Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Mozilla Plans To Remove Support For Firefox Complete Themes

Posted by timothy on from the too-much-freedom dept.

AmiMoJo writes: Mozilla's engineers have announced the removal of Firefox complete themes as a way to lighten the browser core and remove a feature they don't see as heavily used any more. "Personas", or lightweight themes that are basically just wallpaper images, will remain. The Firefox community did not respond well to this piece of news, most seeing it as the engineers "chromifying Firefox." The change is part of Mozilla's Great-or-Dead initiative, which plans to simplify the Firefox codebase and remove features that are not popular.

15 of 267 comments (clear)

  1. Always seemed redundant to me. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We already have gui toolkit theming, why do we also need individual application theming?

    1. Re:Always seemed redundant to me. by shellbeach · · Score: 4, Informative

      They keep copying Chrome anyway so what’s the point of using a bloated browser that tries to mimic Chrome?

      For me, it's the amazing Tree Style Tab extension that keeps me on Firefox more than anything else. Chrome seems to have no intention to ever implement this.

      As for getting rid of theme support ... from my perspective I'm all for it. I remember the original Phoenix 0.1 release, when the aim was to completely gut the Mozilla codebase of all bloat. It's about time that happened again.

    2. Re:Always seemed redundant to me. by GuB-42 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think GP is talking about the sponsored start page and pocket integration. Pocket is the worst.

    3. Re:Always seemed redundant to me. by dryeo · · Score: 3, Informative

      The good news, they're getting rid of bloat, things such as xul. The bad news, no more xul based extensions (most all) so no more Tree Style Tab extension so all users who stick with Mozilla for the extensions won't have an excuse to not move to a different browser.
      They seem determined to reduce the user base to 0%

      --
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
    4. Re:Always seemed redundant to me. by hairyfeet · · Score: 3, Informative

      So switch to PaleMoon which has forked away from FF and has said they plan on keeping the extension framework, even going so far as to contact the extension devs to get them to support PM (which has its own UI string now) and they are compiling their own forks of the extensions that don't support PM.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    5. Re:Always seemed redundant to me. by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Informative

      You are VERY welcome. I can tell you its VERY solid, the UI stays consistent (pre Australis of course) and they are dedicated to keeping FF the way it WAS, with a sane design, extensions, the whole shebang, and have been for a couple years now. they have even gone so far as to set up their own sync servers so you can enjoy that functionality without PM being tied to the FF backend, very nice indeed.

      A lot of my customers are SOHO and SMBs and they don't like this "change for change sake" BS so I went and tested browsers and found the ones that were the most solid and dependable. I've been handing out PaleMoon and Comodo Dragon, which is similar as far as consistency but Chromium based, for a couple years now and my customers? Nothing but happy with them both. I also practice what I preach and my own browsers are PaleMoon and Dragon and they've been rock solid and reliable, and I don't have to fear my UI getting shat upon if I update the thing. Both are great, give 'em a spin.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
  2. Can I get just a browser? by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Can I get a version which doesn't have social network tie-ins, isn't a mail client, doesn't have its own chat, make it easy to block ads and other crap, doesn't spy on me, and doesn't otherwise think it's going to be the center of my damned universe?

    Because that would be awesome.

    Probably never gonna happen, but it would be awesome.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  3. Firefox long term strategy by Snufu · · Score: 5, Funny

    Step 1: Eschew everything that makes Firefox distinct from Chrome.
    Step 2: Make an inferior clone of Chrome on a budget smaller than Google's sofa change.
    Step 3: ???
    Step 4: Overtake Chrome!

  4. Re:For once I agree by gman003 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Let's hope "video autoplay" is next!

    about:config media.autoplay.enabled = false
    There might be a UI method of getting to that but I couldn't find it in the five seconds I allocated to searching. Note this only stops HTML5 videos, but you really ought to have Flash set to click-to-enable (or disabled) for myriad other reasons.

  5. Please please by ADRA · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Can someone tell me if this actually affects me? Oh they removed some underlying feature. That is neither here nor there if its of truly marginal use or something that can be added back with Add-Ons. All this isn't clearly outlined in the comment or announcement, so here goes:

    I have the following plugins. Which Add-Ons if any will be broken without any future fix after the deprecation?
    - Classic Theme Restorer
    - Add to Search Bar
    - Adblock Plus
    - Quick Search Bar
    - Hard Refresh
    - Flashblock

    --
    Bye!
  6. Re:Storm in a glas of water by gstoddart · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Does "basically want Chrome then" mean "don't want a browser which tries to put 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag"?

    Because the answer is overwhelmingly "oh hell yes".

    If Firefox is differentiating itself by adding features most people don't want or use, they're doing it wrong.

    So many features added to browsers these days leave me immediately thinking "How do I disable this crap?".

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  7. Re:Agree by sexconker · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And Hello?
    And the fucking proprietary DRM and media shit?
    And the "about:newtab" shit that shows you your top visited sites, and "recommended" sites?

    All of that shit should be nuked from the code base, and everyone involved should be stripped naked, tied to a tree in the woods, and have their genitals coated in honey.

  8. Re:Agree by Burz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    FF still ignores OS themes, making their special "complete themes" necessary for many people. And I do mean "necessary"...

    I like to read at night without having to turn display brightness to nearly zero (which is still too bright and makes everything look like dishwater). Even if I use an extension like BYM to darken web pages, I still have the FF GUI blaring at my eyes. The solution is to use an addon like DeepDark to tame the UI.

    Now I'll have a browser that neither honors my Gnome dark theme setting, nor honors its own custom dark theme. THAT is a clusterf*ck.

  9. Re: Storm in a glas of water by MyAlternateID · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Most people just want to use their browser. Almost everyone I know uses Firefox mostly because IE sucked so much in the past. And they do not play around with themes. They might install icon sets, but only at home.

    I know geeks like to configure everything and that is OK , but it is not what matters for the majority of users.

    And no I do not want to use the Google sees it all tool for obvious reasons.

    The great number of useful extensions is my own main reason for using Firefox. I also have Chromium and Konqueror installed but I hardly ever use them.

    The Web is just too shitty of a general experience to use any browser without a good ad blocker. The many, many other available extensions is just icing on the cake.

  10. Re:Agree by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They already announced that Pocket will be removed. Not removed, but placed inside its own add-on. http://webscripts.softpedia.com/blog/mozilla-to-move-pocket-integration-to-a-standalone-firefox-add-on-495871.shtml

    That is awesome news! Moving integrated add-ons like Pocket to "featured add-ons" is a great idea! Keep the core browser lean and mean. Like it was meant to be.