What's your thoughts on what Walton said

[tomatoshadow2]

Hey guys, I just wanted to hear if you had any thoughts on what Research Engineer from Mozilla Patrick Walton, said when the old add-ons were killed, it was a huge security improvement for Firefox Quantum. Here's the link to the tweet. https://twitter.com/pcwalton/status/1039224389521170432
Mods if I'm not allowed to post Twitter links, please remove.

[therube]

Two-faced BS.

Yes, Legacy extensions can do anything & everything.

Yet there was no outcry, no extension apocalypse.
Extensions worked. Were useful. People used them.

Extensions & community made Mozilla.

Now there is nothing but crap.
Crap extensions. Nowhere near as good as their predecessors. Horrible UI & UX.

People, apologists, as I think of them, make every excuse in the book, oh, it turns out I really didn't need, oh, I learned I can do without, oh...

That's BS. That's accepting less!

Why!

We are a consumerist society, we want more, more, more, not less.


And to top it off, currently, the Mozilla webextension process is riddled with malware.
Malware in the actual extensions, & malware in the process of "extensions"; reviews, transparency, open[ness] (one of Mozilla's big "manifesto" words [the other being profit]).

[toolong]

Two-faced BS.

Don't hold back!! Tell us how you really feel!!

[tomatoshadow2]

I totally agree, I love Firefox, will forever use it, as you said, the whole extensions thing is not good, can I ever imagine them to go back to the old system guys? Most of the compliments I've always read are just about less extensions tbh.

[Benjamin Markson]

It’s underappreciated how massive of a security improvement it was to kill old addons in Firefox Quantum.

The security argument is a straw man (aka two-face BS).

I think Quantum illustrates two things. It's easier to lock-down the tools than it is to allow your users to control their own experience. Mozilla follow in the field where they once led.

To be fair, maybe today's technology has become too complex and fast-paced for it to be led by visionary mavericks. If you want a career in software then the Silicon Valley way is the only way. Quantum is the Silicon Valley way.

Ben.

[malliz]

Another load of Rose grower from the "security experts" who let conduit flood AMO for years. They must have a weekly "think up another excuse" meeting where they get high on Mountain Dew and run competitions to see who can post the lamest excuse.

[mightyglydd]

But mal they've hired a new security tsar from the GRU Google, https://www.darkreading.com/risk/mozill ... id/1332726
What could possibly go wrong ?

[malliz]

involving policy, trust, and security

The trust horse bolted years ago

[tomatoshadow2]

Yes well said malliz and Mighty, that should be very interesting as well.

[frg]

Well with Webassembly and service workers in the future no one needs to tell me about better security

In theory web extensions are more secure because they are theoretically confined to content only. With the planned memshrink (rip out everything this is useful) and more parallel processes this in theory becomes more secure.

Personally i think they were discontinued so fast because they were unable to make all this work properly with e10s.

[tomatoshadow2]

Good point frg.

[mightyglydd]

Yep, I seem to recall a MozCo list of e10 compatible extensions, it was seldom updated and the majority of 'Compatible' extensions hadn't been tested !

[toolong]

Yep, I seem to recall a MozCo list of e10 compatible extensions, it was seldom updated and the majority of 'Compatible' extensions hadn't been tested !

I remember that list. But I thought that is was 'users of the extension(s)' that were supposed to test them and to report their findings. Maybe some of the extensions didn't have many users? Or they did work and it was not reported. People, in general, don't report successes.

[mightyglydd]

Hah, that's another subject, if they wanted users to test, why wasn't there a simple e10 On/Off option in Builds?
Farting about with ever changing about:config settings made it a royal PITA.

[tomatoshadow2]

Yes, they should of definitely done all of this, especially the e10s on/off switch, seemed to take forever to get e10s.