can decrypt it (assuming he remembers his passphrase) and you're done.

If you make this a non-optional feature then it can be touted as a big privacy win and people will surely be happier wit it. If you allow the passphrase to be stored locally then ease of use is solved too (obviously you'd still need to enter it if you used a browser not on your home PC, but that's ok).

Re:so use encryption.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is slashdot, don't expect anyone to RTFA.

Re:so use encryption.

[Nullav]

You're right. If only we could force them to release the source code or something, then we could just look.

Re:so use encryption.

[caferace]

Build it yourself from source, and run it on your own server. Gosh.

I wouldn't use this

[caluml]

I wouldn't use this. After all, the bookmarks I have at home are different from the ones I have at work. :)
I can't envisage a time when I'd need this. Plus it's very easy to SCP my bookmarks.html from my PC at home if I need them - or a simple SSH and grep to find the precise one I want. A solution in search of a problem?

Re:I wouldn't use this

[noamt]

Not a solution in search of a problem, but maybe a solution you (and others) don't need. You have SCP/SSH set up, 99.9% of the people don't.

Google also have such a thing, can't remember what they call it but there's a Firefox extension. So it's nothing new either.

Privacy issues? What privacy issues?

[One Childish N00b]

If you don't want to use it, don't download the extension. To use it, you have to:

  - Go to a site
  - Create an account
  - Download an extension (on every single computer you use)
  - Put in your username and password (again)
  - Put in a private encryption passphrase
  - Manually click the 'Sync' button.

Only then will it start automatically updating your bookmarks. If you have privacy issues about uploading your bookmarks to Mozilla's servers, then you can quite easily back out at any of these points, or not bother at all. If the fear is that they will share your bookmarks, then simply don't give them any to share. This is not a feature that is on by default, and the blog linked to even specifies that, if you're that paranoid about giving them your data, there will be a way to set up your own Weave server, so no-one but you will be able to know you visit PissMidgets.com

Slightly sensationalist article methinks.

Re:user is male

[jcaldwel]

This makes me cringe, too, but technically, according to Webster, "he" can be used in the "generic sense or when the sex of the person is unspecified".

I can't call the language non-biased, but the bias exists in the English language itself.

That being said, the author should have followed basic writing etiquette and replaced the pronouns with him/her, he/she, etc... or, get rid of the gender-biased pronouns altogether and restructured the sentences to use words like "oneself".

They need to focus on maintenence, too.

[Anonymous Coward]

There are a lot of new features in Firefox 3. But there has also been a serious neglect of the maintenance aspect of software development.

I know maintenance is not as glorious as adding new features, but it's still very important with each new release to fix the problems that were found with previous versions (or at least verify that such problems no longer exist).

While some small number of people might like these new bookmarking capabilities, I think they should have spent more time on fixing some of the issues plaguing the core of their browser: excessive memory usage, memory fragmentation, excessive CPU utilization, and segfaults. Fixing those would help every user.

Re:online, online, and online again

[KlaymenDK]

I think anything that can make a computer workstation as generic as a television is a good idea; the challenge lies in handling the user data/settings. If everything was online and online again, you would not need X-on-a-stick but only to log in to your online profile from any workstation.

Hm, imagine that. Having a workstation that from the ground up is equipped to handle roaming users, even across the internet. There would be issues with compatibility and installed software, but assuming the basics (OS login, browser bookmarks, yadda yadda) it would be a fair step towards ubiquitous computing. Ah, the future ... are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet?...

Re:online, online, and online again

[KlaymenDK]

True, that. The eye candy is always the first thing to go in, and the productivity last (if at all).