<story><title>Firefox is back. It&apos;s time to give it a try</title><url>https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/technology/personaltech/firefox-chrome-browser-privacy.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>afranchuk</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s been my experience&amp;#x2F;preference as well. In fact I have been very taken aback by all the &amp;quot;Firefox is back&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;time to try Firefox again&amp;quot; headlines. I guess I didn&amp;#x27;t realize what sort of exodus occurred when chrome came out. But honestly, I &lt;i&gt;never&lt;/i&gt; ran into performance issues with Firefox over the years and various versions, including the overhaul with Firefox 3.&lt;p&gt;I typically have 2-8 tabs open (hasn&amp;#x27;t changed much over the years). Maybe other usage patterns used to cause problems... Also worth noting I was always on Linux; maybe Windows&amp;#x2F;Mac versions weren&amp;#x27;t as good?&lt;p&gt;When quantum came out, I didn&amp;#x27;t personally notice a big performance improvement in terms of user experience (though I don&amp;#x27;t doubt it&amp;#x27;s there, and I don&amp;#x27;t watch CPU&amp;#x2F;MEM constantly). I&amp;#x27;ve seen these headlines and have just been thinking to myself &amp;quot;but it&amp;#x27;s always been good!&amp;quot;</text></item><item><author>radmuzom</author><text>Most of the comments here are about using or not using Firefox, depending on it&amp;#x27;s features as compared to primarily Chrome. However, for me, it is not about being better or having more features at all - it is because I like Firefox and want to support Mozilla and believe that Google should not control the web. It is somewhat similar to the free software vs. open source debate - one should use free software not because it is better, but because it is the right thing to do (I understand that not many people agree with this philosophy, which is fine).&lt;p&gt;Having said that, all sites which I regularly use work perfectly for me in Firefox with acceptable performance. So I never found a reason to switch at all. Rarely, I come across a website which is &amp;quot;best viewed with Chrome&amp;quot;; my default action is to close that site immediately.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Bartweiss</author><text>This is an interesting take, since it&amp;#x27;s so difference from my experience. There&amp;#x27;s definitely &lt;i&gt;some&lt;/i&gt; difference in use cases that had a large impact - whether that&amp;#x27;s device memory, open tabs, or even choice of websites.&lt;p&gt;I didn&amp;#x27;t switch to Chrome when it first came out, but over the next couple of years I found Firefox frustratingly slow and crash-prone. When I cut over, everything was drastically faster and more reliable, plus the feature set (extensions, url completion, incognito for parallel sign-ins, and so on) was noticeably better. High memory usage was the only price, and Chrome surrenders that somewhat gracefully when it&amp;#x27;s needed.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m hoping to make the switch back. Chrome has become more frustrating as Google adds brand alignment, and moreover I simply don&amp;#x27;t &lt;i&gt;like&lt;/i&gt; being siloed by a brand. But the usability gain was massive when I first switched, and I&amp;#x27;m only making the move now because there&amp;#x27;s been a lot of good news out of Mozilla.</text></comment>
<story><title>Firefox is back. It&apos;s time to give it a try</title><url>https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/technology/personaltech/firefox-chrome-browser-privacy.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>afranchuk</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s been my experience&amp;#x2F;preference as well. In fact I have been very taken aback by all the &amp;quot;Firefox is back&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;time to try Firefox again&amp;quot; headlines. I guess I didn&amp;#x27;t realize what sort of exodus occurred when chrome came out. But honestly, I &lt;i&gt;never&lt;/i&gt; ran into performance issues with Firefox over the years and various versions, including the overhaul with Firefox 3.&lt;p&gt;I typically have 2-8 tabs open (hasn&amp;#x27;t changed much over the years). Maybe other usage patterns used to cause problems... Also worth noting I was always on Linux; maybe Windows&amp;#x2F;Mac versions weren&amp;#x27;t as good?&lt;p&gt;When quantum came out, I didn&amp;#x27;t personally notice a big performance improvement in terms of user experience (though I don&amp;#x27;t doubt it&amp;#x27;s there, and I don&amp;#x27;t watch CPU&amp;#x2F;MEM constantly). I&amp;#x27;ve seen these headlines and have just been thinking to myself &amp;quot;but it&amp;#x27;s always been good!&amp;quot;</text></item><item><author>radmuzom</author><text>Most of the comments here are about using or not using Firefox, depending on it&amp;#x27;s features as compared to primarily Chrome. However, for me, it is not about being better or having more features at all - it is because I like Firefox and want to support Mozilla and believe that Google should not control the web. It is somewhat similar to the free software vs. open source debate - one should use free software not because it is better, but because it is the right thing to do (I understand that not many people agree with this philosophy, which is fine).&lt;p&gt;Having said that, all sites which I regularly use work perfectly for me in Firefox with acceptable performance. So I never found a reason to switch at all. Rarely, I come across a website which is &amp;quot;best viewed with Chrome&amp;quot;; my default action is to close that site immediately.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>dspillett</author><text>&amp;gt;* I guess I didn&amp;#x27;t realize what sort of exodus occurred when chrome came out.*&lt;p&gt;It wasn&amp;#x27;t really a mass exodus, but a gradual wax &amp;amp; wane over time (with more moves FF-&amp;gt;C over the long term than C-&amp;gt;FF).&lt;p&gt;In development fields the count is complicated by people who regularly use both, but prefer one.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;&amp;gt; I typically have 2-8 tabs open&lt;/i&gt;&lt;p&gt;I tend to have many open[1], over several windows on different desktops. I use open tabs more than I use bookmarks! Every once in a while I go through the open tabs and close those I&amp;#x27;ve not touched in a while that I don;t expect to touch any time soon (obviously the need to have it open has passed). I currently use Chrome more then FF, and here The Great Suspender[1] is a godsend for saving RAM (and to a lesser extent CPU time) Chrome would otherwise consume.&lt;p&gt;[1] TGS lists my current use on this machine as &amp;quot;22 windows, 148 tabs&amp;quot;</text></comment>