AskSlashdot: How Do You See Your Life After Firefox 52 ESR? (mozilla.org)

Artem Tashkinov writes: Soon to be released Firefox 56 says that out of 35+ add-ons that I have installed only a single one is a proper WebExtension which means that Firefox 57 will disable over 95% of my add-ons many of which I just cannot live without and for most of them there are simply no alternatives. This number of add-ons sound like an overkill, but actually they are all pretty neat and improve your browsing abilities. That's the reason why I'm using Firefox 52 ESR, which still fully supports XUL add-ons, however after June 2018, it will stop being supported.

Let's list the most famous ones:

• DownThemAll is still largely irreplaceable since you can download from many parts of the internet much faster if you split the downloaded files in chunks and download them simultaneously;
• GreaseMonkey allows you to fix or extend your favourite websites using JavaScript;Lazarus: Form Recovery has saved my time and life numerous times; it regularly backups the contents of web forms and allows to restore them after browser restart or accidental page refresh;
• NoScript: allows you to whitelist JS execution only for websites that you really trust; JS has been used as an attack and tracking tool since its inception;
• Status-4-Ever and Classic Theme Restorer return Firefox to the time when it was a powerful tool with its own identity and looks, and not a Chrome clone;
• UnMHT add-on allows you to save complete web pages as a single MHT file;

So what will you do less than a year from now?

Comments

Already stopped updating

[WoodstockJeff]

FireFox stopped allowing key add-ons I use already, because the authors have not created signed versions. So I had to reinstall version 47, where I could at least tell it to accept the fact that they add-on wasn't signed.

Re:Already stopped updating

[GuB-42]

Sounds a little like you are blaming FF for the fact that the extension devs are too lazy to provide their users with a way to trust their addons. Is that right?

I think he is blaming FF for not letting the user choose.
Walled gardens are not a terrible idea. Protecting the user against himself is sometimes necessary. But the thing is : we have enough of this already. A lot of Firefox users use it because they want to keep control, otherwise they would have just use the default option of IE/Edge, Safari or Chrome. They don't use it to let the Mozilla foundation be their nanny.

without my security extensions, play Vivaldi

[evolutionary]

If Mozilla doesn't come up with a way of keeping the extensions we have grown to love firefox for, I guess I won't be using FireFox. It is strange that Mozilla would not have taken this into account. I've been playing with Vivaldi and I'm a fan of the browser (as well as his music) Have Vivaldi with Umatrix installed, which is like "NoScript" on steroids. So for me Vivaldi is a good alternative to Firefox.

Just famous or famous and going away?

[fahrbot-bot]

NoScript

Because NoScript is migrating to WebExtensions API. I believe that Classic Theme Restorer has already proclaimed that they won't. Don't know about the rest.

Re:Just famous or famous and going away?

[JohnFen]

I believe that Classic Theme Restorer has already proclaimed that they won't.

Both the CTR folks and Mozilla have stated a number of times that it will not be possible to create an extension that does what CTR does -- so it's toast.

Which is, in the end, the deciding factor in my not staying with FF after 56. CTR is the only thing that makes the FF UI tolerable.

My add-on list: All are marked as "Legacy".

[Futurepower(R)]

The big issue: Technology companies are usually badly managed. Mozilla Foundation is just one example.

My list, updated from the list I posted to another story. Every add-on is marked "Legacy" in Firefox version 55.0.3 64-bits.

1. Adblock Latitude For Pale Moon browser only. Blocks display of ads. "Adblock Latitude is a direct fork of Adblock Plus made specifically for the Pale Moon browser."
2. BetterPrivacy Deletes Local Shared Objects, LSOs. LSOs are files placed on your computer by the Adobe Systems Flash plug-in. Use of Adobe Flash allows web sites to track you, permanently even though your browser is configured to delete the files known as "Cookies" after each re-starting of your operating system.
3. CanvasBiocker Prevents websites from using the Javascript <canvas> API to fingerprint them.
4. Classic Theme Restorer Quoting 3 paragraphs:
   
   "This add-on will stop working when Firefox 57 arrives in November 2017."
   
   "This add-on will stop working when Firefox 57 arrives in November 2017 and Mozilla drops support for XUL / XPCOM / legacy add-ons. It should still work on Firefox 52 ESR until ESR moves to Firefox 59 ESR in 2018 (~Q2)".
   
   "There is no 'please port it' or 'please add support for it' this time, because the entire add-on eco system changes and the technology behind this kind of add-on gets dropped without replacement."
   
   
5. Cookies Manager+
6. Disconnect
7. Facebook Blocker Prevents Facebook from following you everywhere there are Facebook "Like" buttons.
8. Firebug "Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page..."
9. Ghostery DON'T UPDATE. New versions don't allow sufficient user control.
   USE THIS: ghostery-5.4.10-sm+an+fx.xpi Link: Version 5.4.10
   Ghostery sells data it collects. (Business Insider, Jun 18, 2013)
   Ghostery web site
10. HTTPS Everywhere Doesn't install in Pale Moon. Encrypts traffic by using HTTPS encryption rather than HTTP wherever web sites accept HTTPS. See How to Protect Your Data After Congress Passed Legislation That Allows Your Internet Search History to Be Sold (Vogue Magazine, March 29, 2017)
11. Mozilla Archive Format For Firefox and Waterfox only. Saves web pages. For the Pale Moon browser, use MozArchiver.
12. MozArchiver For Pale Moon browser only. Like Mozilla Archive Format that is used with Firefox. Saves web pages.
13. NoScript "The NoScript Firefox extension provides extra protection for Firefox, Seamonkey and other mozilla-based browsers: this free, open source add-on allows

Pale Moon

[JBMcB]

I'll probably switch to Pale Moon. Even has the old school UI that I like.

Current plugins installed:

NoScript *INDISPENSABLE*
GreaseMonkey
Nuke Anything
DownThemAll
VideoDownloadHelper

mozilla + rust = servo

[jopsen]

https://servo.org/ Browsers engines are hugely complicated, and forking then will always be hard, very hard.
Mozilla Firefox is and will remain the best option... with the work being put into servo and features being ported over to firefox we're seeing dramatic performance improvements coming up...

Extensions breaking is always sad, but there is finally a WebExtensions spec, so breakage can be prevented in the future. The reason extensions are breaking is because they historically have been tied to semi-internal APIs; and have been holding back development... In fact the power previously given to extensions could be considered dangerous.

Re:mozilla + rust = servo

[phantomfive]

It's fine to make a stable API, but if WebExtension makes GreaseMonkey impossible, then it's a broken API. It doesn't matter how stable that API is, it's broken. The developers who don't understand are geniuses of the apple bar kind.

Re:mozilla + rust = servo

[higuita]

Actually several add-on where found to leak memory, crash the browser, change settings, spy the user, steal passwords, relay cookies, add fake CA. all those that where found, where blocked, but the current API is dangerous. Mozilla already disabled several features to try to make it safer, but that broke many add-on and the reality is that add-on have access to almost everything in the browser, they can workaround those limits.
Again, fixing the old add-on interface would require a major rebuild of the add-on, so it is better to simply dump it and write a new API that allow better control and as bonus, allow easier reuse of code between chrome and firefox add-on (so it would help most add-on developers)

In the last 3 years, each firefox release broke several add-ons. keeping in that road will only make people unhappy. breaking all the add-on once and change to a proper API will allow future firefox be released without breaking the add-ons. Having a proper API, compatibility is easier to maintain and after the initial add-on breakage and unhappy users, slowly the maintained add-on will be ported and easier to keep working for a long time

Re:Use less firefox

[Anonymous Coward]

I started using Firefox when it first came out and used it until about six months ago, when I switched to Vivaldi. I use Vivaldi with uBlock, uMatrix, TamperMonkey and a couple of other extensions that cover everything I need. A lot of extensions that I used on Firefox, like TabMixPlus, aren't needed on Vivaldi because the UI is designed for the power user. I can't guarantee that every extension is replicated (I've never used DownThemAll or UnMHT) but it's quite powerful and versatile. Try it and see if you like it.

XUL should be kept for existing extensions only

[Eravnrekaree]

I gave up on Firefox a long time ago, after far too many crashes. XUL is pretty badly designed as an extension API. Many had asked firefox devs, nevertheless, about the possibility of maintaining backwards compatability with existing plugins, only requring the new API for new plugins. They said that such major changes were planned to browser internals that the amount of porting it would take for plugin developers just to keep up would mean a major rewrite of plugins anyway.

XUL and friends is a very low level interface, and is extremely unsafe since it exposes so much of the browser internals. This is a serious security problem. It is infeasible for the browser maintainers to verify the safety of these extensions. WebExtensions will improve security greatly. Really, Ive always thought the way Firefox does extensions is foolish for this reason and just asking for trouble.

WebExtensions does have an advantage, its compatable with Google Chrome, so if you do port, your extensions become available to many more people.

yes, it would be nice if there was a way to keep XUL for existing extensions only, and only require Web Extensions for new extensions. But really, XUL is pretty bad from the security standpoint.

Some, not all, of those extensions are migrating

[MAXOMENOS]

• NoScript is migrating to the WebExtensions API.
• DownThemAll is, rather famously, not moving to WebExtensions API and is calling it quits.
• GreaseMonkey appears to be a migration-in-progress, although it doesn't look great; meanwhile TaperMonkey can be used as a work-around.
• Nuke Anything was last updated in 2014 and appears to be abandonware
• VideoDownloadHelper believes they will be able to migrate to WebExtension API by FF57
• Status-4-Ever might migrate to WebExtensions eventually, but probably not by FF57. Details here.
• Classic Theme Restorer is not migrating and will eventually die.
• UnMHT appears to be a big fat question mark - which is to say that my Google-fu has failed me.

Others?

Re:Use less firefox

[hairyfeet]

Switch to Pale Moon. They haven't been using any FF upstream since the Australis fuckfest and its been doing great, just rock solid classic FF without the bullshit. They have done a ton of tweaking to make FF run better, have better support for video formats, security patches, etc and the devs have been great about answering their users and actually listening to them instead of giving them the bird like Mozilla did!

So please ask any extension devs that make extensions you love to switch to PM, that is what I did and you'd be surprised how many of them are now making their extensions for PM. For any extensions that are not going forward you can talk to the PM devs, they are making their own repo for extensions and its growing by the day.

Old Reliable Firefox, I'll miss you

[scdeimos]

I can't wait to see how awful the web has become. :(

While NoScript is getting ported to WebExtensions, and GreaseMonkey is trying to port to WebExtensions, other useful extensions like Self-Destructing Cookies are giving up entirely [This add-on is no longer maintained. It is incompatible with Firefox 55+ and this will never change. Also, it will not be rewritten as a WebExtension.].

The site Are we WebExtensions Yet? lists some of Firefox's most popular extensions and their porting status to WebExtensions.