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Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by lol768 on Friday February 03, 2023 @09:46AM (#34641644)
> There's nothing actually substantive about it. It doesn't feel like it belongs on HN.

Most of the comments on every new Firefox release post are just as bad and have nothing to do with the actual release (folks whining about how their incredibly-niche use-case isn't supported anymore which breaks their workflow etc.), so in some ways it's nice to see something positive (which I would wager is more representative of the average user).

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by Ygg2 on Friday February 03, 2023 @10:07AM (#34641976)
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by goose847 on Friday February 03, 2023 @11:33AM (#34643420)
Wow there really is an xkcd for everything.
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by Zecc on Friday February 03, 2023 @12:17PM (#34644270)
You didn't know that one?

You must be one of today's lucky 10000 [1].

  [1] https://xkcd.com/1053/
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by NetOpWibby on Friday February 03, 2023 @03:59PM (#34647636)
It's xkcd's, all the way down.
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by Elyra on Friday February 03, 2023 @04:44PM (#34648148)
> It's xkcd's, all the way down.

Forgot your link [1]

[1] https://xkcd.com/1416/

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by NetOpWibby on Saturday February 04, 2023 @05:37PM (#34659162)
BRUH
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by chrsig on Friday February 03, 2023 @04:46PM (#34648170)
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by NetOpWibby on Saturday February 04, 2023 @05:37PM (#34659163)
Incredible
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by SilasX on Friday February 03, 2023 @10:50AM (#34642672)
By coincidence, just this morning I had a panic because I tried to close FF by closing the only window (which is something I need to do periodically because memory usage will build up over time), and I thought I had lost the tabs because when I opened it back up, they were gone with no way to restore. Apparently the behavior had changed so that closing the last window no longer closes FF, but just that window a la Skype.

(Fortunately I was able to figure out what was going on and restored the previous window.)

Also, the automatic "check before exiting FF" got turned off somehow.

So, yeah, lots of fun surprises to deal with.

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by michaelmrose on Friday February 03, 2023 @11:57AM (#34643869)
Firefox normal collection, automatic or triggered in about:memory, will reduce memory used by Firefox about the same as restarting firefox. The latter only SEEMS to reduce usage because it also unloads all tabs which are only reloaded when accessed. If you want to prove that to yourself compare a restart preserving tabs and manually trigger tab unloading in about:unloads

If you are dealing with normal amounts of memory usage and you have less than 16GB you may consider upgrading RAM considering this is as little as $40-60 at this point and well worth the look.

The check before closing multiple tabs didn't get turned off somehow the default changed in 2021 to default unchecked.

Lastly the behavior regarding closing the last window closing Firefox remains unchanged. It does in fact still work that way. If it didn't properly close I would suggest that is a bug or a second window on another workspace. If all you desire is to restart as opposed to actually closing firefox you can trigger a restart in about:profiles this has the benefit of working no matter how many windows you have open.

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by SilasX on Friday February 03, 2023 @12:32PM (#34644589)
>Firefox normal collection, automatic or triggered in about:memory, will reduce memory used by Firefox about the same as restarting firefox.

Obviously not, since the memory usage is increasing without bound despite no corresponding increase in memory-intensive tabs. Thanks for suggesting an alternate workaround for the collection failures though.

>If you are dealing with normal amounts of memory usage and you have less than 16GB you may consider upgrading RAM considering this is as little as $40-60 at this point and well worth the look.

I have 32 GB, which it (thankfully) hasn't come close to, but would, if I weren't periodically restarting. Kinda funny how we automatically don't expect 16 GB to be enough memory for text/image web pages though.

>The check before closing multiple tabs didn't get turned off somehow the default changed in 2021 to default unchecked.

Makes sense, I think it was a while since I was shocked to see that behavior.

>Lastly the behavior regarding closing the last window closing Firefox remains unchanged. It does in fact still work that way. If it didn't properly close I would suggest that is a bug or a second window on another workspace.

No other workspaces, so probably a bug. I found this report of something very similar, though on Mac rather than Windows:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1772056

>If all you desire is to restart as opposed to actually closing firefox you can trigger a restart in about:profiles this has the benefit of working no matter how many windows you have open.

Thanks, but I'd prefer the option that can be done with a few quick key commands, and Firefox isn't customizable in that way anymore.

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by michaelmrose on Friday February 03, 2023 @02:03PM (#34646252)
The quit behavior does seem to be a Mac specific behavior not a bug. You'll note the request to change it is labeled an enhancement as opposed to a bug. I agree it seems a sub-optimal choice.

Your memory usage growing without bounds on the other hand is obviously a bug. I would create a fresh profile and see if you can reproduce this behavior without extensions and report it.

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by hojjat12000 on Friday February 03, 2023 @12:17PM (#34644271)
I also suggest using Tab Session Manager. Sometimes I save a session and close everything and start working on a different project, but I know I can go back to my previous session and continue the previous project. I'm not afraid of losing any tabs because it also has an autosave.
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by jml7c5 on Friday February 03, 2023 @05:40PM (#34648820)
Does it save each tab's back/forward history? AFAIK, the WebExtension API doesn't provide any robust mechanism to obtain it directly.
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by entropie on Friday February 03, 2023 @01:26PM (#34645617)
> and I thought I had lost the tabs because when I opened it back up, they were gone with no way to restor

You know ```Ctrl+shift+t``` this opens the last closed tab and - at least in chrome - restores the previous environment after restart

Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by mrinterweb on Friday February 03, 2023 @01:27PM (#34645647)
Yeah. The votes are just the normal FF fanclub, which I'm a card holding member of. This post seems a bit like karma farming to me.
Re:Tell HN: Firefox Is an awesome browser right now by Zuiii on Friday February 03, 2023 @10:57PM (#34651322)
> (folks whining about how their incredibly-niche use-case isn't supported anymore which breaks their workflow etc.)

If these complaints come up every release, then perhaps they aren't "incredibly-niche" after all. At least not what they represent in aggregate.

Browsers remind me a lot of superstores and why successful ones go out of their way to stock low-volume specialty items despite them having low profit margins, costing more to handle and stock, and having a very small subset of their customers care enough to buy them:

1. Customers will usually go to a store that's further away from them if it has 100% of the items they want even when your store is much closer but only has 95%.

2. Cut enough of those low-volume items and you'll become that 95% store for most of you customers.

What the team steering firefox need to understand is that the average user is a myth. The average user does not exist. Every user is unique and has their own set of peculiarities. If you remove enough functionality based on telemetry or your own limited perception of what "niche" is (hello, gnome!), everyone will eventually be affected.

I think most of Firefox's hemorrhaging of users today is because Firefox became a 95% browser for most developers and users.