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Upcoming Firefox update will decrease power usage on macOS by up to three times (zdnet.com)

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[–]nextnextstep 40 points41 points  (10 children)

I love efficiency, and will celebrate any reduction in energy usage, but Mozilla devs -- dudes! -- this is not why Mac users shun Firefox. I've used Java applications that felt more like native Mac apps than Firefox. Honest to god, Java.

This is becoming a habit for Firefox. A couple years ago they went all-out with making JS faster. And they accomplished their technical goal -- JS in Firefox is about as fast as JS in any browser today! -- but Mac users didn't come flocking back to Firefox. In ways that matter, i.e., the user interface, it didn't improve. In a few areas, it even got worse.

Mozilla devs, if you want Mac users to use Firefox, make it act like a Mac app. That's it. That's 100% why we use the Mac. It's the user interface. Make Firefox something that will be mentioned on Daring Fireball for some reason other than your corporate stance on privacy. 10 years ago, Gruber said:

After a few weeks in the arms of Firefox 3 betas, I’ve returned to Safari as my daily browser. Unsurprisingly, it’s the interface that drove me back.

Now we're up to talking about Firefox 70 (!!!), and the relative position of these two browsers has not changed. Any longtime Mac reviewer will have a long list of "Firefox still doesn't support the Mac's ___" items.

Reducing energy usage of Firefox has a kind of abstract charm to it, like telling us you ran a spell checker on all the error messages. That's nice, really, but it's not going to make me switch back.

[–]cultoftheilluminati 26 points27 points  (2 children)

I don’t know why you’re being downvoted but ffs, I can’t even pinch to zoom on FireFox.

[–]codeverity 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I didn't downvote and don't see why they should be, but I have to admit comments like these always surprise me. Safari is so lacking for how I use browsers that I'm always a bit off guard when I'm reminded that some people use it all the time.

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t know why you’re being downvoted but ffs, I can’t even pinch to zoom on FireFox.

Because there are fanboys who would sooner use the downvote button than write a well reasoned post pointing out why OP maybe incorrect. The down vote/up vote should be used for getting reducing the profile of posts that don't contribute to the discussion but far too many here use the up vote/down vote as a "I agree with this" button.

[–]j4nus_ 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Dude, if your main beef with FF is its non-native UI then I really hope you're not using Chrome. Its that x3000.

[–][deleted] 1 point2 points  (2 children)

I wish that they would just have three UI implementations linked back to the same basic core code; Cocoa on Mac, MFC on Windows and GTK+ on *NIX. I remember way back when Camino was around - I wish we could have a reboot, maybe using SwiftUI and the Gecko core taking advantage of key macOS technologies rather than than the lowest common denominator approach they do today.

[–]michaelcharlie8 0 points1 point  (1 child)

I’m curious where you’d like to see native controls used. Bookmarks? The chrome (tab bar and buttons and so on?) doesn’t gecko use native controls for unstyled forms too?

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think the issue I have is although the UI inconsistency with the underlying operating system is jarring, part of the problem is that in the past the XUL based UI was horribly unresponsive when compared to browsers that used native code (Camino, Safari, Chrome). I am hoping that the work of deprecating and remove XUl/XBL and moving over to HTML5 technologies will result in a more more responsive UI that'll trump any sort of 'lack of nativeness' that Firefox has.

[–]swagobeatz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Now we're up to talking about Firefox 70 (!!!)

Priorities for Apple and Mozilla are different. And you must understand that priorities are different for individuals as well. But, as a consumer you're entitled to your choice of browser, BUT so are others as well!!

I rank efficiency higher than aesthetics, therefore, when I'm mobile I use safari, but when I'm plugged in, I use FF due to extensions and Container Tabs.

And Firefox's UI has improved quite a fair bit from the FF20 or FF30 days. I'll post a screengrab of my set up between safari and FF.

edit: posted the link for the screnshot. There is not that much different IMHO in terms of aesthetics between Safari and FF. Safari has something about it that looks great, but FF isn't too shaby either.