[Oneiric-Topic] Default Browser

Wed Apr 27 22:52:37 UTC 2011

Apologies for the delay in response, responses inline.

On 04/18/2011 09:05 AM, Chris Coulson wrote:
> On Thu, 2011-04-07 at 10:36 -0500, Micah Gersten wrote:
>> Since now both Firefox and Chromium have committed to rapid release
>> schedules, I think it's time to reevaluate the default browser in
>> Ubuntu.  I am concerned that some of these upgrades might break system
>> integration at some point.  While the security team does its best to
>> prevent regressions, we can't test every case (especially ones we don't
>> know about :)). Perhaps, if we can find one with sufficient features,
>> switch to a Webkit based browser with a more normal release schedule (6
>> months).  We could have an installer like Kubuntu does to install
>> Firefox or Chromium on demand.  This will also keep the system
>> documentation current within the release as the screenshots/menus won't
>> be out of date shortly after release.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Micah
>>
>>
> Hi,
>
> So, here are my initial thoughts about this. I'm not going to respond to
> every mail in this thread, as that would just take too much of my time.
> The response here is directed at the whole thread really.
>
> What problem are we actually trying to solve here? If it is an issue of
> maintenance, then I don't think it really solves anything for us - in
> fact, I it makes it slightly worse IMO and I will attempt to explain
> why.
This isn't about maintenance as much as a uniform browser experience. 
The theory being that casual users don't care about the latest and
greatest stuff as long as they know they're secure and have the tools
they need.
> Changing the default browser isn't going to make Firefox or Chromium go
> away (unless you're suggesting we abandon them entirely, but you suggest
> adding a shortcut to Firefox or Chromium in the default install). If we
> change the default browser, we're still going to provide the same level
> of support we have always provided for Firefox (and Chromium too, many
> thanks to Fabien), and I definitely wouldn't want to see this change.
> However, there would also be an extra browser for us to look after as
> well, so if the problem is actually related to maintenance, then this
> doesn't really solve it at all.
>
> Also, quoting what you say in your mail:
>
>> While the security team does its best to prevent regressions, we can't
>> test every case (especially ones we don't know about :))
> This is why we run the test-suite in Firefox now, and this should avoid
> the need for a lot of manual testing (although, I'm not entirely sure
> about the scope of your current testing). The Firefox test suite is
> pretty extensive - see
> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=644621 as an example of the
> sort of level at which things can be regression tested in Firefox. I'm
> not aware of many other projects that use testing frameworks that enable
> you to test things at this level.
While having the Firefox test suite enabled is good, that only find
regressions in Firefox itself.  As the default browser, I'm concerned
about system integration breaking which the Firefox regression suite
cannot catch.
> Also, remember that Firefox is quite an important and familiar brand
> name for people migrating from other operating systems (and we do need
> to entice these people to come and try Ubuntu). IMO, only Chromium can
> match Firefox here, but you are suggesting we look at something else
> anyway.
Indeed, which is why making it simple for those who recognize the brand
and want it as their browser is important.
> I see a lot of people are recommending Epiphany. I've used this before,
> but it's never been my default browser. I used it again today, for the
> first time in a year or so. Here's a brief summary of some of the things
> I noticed:
>
> - Text rendering is pretty bad. For some reason, text appears to be tiny
> in Epiphany compared with any other browser (or any other application on
> my desktop for that matter). This is easily visible by comparing
> something like http://www.bbc.co.uk/news side-by-side in Firefox and
> Epiphany.
>
> - It has a very wasteful statusbar by default. Ok, I know you can turn
> this off - but when I did this and then hovered over some links on the
> page, I got a tiny overlay in the bottom-left hand corner displaying the
> destination URL in the same barely-readable font that the rest of the
> page is in (I had to squint so I could read it). These font sizes don't
> seem to match anything else on my system.
>
> - Invalid certificate warnings in Epiphany are unacceptable. Firefox
> presents you with an obvious warning before displaying the content and
> requires the user to acknowledge what they are doing in order to see the
> content. Epiphany warns you of this by presenting the content normally
> and displaying a broken padlock at the end of the URL bar (rather than
> the unbroken padlock it usually displays). I hardly even noticed this.
> This is basically https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=542454 ,
> which is 2.5 years old. Jamie also reported the same issue in Launchpad
> (https://launchpad.net/bugs/589877).
>
> - My extra mouse buttons don't work in Epiphany (to go back and
> forwards). This was reported 5 years ago
> (https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=337852).
>
> - There is no button to quickly bookmark the current page. Instead, I
> have to go to Bookmarks -> Add Bookmarks... where a modal dialog
> appears. There also appears to be no visual cue that the current page is
> already bookmarked, although this is pretty minor.
>
> - No session saving, and it doesn't even seem to ask for confirmation
> when I close a window that has multiple tabs open.
>
> - If I accidentally close a tab, I don't seem to be able to get it back
> again.
>
> In addition to this, Firefox has a significant number of addons and a
> vibrant addon developer community (presumably because it is quite easy
> to develop addons for Firefox). What is Epiphany's support for addons
> like?
>
> Can I synchronize my bookmarks, tabs, history, settings and passwords
> with Epiphany on my other devices? I run Firefox on my Android handset,
> and synchronize my data between my desktop, laptop and cell-phone. This
> works pretty nicely, and Chromium has also got pretty good support for
> synchronizing user data too.
While sync is important for power users, how important is it for the
casual user of Ubuntu?
> Epiphany also doesn't seem to provide any support for integrating
> web-apps in to the desktop. This is where Chromium is currently a clear
> leader (although, Mozilla are working on this too). In Chromium, I can
> navigate to the web store, find an app, install it and create a launcher
> on my desktop (which I can add to the launcher in Unity). I can then use
> this new icon to launch my new web app in the same way that I would
> launch any other application, and it opens in a completely chromeless
> window. This is awesome (and is also the future).
>
> I'm not too keen on the visual appearance of Epiphany, although I
> appreciate this is really a matter of personal opinion (and I'm basing
> this opinion on the version we have in Natty btw). It's nice that it
> follows the users GTK theme, but that doesn't automatically make for an
> aesthetically pleasing application (software-center uses some
> non-standard widgets and doesn't blend in to the desktop in the
> traditional sense, but it is probably one of the best looking
> applications we ship on the desktop). Firefox really sits nicely with
> the Ambiance theme in Ubuntu. It also has nice extras, such as an
> animated tab bar, Panorama and extensive theme-ability. The new
> addon-manager rocks too.
>
> We also shouldn't overlook the fact that Firefox is backed by a pretty
> large developer community, and this is a great benefit to Ubuntu.
> Without this, we'd be forced to invest even more time in fixing issues
> we have (and fixing things I currently take for granted, such as support
> for extra mouse buttons and more noticeable warnings of invalid SSL
> certs).
>
> On a positive note, rendering and page-load speed seemed comparable to
> Firefox, and it's pretty quick to start too. It also has some advantages
> such as keyring integration, and the ability to save/open files to/from
> gvfs mounts (although, the work has already been done in Firefox to weed
> out the last remaining pieces of gnomevfs and complete the GIO
> integration - it just needs reviewing and committing).
>
> At the end of the day when we select the default browser, the question
> we should be asking ourselves is:
>
> "Which browser provides the best experience for our users?"
>
> ...rather than...
>
> "Which browser is easiest for us to maintain?"
>
> IMO, the last question is looking at the problem in the wrong way :)
>
> Regards
> Chris
>
> PS - Sorry it is so long - I did try to not make this e-mail a
> brain-dump of my thoughts. I've probably also missed out things that I
> wanted to say too.

To use the old cliche, will grandma be happy if she gets a browser that
looks different every 6 weeks?  If functionality moves, will people be
able to adjust?  Your question hits the nail on the head, which browser
will provide the best experience for our users?  Is it one that's
constantly changing or one that's static for the release?  As power
users, we generally want the latest and greatest.  Mozilla's rapid
release cycle gives us a great excuse to do this.  However, since we're
trying to bridge the chasm here,  what are users on the other side
looking for?
Just for the record, the maintenance burden will be about the same
whether Firefox is the default browser or not, the main issues are IMHO:
Can we satisfy the core requirements of browser usage w/out using
Firefox/Chromium?
Will people be happy with a rapidly changing browser?
What's the tradeoff of a security update vs system integration breaking?

These questions also apply to Thunderbird as a default E-Mail client as
well (s#browser|Firefox/Chromium#mail client|Thunderbird#).

Micah