Hey Lemmy, what browser do you use and why?
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Cromite. A de-googled, hardened fork of Chromium. Not perfect by any means. But it gets the job done admirably.
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Ironfox on mobile and qutebrowser on my computer.
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Ironfox on phone, Librewolf on computer.
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There's many options for browsers that can sync with your phone. I used to love Brave until all the shifty moves they pulled. Installing paid propietary software without consent, switching the telemetry on without saying anything and claiming it was an accident...
And their ad block is like a leaking sieve compared to uBO/Ad-Nauseum. Not to mention useless when they've been known to put ads on the homescreen and in the browser itself. Then underneath all that you have Google lurking in the shadows, ready to take your data and sell you advertisements tailored to your interests.
I had had enough of both Brave and Reddit when my umpteenth Brave search was being advertised to me on Reddit.
Librewolf might not sync due to how pure and barebones it is, but you could check out Zen or Floorp or Firedragon. Any FF fork that lets you login with a Mozilla account will work. I never sync, myself, but from what I've seen you should be able to.
I do like the Brave browser itself, so I get it. But even plain old Firefox might be the lesser of two evils here. Just search up "brave browser drama" and check things out. It gets kind of nasty. The devs are not the most trustworthy people...
Sorry if this sounded pushy. I'm not trying to be. I got burned with Brave and it still stings a bit, lol.
wrote on last edited by [email protected]Don't worry, I get it. That's partly why I commented here. Ive been kinda hoping someone would chime in and tell me about a browser that can block ads and sync with your phone without being, you know, chromium.
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
wrote on last edited by [email protected]Qutebrowser and Firefox depending on what I'm browsing as qutebrowser is nicer but firefox has better adblock and addon support. Firefox with tridactyl is really good these days and very close to qutebrowser ux quality. Chromium for web development as chrome devtools are still unmatched unfortunately.
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Qutebrowser and Firefox depending on what I'm browsing as qutebrowser is nicer but firefox has better adblock and addon support. Firefox with tridactyl is really good these days and very close to qutebrowser ux quality. Chromium for web development as chrome devtools are still unmatched unfortunately.
You've just changed my life with Tridactyl. It even has themes... This is what I'm missing. I can't wait to try this. I love Qutebrowser, but no matter what custom lists I add (even using all three list types), I can't get it it block everything. And I can't find a Greasemonkey youtube script that works.
Tridactyl is going to be so much fun. Thank you!!
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Firefox, Floor and Brave (Brave to play DRM content)
Floorp and Firefox can play DRM, I think. There's a checkbox in the settings, at least. I've never tried it because I use third party apps to play DRM media.
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Zen, a heavily modified firefox. A different design paradigm than every other browser, which I personally like. Easy hot keys, runs on any OS, lots of customizability.
Needless to say I'm a big fan!
I keep Zen around for the same reason. However, right now its fairly laggy and buggy so I keep checking back after updates.
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This ia what they call an echo chamber. You took it at face value and didn't question it.
I don't disagree. I was young and stupid.
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Zen, a heavily modified firefox. A different design paradigm than every other browser, which I personally like. Easy hot keys, runs on any OS, lots of customizability.
Needless to say I'm a big fan!
Yeah, I never thought I'd be a vertical tabs fan, but I am really loving it in combination with their compact mode. Really nice layout with the containers, pinned tabs and essential tabs! Also really digging the Glance feature and floating URL bar. I'm really looking forward to folder support!
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Firefox bc fuck chrome
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I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Heavily modified vivaldi.
Vertical tabs on the left side. Side panels with often used tools. Autohiding UI, pop-out links.
I cannot live without native mouse gestures and the Vivaldi speed dial. Opera also offers it, but that browser is unfortunately a shell of what it was.Zen browser as a semi backup.
I tried using zen as my main browser for a month, but I ended up going back to Vivaldi. It's just so much better.
-
I'm what's known as a chronic hopper. I'm always on the lookout for new software, especially when it comes to browsers and Linux distros, but I'm here to ask you about browsers specifically. I'm fairly sure I know most of them, but I want to really know why you run what you do. In return, I will give you my experiences with the browsers that I have tried and why I hopped from them if I did.
Don't feel the need to read the list. I'll be more than happy to just hear your answers!
- Firefox: One of the grand-daddy browsers. I honestly didn't hop from it due to anything specific, but more that I've used it so much that I needed a change.
- Chrome: I used this very little. Just being on it made my skin crawl. However, I still keep it around in a container because some sites straight up tell you that you have to use it to access their dashboards or application forms. While that is now much less these days (as most things will now ask for Chrome or Firefox now), it still does happen, especially on dated government sites that get updated like... once a decade...
- Opera GX: Yup, I fell into the hype. I think I used this for all of a month before recognizing it as over-engineered and needlessly bloated. It pulls you in with gimmicks and pretty lights and that's pretty much all it has. A browser that's literally built on smoke and mirrors and pushy advertising.
- Brave: There's been a lot of huff about Brave lately, but back when it launched and wasn't very mainstream it was the smoothest and a relatively more secure browser than the competition. There was a time when nearly everyone ran Brave. The problem started when they began to opt you into gimmicks and extra things you didn't need without your permission. That was a turnoff for me. I outed before things really went downhill.
-Floorp: A random find from exploring Linux for the first time. I was running Pop!_OS and found it on the store. I've never experienced such a smooth Firefox fork before. It really is barebones, but has a lot of customization built in. Instead of the custom options piling on one another, most of them change how it works on a foundational level. The style of your UI and tabs, side tabs, fading URL bar buttons, and a lot more. At it's core, Floorp is a stripped down and security first FF fork developed in Japan. I took the time to translate the TOS pages, and most of it is promising that there is no data collection. It's fairly vetted and trusted from what I've researched. - Vivaldi: Still one of my favorite browsers when I went back to Windows, but probably has the most bugs I've seen in any browser. It got better once they swapped to React portals, but Vivaldi (Windows version) would occasionally freeze my whole PC or else I'd BSOD. This was a combination of the browser's stability and making my own custom CSS for it, but overall it frustrated me more than other browsers.
- Qutebrowser: Still one of my favorites, and a must-have for me even if its not my main browser. I was diving into the Vimium extension for Firefox, which in turn led me to Neovim, which led me to Qutebrowser. There's a few main points as to why I don't use it as my go-to. First, its not very good at squashing first-party ads. Even though you can combo custom ad block lists, Brave adblock, and python-adblock, it just can't seem to get them all. Second, I rely on my history when browsing YouTube and if you want to get around ads, your best bet is to write a custom shortcut that opens links in MPV/VLC. There are Greasemonkey scripts that should increase ad speed to a fraction of a second and auto-skip, but none of them ever worked for me and most are ancient.
- Nyxt: My next logical step after Qutebrowser was Nyxt. However, I've never managed to figure out how to work it. I haven't really done any extensive bug testing, but when it opens its just a blank window and there's not much I could find for documentation on it. Part of me wonders if there's something that only trusted people know that gets it working, the other part wonders if I'm just missing some sort of library or dependency. From here I went back to Floorp for a while.
-Zen: I was very excited when I found this browser. Another Firefox fork, it aims to be much like Arc browser, but adds a lot more on top of that. However, in recent months I find they've become a little too ambitious. If you asked me two months ago, I would tell you that Zen felt just as smooth as Floorp, but these days its much, much laggier. The scrolling is choppy, the pages load slow. I use the same exact extensions on Zen as I do Floorp and the difference now is night and day. I've also tested this on fresh, no-extras no-extension installations and the results are the same. Zen tends to change things and instead of letting the user opt into the additions or changes, they force the changes in their updates. That type of development model just isn't really for me. I don't want to have to re-figure out how to use my browser every few days.
So there it is. I hop a LOT. Honorable mention is Ladybird and I've tested it a little. It is extremely alpha, being just a portal with the basics you need for browsing, but I'm amazed at what they've done so far and very excited for it's release. For now I've returned to Floorp and am very happy with it. I'm very curious to know why you like what you do, whether its just because its what you've used for a long time or if there's something that you can't do without.
Also, please excuse me if this question has been asked before. I didn't want to necro an old post and I want to be able to reply and ask more questions! I've seen many posts discussing a single browser, but I want a more general view. I'm very interested, because the Lemmy community often values their privacy and their rights, which is a major factor in choosing software for me.
Edit: I feel like I'm answering very quickly, but want you to know that I'm not a bot nor using AI. I type at 110wpm in Dvorak. Typing is a huge hobby of mine and would never use AI to do something I love to do for me. I'm set on getting to 200wpm (100 was my first goal). That being said, I can't answer everyone, so I'm sorry if I missed your reply!
Chrome for pages in Japanese I need to translate.
Chrome/Edge for certain Japanese govt websites that won't work in firefox (taxes and other such via the My Number program). I mostly use edge for this just so I can have the other pages of documentation open to translate in Chrome
Firefox for everything else.
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You've just changed my life with Tridactyl. It even has themes... This is what I'm missing. I can't wait to try this. I love Qutebrowser, but no matter what custom lists I add (even using all three list types), I can't get it it block everything. And I can't find a Greasemonkey youtube script that works.
Tridactyl is going to be so much fun. Thank you!!
Glad to expose it to more people - it's truly great!
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Chrome for pages in Japanese I need to translate.
Chrome/Edge for certain Japanese govt websites that won't work in firefox (taxes and other such via the My Number program). I mostly use edge for this just so I can have the other pages of documentation open to translate in Chrome
Firefox for everything else.
Is the built-in Firefox translator bad for Japanese?
I ditched chromium a long time ago. Luckily any gov sites I need to use nowadays have FF variants support -
The closest thing I've found to Vivaldi tab management without installing a bunch of custom CSS and extensions is Zen Browser. Zen would be my favorite browser if it was a little lighter, but it's worth checking out if you like Vivaldi, imo.
I tried Zen and while it was really nice looking it didn’t quite jive with me. One of my students suggested Floorp today, might mess around with it this weekend.
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I tried Zen and while it was really nice looking it didn’t quite jive with me. One of my students suggested Floorp today, might mess around with it this weekend.
Zen and Floorp both have multiple UI designs you can change through the settings. I think Zen only has side-style tabs, though. Floorp is more malleable and has several UI variants plus many options to change how it works alongside integrated Tree Style Tabs support.
If you don't want all the customization and such, Librewolf would be the choice. It's a "just the basics" Firefox fork. No additives, no telemetry, nothing. The settings page is incredibly short, lol.
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Glad to expose it to more people - it's truly great!
I'm in love with Vim shortcuts as is. Having a bit of trouble figuring it out, though. Trying to track down the config folder. I have firefox-tridactyl added on Arch, but I also just installed it as an extension through Floorp. No idea where I'm supposed to find the configs for either. I'd like to make a theme using my custom astigmatism-friendly colors.
Well, I've been through the Arch sacred texts, so this won't be new to me. Time to get some reading in, lol.
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I'm curious as to see how Floorp would work on Japanese sites. Its developed in Japan, so it should work good. I understand that there are still too many sites that won't work without Chrome though, it's a major pain.
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Firefox bc fuck chrome
Number one on the list of why you should use Firefox, lol. Fuck Chrome.
