On the contrary, the first thing I do is log in to Sync, which is (/claims to be) encrypted so Mozilla can't read your settings/data, and everything Just Works TM.

Plus, I get the added benefit of syncing all my passwords and being able to send pages to my phone, though I would quite like it if it were faster (I've had cases where the pages took days to arrive).

Sync can also be self hosted.

https://github.com/mozilla-services/syncserver

I love firefox but this is one hell of an annoyance I would beat author with a large trump. A hellofablob of dependencies etc. Like it was deliberately build to not self host it (and no I dont want docker).

I really really really hate it for almost 10 years. There was a project rewritting it in go but was abandoned and probably the next thing I will develop will be a replacement .

> and no I dont want docker

Forgive me, but it sounds like you just want to be unhappy about the distribution, because that solves your problem pretty well.

I have freebsd server and jails. Ergo, docker doesnt solve my problem.

Given it's written in python 2.7, it's due for a rewrite if I understand.

maybe not deliberately, but i can imagine that it wasn't built with self-hosting in mind, until someone (from inside or outside) pushed for a self-hosting option.

is there a documented API? how much does it really take to sync? if it's browser encrypted it would really be just login, push or pull a blob. how hard can that be?

FYI you can manually trigger synchronization in both the mobile and desktop browsers, the option isn't buried very deep in either and is the only workaround I've found to avoid delays!

Edit: on mobile it's under Hamburger > Settings > Firefox Account

That's what I usually do, but sometimes I send links from the phone to the desktop so I remember to read them there, and if they never appear I just forget about them.

My problem with sync on mobile is that it appears to be impossible to manually sync the data when the phone's general sync setting is set to off (When I want no apps to sync). My email software let me manually check for new email... this appears to be a Firefox bug.

I haven't needed to do all of these since I set up Sync, which makes me think life might be easier if you just made a Firefox account to sync your settings.

To me Sync and Pocket are extra features (and some others), that should be enabled by user action.

Why doesn't Firefox come with a Mozilla Tools section in Settings which allows easily to enable those services + a button to that settings page on the (bottom/top right) new tab page. This way it would be reachable, but at same time, not so intrusive as it is right now. I would even go as fare and say that the dev-tools should be an addon too, and not ship by default (because probably 99% of the users never use it).

It should be possible to create a delightful browser experience, which respects user privacy and enables power-users/developers to do more.

I believe pocket and especially sync do nothing if you don't use them. This is in absolute contrast with Chrome that ties your whole navigator to your google account if you ever log on gmail...

Pocket link recommendations appear on the new tab page on new installs. You can turn them off, but they are there by default. Additionally the Pocket button persists in the address bar, but is also removable. It's indeed minuscule in comparison with what Chrome does.

That's funny, Chrome's lack of Ctrl+Tab cycling via most recent is a death blow for me. I love that about Firefox, and love that it's configurable.

Otherwise... yeah. It's pretty unusable out the gate.

My new pet theory is that software nowadays is _anti_ power user.

In the 90s and 2000s, software came with a bunch of features that most users would want, and also a few small but powerful features that a tiny portion of their users ("power" users) really cared about. Almost every software had "power" features of some kind. A config file, command line arguments, that kind of stuff.

Nowadays, popular software like Chrome are all too eager to drop "power" features; to make themselves simpler. This avoids confusing general users, at the cost of alienating "power" users.

Dropping Ctrl+tab (heck, making shortcuts support a low priority) is one of such features.

Power users often make it a priority to shut off in-product metrics that would represent their needs statistically. Since ‘power users’ as described are probably 0.01% or less of the world’s population, that’s probably less of a big deal for decision making than it sounds, but it’s always interesting to me to watch a subgroup dedicate itself to not being counted and then complain about the outcomes as if they didn’t contribute to their own workflow’s downturn.

This is a false dichotomy and a strawman.

The only two options are not either participating in often misused, grossly overreaching, non-configurable telemetry programs or disabling them completely.

And power users are not dedicating themselves to not helping the product getting better. You've gotten the argument twisted. We love to make software better by offering up information about how we use a product. However, in this climate the rational response is to disable all telemetry until the situation is under control with better legislation.

Don't paint this with the wrong colors. Power users are not the irrational group here, and this 0.01% figure which you based your argument on isn't grounded in reality, and therefore neither is your argument.

The assumption by framing that telemetry programs are “often” anything notably weakens your argument. A collection of examples of different entities misusing telemetry over time would strengthen your argument.

I don't need to provide evidence of misuse. The terms of the telemetry programs of the most popular mobile apps and modern destkop apps are far too broad. Just like I don't allow my government more power than it needs, not waiting around for proof of misusing unlimited power, I don't need to wait for a dozen major scandals related to telemetry. But certainly, there are dozens upon dozens of cases of people getting damaged by data leaks from other companies (see Equifax), which is a directly related problem.

The overreaching abuse of telemetry and ToS is a known thing, it's public consensus among those who actually read these things, and so the onus of proof is on you to prove otherwise, not me.

Otherwise I would have to provide a collection of different examples every time I explain to someone that an object in motion remains in motion until acted upon by an outside force. At some point, you have to accept consensus as fact unless you can prove otherwise.

Chrome and Firefox both don't even allow reconfiguring most hotkeys. That's not anti power user, that's plain anti-user and anti-accessibility.

You can set these settings using a user.js file, so you don't have to reconfigure everything over and over again.

Yep, if you don't want to use Sync, user.js is an alternative. It's also helpful for sharing settings across multiple profiles. (For the latter, I do wish there was support for including other files...)

There is a user.js project on github[1] maintained by ghacks.net community members that provides a source of documentation for many settings. It's also useful as a way to monitor new and deprecated settings.

[1]: https://github.com/ghacksuserjs/ghacks-user.js

thanks for this!! Hope this will solve my main annoyance with Firefox: sometimes I change Linux distro and then I lose all of my firefox settings, ("sync" would be better and keep flags changed by the users, but I don't think that the FF devs bother about it)

Uh didn't know that, I'll have to redo my `about:config` tweaks in that format.

How does this make for a better "browsing experience"? It is just neurotic nitpicking. A good browsing experience means performance, security, minimal popups and minimal tracking. Firefox provides this OOTB now.

For example the notifications one improves browsing experience by eliminating spam notification popups from news sites

You must be new here... Welcome to HN.

> - about:preferences#general > Downloads > always ask where to save

I hate the default behaviour so much. What's wrong with asking me where to save the file? I almost certainly have a place in mind where the file should go.

I prefer to dump everything in the Downloads folder and move files if they're needed on a longer term.

a useful default would be to ask for the location the first time something is saved and then provide the option to not ask again but reuse that location.

I think it's easier to drag-and-drop from the Downloads folder to where I want to save it, than to dig through a Save dialog to find the folder I want to save something in. So it's less work whether or not you want to put your download somewhere long-term.

The download folder can still be the default, and all you'd have to do is to press "save" if you're okay with the default.

It's a shame they never made a Shift+Click type feature (or something like that) for downloads - like a modifier or menu option that forces the Save As dialog.

I prefer it to get out of my way and just download the file. I'll have time to sort my directories later.

Half the time I actually just want to open the thing but don't give a damn where it goes.

The other half the time I want it to go somewhere, but I'm not in love with using a GUI file explorer to get it there.

It's a good thing that you are actually able to tweak these things to your personal tastes.

Yes it is, and I'm thankful that it is possible.

There is – and always was – someone who gets paid to distract you from doing what you want to do. This is called advertising and we have seen on the web multiple very aggressive excesses here: pop-ups, auto playing sound/video and nowadays notification spam. What I'm trying to say here is, that you shouldn't need to be a nerd to get a pleasant browsing experience.

If you limited your post to just the lines that you're talking about in this post, you'd have "install ublock" and "Notification Settings > Block new requests".

Not very damning, nor nerdy.

But no other major browser is any better in that department, they're all worse.

I can’t imagine why this is the top comment. You’re complaining that you have to set the preferences options to your personal preferences which will certainly differ from other users.

The absolute worst default setting for me is smooth scrolling enabled.

See my sibling comment, that should make it much better.

The one thing that really annoys me in all major browsers, is that you can't set a 'new tab page' without installing an extension. It's a nuts design.

Not sure exactly what you mean, but Firefox allows you to specify both new tab and new window behavior, even independently. Firefox Default, Custom page or just blank.

All I have for New Tabs is 'Firefox Home (Default)' and 'Blank Page', it does not allow me to set a Custom URL.

Which is why I have an extension installed to do it.

I'm not too bothered by this, otherwise I would likely set it to HN and waste even more time than I already do.

Two more about.config:

- gfx.webrender.all = true (important on Linux, fixes jerky scrolling)

- general.smoothScroll.mouseWheel.durationMaxMS = 200 (makes mouse scroll animation faster)

Once upon a time, software would go through all of the configuration options and explain what they did. This would always happen on a new installation but good software also had a button to click to repeat the walkthrough.

Ode to user-friendly software.

That's not at all true, any and all wizards or configuration dialogues would go over a small subset of settings deemed 'important' by someone. There isn't a single program out there anywhere that has a walkthrough that goes through all configuration options. At least I don't believe one to exist, I would certainly be enthusiastic to be proven wrong!

About:config in Firefox has 3930 lines. That would be a very, very, very long walkthrough :) I can see it now, "Okay, to use Firefox, you will now have to click 'next' 4000 times." Thanks.

I remember installing Linux like that during the (early?) 90s. It took about two days of answering endless questions ("Do you want Klingon fonts?")

I much prefer what we get nowadays.

About 10 years later (sometime in 01-03) I remember installing Red Hat from the CDs in the school library. It was absolutely no problem to get it working for what I needed it for, and with minimal tweaking (I had no clue back then) I got sound working as well.

Remember, this was back in the days were on Windows you'd carefully archive any CDs or diskettes that came with your computer to have a chance to reinstall it and Linux just worked (sometimes, it wasn't always that easy back then.)

Sounds like you must have chosen the expert install option (or whatever they called it) in slackware install scripts..

Are you sure there wasn't also an option to just install a typical server or desktop application set, or just install everything? :)

But do you get Klingon fonts?

I tried blocking the telemetry but stuff kept coming back with updates.

In the end, using Little Snitch (on mac), I ended up blocking firefox communicating with mozilla.org. I update firefox via safari.

I don't do any of those things, and I find the experience nice. These are pretty specific customizations.

Your first two changes seem to be the default now.

Problem is, all those are preference settings that change with each user's preferences, and at the end of the day they need to default to something, so it only makes sense that they default on what might be most useful for most users.

Just as a quick counterexample, in my case:

> about:preferences#general > Startup > restore previous session

Same.

> about:preferences#general > Tabs > uncheck Ctrl+Tab cycle

Never have used Ctrl+Tab so no point in disabling it. Never going to push those keys, so the default doesn't bother me at all.

> about:preferences#general > Downloads > always ask where to save

I do _not_ want having to indicate where to save. That's why I have a Downloads folder; everything downloaded must go to the Downloads folder, no questions asked. I'll delete or organize later.

> about:preferences#home > Firefox Home Content > disable all except Top Sites

Same for me.

> about:preferences#privacy > Permission > Notification Settings > Block new requests

Same for me.

> about:preferences#privacy > Firefox Data Collection and Use > disable

I don't really mind. Depending on the mood, it will be disabled or left enabled upon a new installation. If it helps them develop Firefox, I'm willing to let Mozilla snoop a bit.

> Set in about:config extensions.pocket.enabled to false

Never used Pocket. Could disable it, but I just hide the icon. Lately I've been thinking that maybe I'm missing on some nice feature that the browser is offering me and I'm ignoring...

> Install the addons: uBlock Origin, Gesturefy, Firefox Multi-Account Containers

Those are your choice of extensions. Although I coincide with uBlock and the Multi-Account ones. The later, though, is just in a very preliminary development state; it needs much more work IMHO to be even a candidate for integration into the default installation. Right now, it is too minimal (missing convenience features such as exporting the settings and sync with the official Mozilla service)

> I remove the home button

I want my Home button. I have to explicitly enable it in Chrome, so I could complain about the same thing you do.

> I remove the sidebar button

I want my sidebar easily accessible, frequently swapping between "Tabs" and "Bookmark Search Plus 2". My sidebar is 99% time open.

> I reject every Firefox pop-up that wants me to enable Sync or whatever

I want my Mozilla account set up for synchronization of everything it allows (except history). It's a fundamental part of my workflow and it's the first thing I enable after a clean installation.

In summary, your preferences are just as valid as mine and any other person's, so I'd understand that they will never find a perfect set of defaults that would satisfy everybody.

EDIT: Added separation between paragraphs