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Firefox is fine. The people running it are not

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  • But the common understanding is a bit different than yours.

    the common understanding is that android is a different operating system to ubuntu, and macos is a different operating system to openbsd

    Would Debian GNU/kFreeBSD be 50% Linux, 50% FreeBSD under your definition even though it has no Linux code?

    it is what it is: a completely different thing… BSD system tools with a linux kernel

    You’re gunna do you and use your own definitions and I respect that. But the first line from the page is

    Debian GNU/kFreeBSD is a port that consists of GNU userland using the GNU C library on top of FreeBSD's kernel, coupled with the regular Debian package set.

    It is literally GNU userland using the GNU C library on top of FreeBSD's kernel, coupled with the regular Debian package set

    You can say Debian GNU/kFreeBSD is BSD system tools with a Linux kernel but you would be evidently and clearly wrong.

    Anyways. I wish you well. Best of luck.

  • You’re gunna do you and use your own definitions and I respect that. But the first line from the page is

    Debian GNU/kFreeBSD is a port that consists of GNU userland using the GNU C library on top of FreeBSD's kernel, coupled with the regular Debian package set.

    It is literally GNU userland using the GNU C library on top of FreeBSD's kernel, coupled with the regular Debian package set

    You can say Debian GNU/kFreeBSD is BSD system tools with a Linux kernel but you would be evidently and clearly wrong.

    Anyways. I wish you well. Best of luck.

    okay, sorry i got the kernel and system tools mixed up in my head after reading it. that proves nothing other than the fact that you’re looking for a gotcha rather than a serious discussion

  • okay, sorry i got the kernel and system tools mixed up in my head after reading it. that proves nothing other than the fact that you’re looking for a gotcha rather than a serious discussion

    That’s ok! I was just trying to help you see the difference. You do now. It’s a win/win. There was a reason why I kept on brining up Debian GNU/kFreeBSD. It really highlights the difference.

  • When I asked a couple of developers who work on websites/webapps with a lot of moving parts, they said it was easiest to just test for chrome, since that's what most people use.

    It's turned into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

    It's ironic that I use Firefox personally but unfortunately we prioritized Chrome when I did more front end work too. Firefox would often render views differently compared to Chrome (Safari was also a shetshow) and we had to prioritize work ofc, especially for legacy stuff.

    The thing is, as a pure guess, I would bet that it's Chrome that's not adhering to the web standards.

  • This post did not contain any content.

    One observer has been spectating and commentating on Mozilla since before it was a foundation – one of its original co-developers, Jamie Zawinksi

    ...

    Zawinski has repeatedly said:

    Now hear me out, but What If…? browser development was in the hands of some kind of nonprofit organization?

    In my humble but correct opinion, Mozilla should be doing two things and two things only:

    1. Building THE reference implementation web browser, and
    1. Being a jugular-snapping attack dog on standards committees.
    1. There is no 3.

    This makes sense to me. I initially thought everything that Proton does, that should have been Mozilla. They should have been a collection of services to compete with like O365 and Google One. So I didn’t see a problem with Mozilla selling a VPN, even though if I remember right it being just a Mullvad rebrand.

    Right now to me it looks like Proton is the closest mostly missing a web browser and a more cloud office offering.

    Mozilla functioning more as the reference browser for others to finish packaging and supporting sounds good to me because Mozilla doesn’t seem to be great at attracting general users or even picking what businesses to try and break into.

    Linux kernel devs do Linux kernel development and distros small and large do the integration with everything else needed for an operating system, branding, support, etc. Sounds like Mozilla should have been the core devs for a number of reference software projects. Firefox browser engine. Maybe an equivalent to Electron based on Servo. Shouldn't have dropped Rust and been the steward for the reference Rust compiler. Could have been the steward for FirefoxOS/KaiOS/etc. Support PostmarketOS maybe.

    Linux foundation stewards or contributes to all sorts of software projects not just the kernel but they're all pretty much things that are relevant for users of Linux operating systems. Mozilla could have found some software centric focus that in some way came together thematically. I would guess privacy focused browser and software services

  • It's so damn stupid. If your site works meaningfully differently in Firefox vs Chromium, you're already doing something very, very wrong.

    This is like telling people that they are doing something wrong when they don't "buy low and sell high" when they're trading. Obviously. Issues with browser parity are born from a difficulty of the how and the when, not the what.

  • That’s ok! I was just trying to help you see the difference. You do now. It’s a win/win. There was a reason why I kept on brining up Debian GNU/kFreeBSD. It really highlights the difference.

    and my point is that these things aren’t definitions that have particularly concrete categories… an operating system is not a single thing: it can be many different things which include things like GUIs even… as much as we try to fit the world into neat little boxes, that’s just not how things work

    even the categories of operating systems is messy: take single user vs multi user… macos is single user, but openbsd is multi user… in the beginning, the kernel was largely the same but due to the system tools and configuration, macos became a different classification of operating system

    it’s all super messy, and saying that windows vista and windows 11 are the same operating system is extremely reductive

  • and my point is that these things aren’t definitions that have particularly concrete categories… an operating system is not a single thing: it can be many different things which include things like GUIs even… as much as we try to fit the world into neat little boxes, that’s just not how things work

    even the categories of operating systems is messy: take single user vs multi user… macos is single user, but openbsd is multi user… in the beginning, the kernel was largely the same but due to the system tools and configuration, macos became a different classification of operating system

    it’s all super messy, and saying that windows vista and windows 11 are the same operating system is extremely reductive

    But we can agree that there are upper and lower limits though. And I believe that we can now agree that system utilities and system libraries are outside of that limit. Just because the edge are fuzzy, don’t mean we can’t come to any conclusions at all.

    Any now stepping way way back. I think we can now agree that Fedora, Ubuntu and other distros run the same operating system. That operating system being Linux.

  • Firefox still hasn't fixed Bug 1938998 despite me reporting it multiple times. There's a reason why Firefox is almost non existent on mobile. I've been using the internet for 26 years, and have used Mozilla based browsers since 2001, I want them to survive to the next era of the internet, but they are struggling to keep up. Opera and Edge already gave up their engines, Webkit and Blink are basically the same engine with different standards enabled, and Firefox is under 2% on some days on Statcounter. I feel that soon AI based browsers using their own AI-engine will probably take over the internet soon anyway.

    I use it on mobile. It's mostly OK tbh, and the addition of a working ad blocker means it's far better than Chrome for me.

    In fairness that is an invalid URL in my book, but it should at least be consistent across desktop and mobile, or at least tucked behind an option.

  • You called what?

  • forks cant survive without firefox unfortunately

    Firefox is open source, it’s not going anywhere.

  • This is like telling people that they are doing something wrong when they don't "buy low and sell high" when they're trading. Obviously. Issues with browser parity are born from a difficulty of the how and the when, not the what.

    The how is testing on one other browser.

  • But we can agree that there are upper and lower limits though. And I believe that we can now agree that system utilities and system libraries are outside of that limit. Just because the edge are fuzzy, don’t mean we can’t come to any conclusions at all.

    Any now stepping way way back. I think we can now agree that Fedora, Ubuntu and other distros run the same operating system. That operating system being Linux.

    i certainly don’t agree that system utilities and libraries are outside of that limit and said as much when i commented on Debian GNU/kFreeBSD: its its own thing… its neither debian, nor freebsd. it is however based on both

    the gui is definitively part of the operating system - confirmed by that wikipedia page that you linked (though i’d say only in the case where the gui is heavily tied to the default configuration of the OS like windows, macos, android, etc), and that’s nowhere near the kernel

  • You called what?

    I haven't trusted Mozilla for a long time. They've very shadily constructed a business model which is part for-profit corporation seperated from their other nonprofit component which appears to serve little purpose other than optics. Most of their funding comes from / came from Google. Their suits make a lot of terrible statements about emerging tech all the time.

  • The how is testing on one other browser.

    What a novel idea.

  • It's so damn stupid. If your site works meaningfully differently in Firefox vs Chromium, you're already doing something very, very wrong.

    Yep, this is why at least for me when I develop websites I use Firefox first for development to make sure that the website runs on Firefox.

  • i certainly don’t agree that system utilities and libraries are outside of that limit and said as much when i commented on Debian GNU/kFreeBSD: its its own thing… its neither debian, nor freebsd. it is however based on both

    the gui is definitively part of the operating system - confirmed by that wikipedia page that you linked (though i’d say only in the case where the gui is heavily tied to the default configuration of the OS like windows, macos, android, etc), and that’s nowhere near the kernel

    Ok. I have one question then. I think we can come to a clear resolution with it.

    Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, what percentage is it Linux?

    It includes 100% the apps, system tools, GUIs, and libraries that you associate with Linux. It also has 0 lines of Linux code in it.

    If you can justify that it is above >0% Linux I will use your definition of operating system going forward.

  • Firefox still hasn't fixed Bug 1938998 despite me reporting it multiple times. There's a reason why Firefox is almost non existent on mobile. I've been using the internet for 26 years, and have used Mozilla based browsers since 2001, I want them to survive to the next era of the internet, but they are struggling to keep up. Opera and Edge already gave up their engines, Webkit and Blink are basically the same engine with different standards enabled, and Firefox is under 2% on some days on Statcounter. I feel that soon AI based browsers using their own AI-engine will probably take over the internet soon anyway.

    I have never encountered that bug, seems like an issue with the duck duck go not doing proper url encoding. I daily Firefox on mobile and its the best option by far with all the available extensions and of course working adblock

  • Ok. I have one question then. I think we can come to a clear resolution with it.

    Debian GNU/kFreeBSD, what percentage is it Linux?

    It includes 100% the apps, system tools, GUIs, and libraries that you associate with Linux. It also has 0 lines of Linux code in it.

    If you can justify that it is above >0% Linux I will use your definition of operating system going forward.

    i don’t think percentage is a useful distinction… how do you measure that? by lines of code? by behavioural traits? my point throughout this discussion is that it’s not as clean as any of that

    as i said: its its own thing… it is neither linux, debian, nor is it freebsd… in the same way that android is an operating system distinct from other flavours of linux

  • … leadership impacts the product. Ff might be the best choice rn, but leadership will fuck it up.

    If you have a chance to read the article, I'd highly recommend it. It directly addresses that point.

  • Authors petition publishers to curtail their use of AI

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    I’m sure publishers are all ears /s
  • Russian Internet users are unable to access the open Internet

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    Also don't forget all the suicides happening with hard to obtain poisons and shooting oneself in the back of the head three times.
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    Neat. Looking forward to seeing what people build with that.
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    a subtle edit resolving a duplicate reference in a way that removes displays from the list of parts that must be replaceable by a layperson with basic tools That's fucking significant change, considering probably even more smartphones become ewaste from cracked screens than anything else by a long shot...
  • getoffpocket.com, my guide to Pocket alternatives, just got a redesign

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    I've made some updates. There are many perspectives to view a guide like this. I hope there are some improvements to the self-hosting perspective. https://getoffpocket.com/
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    If you're a developer, a startup founder, or part of a small team, you've poured countless hours into building your web application. You've perfected the UI, optimized the database, and shipped features your users love. But in the rush to build and deploy, a critical question often gets deferred: is your application secure? For many, the answer is a nervous "I hope so." The reality is that without a proper defense, your application is exposed to a barrage of automated attacks hitting the web every second. Threats like SQL Injection, Cross-Site Scripting (XSS), and Remote Code Execution are not just reserved for large enterprises; they are constant dangers for any application with a public IP address. The Security Barrier: When Cost and Complexity Get in the Way The standard recommendation is to place a Web Application Firewall (WAF) in front of your application. A WAF acts as a protective shield, inspecting incoming traffic and filtering out malicious requests before they can do any damage. It’s a foundational piece of modern web security. So, why doesn't everyone have one? Historically, robust WAFs have been complex and expensive. They required significant budgets, specialized knowledge to configure, and ongoing maintenance, putting them out of reach for students, solo developers, non-profits, and early-stage startups. This has created a dangerous security divide, leaving the most innovative and resource-constrained projects the most vulnerable. But that is changing. Democratizing Security: The Power of a Community WAF Security should be a right, not a privilege. Recognizing this, the landscape is shifting towards more accessible, community-driven tools. The goal is to provide powerful, enterprise-grade protection to everyone, for free. This is the principle behind the HaltDos Community WAF. It's a no-cost, perpetually free Web Application Firewall designed specifically for the community that has been underserved for too long. It’s not a stripped-down trial version; it’s a powerful security tool designed to give you immediate and effective protection against the OWASP Top 10 and other critical web threats. What Can You Actually Do with It? With a community WAF, you can deploy a security layer in minutes that: Blocks Malicious Payloads: Get instant, out-of-the-box protection against common attack patterns like SQLi, XSS, RCE, and more. Stops Bad Bots: Prevent malicious bots from scraping your content, attempting credential stuffing, or spamming your forms. Gives You Visibility: A real-time dashboard shows you exactly who is trying to attack your application and what methods they are using, providing invaluable security intelligence. Allows Customization: You can add your own custom security rules to tailor the protection specifically to your application's logic and technology stack. The best part? It can be deployed virtually anywhere—on-premises, in a private cloud, or with any major cloud provider like AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud. Get Started in Minutes You don't need to be a security guru to use it. The setup is straightforward, and the value is immediate. Protecting the project, you've worked so hard on is no longer a question of budget. Download: Get the free Community WAF from the HaltDos site. Deploy: Follow the simple instructions to set it up with your web server (it’s compatible with Nginx, Apache, and others). Secure: Watch the dashboard as it begins to inspect your traffic and block threats in real-time. Security is a journey, but it must start somewhere. For developers, startups, and anyone running a web application on a tight budget, a community WAF is the perfect first step. It's powerful, it's easy, and it's completely free.
  • signal blogpost on windows recall

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    I wouldn't trust windows to follow their don't screenshot API, whether out of ignorance or malice.
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    But they did give! They did not chose to deny and not have pizza.