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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday November 26 2017, @03:12AM   Printer-friendly
from the quantum-leap dept.

https://amosbbatto.wordpress.com/2017/11/21/mozilla-market-share/

When Firefox was introduced in 2004, it was designed to be a lean and optimized web browser, based on the bloated code from the Mozilla Suite. Between 2004 and 2009, many considered Firefox to be the best web browser, since it was faster, more secure, offered tabbed browsing and was more customizable through extensions than Microsoft's Internet Explorer. When Chrome was introduced in 2008, it took many of Firefox's best ideas and improved on them. Since 2010, Chrome has eaten away at Firefox's market share, relegating Firefox to a tiny niche of free software enthusiasts and tinkerers who like the customization of its XUL extensions.

According to StatCounter, Firefox's market share of web browsers has fallen from 31.8% in December 2009 to just 6.1% today. Firefox can take comfort in the fact that it is now virtually tied with its former arch-nemesis, Internet Explorer and its variants. All of Microsoft's browsers only account for 6.2% of current web browsing according to StatCounter. Microsoft has largely been replaced by Google, whose web browsers now controls 56.5% of the market. Even worse, is the fact that the WebKit engine used by Google now represents over 83% of web browsing, so web sites are increasingly focusing on compatibility with just one web engine. While Google and Apple are more supportive of W3C and open standards than Microsoft was in the late 90s, the web is increasingly being monopolized by one web engine and two companies, whose business models are not always based on the best interests of users or their rights.


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  • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday November 27 2017, @06:51AM (2 children)

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday November 27 2017, @06:51AM (#601965) Journal

    But the question is: Is the set of things uMatrix does a superset of what NoScript does? Your screnshot doesn't prove that. Note that I have both installed, so I know what the interface of either looks like. The interesting parts are what you don't find in the interface. Note that even if you chose to allow all scripts, NoScript still provides some protection. And when you block some script, NoScript sometimes allows the page to work anyway, even when just blocking the script would make it fail.

    Does uMatrix provide surrogate scripts? Does uMatrix contain XSS protection? Does uMatrix allow you to temporarily enable *just one specific* object from an otherwise blocked site?

    --
    The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
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  • (Score: 2) by Common Joe on Thursday November 30 2017, @12:29PM (1 child)

    by Common Joe (33) <{common.joe.0101} {at} {gmail.com}> on Thursday November 30 2017, @12:29PM (#603403) Journal

    I'm late to the party, but I read your question and can answer because I've used both. At the very core of both programs, uMatrix and NoScript have the same functionality, BUT I find uMatrix superior for two reasons. The way it lays out the information is easier to read, analyze, and manipulate, and the second reason is that it allows subdomains with one click. For instance, (using Chromas's example), in uMatrix if you allow huffpo.net, it also allows use1.huffpo.net and fiji-production-ws.use1.huffpo.net -- but you can fine tune it so it doesn't run use1.huffpo.net, but allows the other two. You can allow specific sites to load images, but ban frames from those sites. Just because you allow huffpo.net doesn't mean that huffpost.com runs. That's entirely different and you can see that in the thicker white stripes. And maybe a third reason -- it allows scripts to run in the website you're going to by default. The original website visited is huffingtonpost.com. Hence the reason why huffingtonpost.com is in light green.

    Speaking of colors and defaults... so what do the colors mean? Light green is allowed by default, light red is denied by default. Dark green is explicitly allowed by the user. Dark red is explicitly banned by the user. (Host names from ad sites are already in dark red because of black listed host names. That is configurable.) You can save your preferences so they load by default next time you visit.

    My biggest problem with uMatrix is that the clickable areas are tiny. When you click on the top half of the box for huffpo.net, it allows the script to run / image to load/ frame to pop up, etc. If you click on the bottom half, it denies it.

    One last thing. In the example given, if you click on the cell with the text "huffpo.net", it allows everything (cookie, css, image, etc) except for the frame (because frame is in dark red and has been explicitly banned). However, you can also click in the little boxes for more fine tuned control. If you click the top half of number 2 allowing just the scripts to run for o.aoldn.com, the cookies and images will not be allowed. Numbers in the little boxes represent how many items will be loaded / run.

    And like NoScript, you'll have to click the refresh button for changes to take effect.

    • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Thursday November 30 2017, @07:07PM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Thursday November 30 2017, @07:07PM (#603590) Journal

      Unfortunately your comment didn't answer any of the questions I asked. Note that you can not answer those questions by looking at the user interface.

      Indeed, if you read my comment carefully, you'll see that I explicitly wrote that I have both installed, so I know about those interfaces.

      BTW, one advantage of NoScript is that it also appears in the context menu. I've not found out how I can enable stuff with uMatrix when in a window without the normal toolbars (some sites open those e.g. to provide a player; exactly the situation where I would like to enable extra stuff, like the site the stream is coming from).

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.