Re: What's a browser? How do you change one?
Author: FUD
Date: 09-26-2020 - 16:46

As a practical matter, everybody has Google Chrome or some other browser based on Chromium (the open-source code underpinning Chrome). Browsers based on Chromium include Chrome of course, Microsoft Edge (starting late last year), and most others that are actively marketed.

Major Non-Chromium browsers include Firefox (partially Chromium-compatible for its add-ons) and Safari (the Apple browser, based on Webkit code).

When you add all the Chromium-based browsers together, they are installed on 95% or more of all computers and phones. Firefox in recent years has been installed in 2-4% (and dropping), and Safari is found only in Apple products. A few other browsers are around, but their total installed base is smaller than a rounding error. Numbers may add up to more that 100%, because somebody using Firefox or Safari usually has to have a Chromium-based browser too. There is a growing number of web sites that don't work with non-Chromium browser - especially news sites - because Chrome/ium is in general more ad- and tracking-friendly than Firefox and Safari. While some ad- and script- and cookie-blocking addons are available for Chrome, for the most part they don't harden things as much as Firefox and Safari with selected extensions do. Using Firefox to read news sites can be frustrating, especially if you have protective extensions like NoScript and Privacy Badger installed; even if you don't, the built-in tracking and script protections that Firefox uses by default are enough to trigger failure of many news sites. I've run into a number of sites that simply detect the browser being used (look up "user agent" to see how they're doing that) and refuse to work without Chrome or a direct derivative; if they're nice, they'll show you a message saying that Google Chrome is required to use the site (shades of Internet Explorer days...).

Frankly, MS Edge (if you're using Windows) isn't too bad, with uBlock Origin, DuckDuckGo, and Privacy Badger extensions installed. Yes, MS collects all kinds of data on you, but Google collects more, and Google is more intrusive about using that data to target ads at you, which fundamentally is what Chrome is built for. So far, Chredge/Edgium (Chromium-based Edge) has always worked for me on those problem web sites that only accept Chrome.

Oh yes, if you're into total security, the Tor browser is based on Firefox...



Subject Written By Date/Time (PST)
  SMART synonymouse 09-23-2020 - 10:38
  Re: SMART Bob the Train Guy 09-23-2020 - 13:49
  Re: Paywall. can't read this. Tony Cz 09-25-2020 - 13:45
  Re: Paywall. can't read this. WebDigger 09-25-2020 - 16:20
  Re: Paywall. can't read this. Serious Question 09-25-2020 - 16:31
  Re: What's a browser? How do you change one? WebDigger 09-25-2020 - 20:09
  Re: What's a browser? How do you change one? FUD 09-26-2020 - 16:46


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