Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by jedberg on Monday June 27, 2022 @12:46PM (#31897194)

A semantic nitpick that is totally irrelevant. Most people on this website usually mean Gecko when they say they want to use Firefox.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by judge2020 on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:02PM (#31897417)

Really? You mean people don't use Firefox because:

- it protects what's important

- you can "Personalize your experience with new colorways."

- has Facebook Container

- syncs across your devices

Mozilla knows the actual engine isn't the deciding factor when trying to get people to change browsers.

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by giancarlostoro on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:17PM (#31897646)

You're on about regular Firefox, not iOS Firefox which is just a UI wrapped around a WebKit component.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by judge2020 on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:23PM (#31897734)

All of those features are possible on iOS via webkit.

Regarding mobile browsers specifically, their advantage over Safari here is blocking cryptominer scripts and autoplay videos: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browsers/mobile/compar...

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by ginko on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:44PM (#31898017)

Adblocking only works* on vanilla Safari. I haven't gotten it to work on Firefox for iOS.

* For some degree of "works", ublock origin is way better

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by anonymousab on Monday June 27, 2022 @03:50PM (#31899847)

iOS as blocking isn't anywhere near as powerful as Firefox extensions, not what it will eventually need to be.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by shreyshnaccount on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:42PM (#31897998)

But that's not the point-we want gecko and we want it to be good!

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by GekkePrutser on Monday June 27, 2022 @03:35PM (#31899666)

The colorways were an antifeature to me (seriously what's the point of introducing a feature when you're already planning to drop it 2 months later) and I'm still waiting for real containers on mobile (the fb one is useless to me as I don't use Facebook) but the other features yeah they're great

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by rPlayer6554 on Monday June 27, 2022 @12:59PM (#31897378)

Let's not pretend all of HN is a hive mind. I for one thought that Firefox the browser had chosen not to be on IOS because to they couldn't use Gecko. This is new information to me.

So no, using the proper names for things is not a semantic nitpick. The commentator didn't not try to invalidate the parent's point, just show the language issue.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by mtomweb on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:02PM (#31897411)

The Mozillians don't think actual Firefox is available on iOS and neither should you.

You can read Mozilla's submission about the #AppleBrowserBan here: https://www.regulations.gov/comment/NTIA-2022-0001-0131

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by JamesSwift on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:25PM (#31897756)

Right, so you can use a Firefox-themed safari, nothing "actual" about it. Coming from Firefox on Android to Firefox on iOS, I can assure you the experiences are in no way similar. The main reason I even use Firefox on iOS is for the sync integration. I honestly can't think of another thing that Firefox is able to do on iOS that makes it "Firefox" at all.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by kevinmgranger on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:03PM (#31897424)

"actual" Firefox absolutely means using their engine.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by briandear on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:23PM (#31897737)

The average consumer doesn’t know the difference nor care. They want to open webpages and have them work.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by codedokode on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:43PM (#31898012)

There is a difference. Gecko might implement features that would allow sites to work and look better in Firefox (for example, smoother scrolling, better animations, new CSS/HTML/JS features and so on). But Apple doesn't allow other browser engines, and Firefox cannot use this as an advantage to compete with Safari.

Also, if Apple allowed other browser engines with better support for new features, then web developers might stop caring about supporting Safari. This might be another reason why Apple doesn't want other browsers on their devices.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by Spivak on Monday June 27, 2022 @08:10PM (#31902565)

Apple wants to make sure that all websites work on their phones out of the box the horror.

Like take the alternative world where the first thing you have to do after setting up your iPhone is installing Chrome because developers found it less effort to just target Chrome. Are we better off?

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by gernb on Monday June 27, 2022 @01:58PM (#31898214)

Plenty of webpages don't work in Safari because Safari doesn't ship the APIs that other browsers have been shipping for years.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by dmitriid on Monday June 27, 2022 @02:31PM (#31898669)

Safari is my primary browser day in day out.

The only pages that don't work in it are developed by people who believe that Chrome-only APIs are standard.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by postalrat on Monday June 27, 2022 @03:08PM (#31899265)

Like web push. Supported in both chrome and firefox for ages. But apple not interested because it can replace apps with web pages.

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by dmitriid on Tuesday June 28, 2022 @12:08AM (#31903976)

Yup. When you ask people "what exactly so horrible about Safari", WebPush is inevitably the number one thing, followed by a bunch of Chrome non-standards like hardware APIs.

Truly, truly a horrible browser that is impossible to use (even though I've been using it for over 10 years now)

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by al_borland on Monday June 27, 2022 @06:47PM (#31901925)

https://developer.apple.com/wwdc22/10098

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by twism on Monday June 27, 2022 @03:17PM (#31899408)

web workers is an example of a standard api that only got implemented (partly) recently. they are more examples like ths

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by dmitriid on Monday June 27, 2022 @05:37PM (#31901182)

You mean Web Workers that were available in Safari since version 4?

Or Shared Web Workers that were originally implemented in Safari version 5? No idea why they got removed to re-appear later, and I honestly can't care: I prefer browsers to be careful with standards than just rush forward.

Why is it that these "examples" are never actual examples?

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Re:Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security by Someone on Monday June 27, 2022 @12:59PM (#31897384)

If you’re going to nitpick, you can run Gecko on iOS. I see two ways that, according to the letter of Apple’s rules, would be legal:

- don’t allow it to browse the web (https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines, section 2.5.6: “Apps that browse the web must use the appropriate WebKit framework and WebKit Javascript”)

- compile Gecko to JavaScript and run it in Safari.

If you serve the compiled Gecko from a web server I don’t see them stopping you from doing the second, but of course, it would just be Gecko, not FireFox, and performance ‘might’ be somewhat subpar.

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