Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

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cosmo666

Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by cosmo666 » 2021-03-30, 21:06

While I use Palemoon for real work, I keep Firefox & Chrome around as bellwethers of trends in the corporate browser oligopoly. I recently discovered the Firefox 'policies.json' feature, along with first-hand experience of Firefox disabling extensions unilaterally, and/or forcing 'updates' thereof. While researching this subject, no surprise, I'm finding reports that Mozilla may be ignoring or overriding some user initiated settings in policies.json.

I discovered this because I was trying to figure out how to enable 'href=file:///local_dir/html_file.html' constructs, due to my ongoing goal of building more local-content resources. It appears formalized local policy-setting options are being adopted widely, and I wonder if Palemoon has already, or plans to introduce equivalent features. (?)

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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by Goodydino » 2021-03-30, 21:57

For some years now, Mozilla has been treating Firefox users as if they are idiots.

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mr tribute
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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by mr tribute » 2021-03-30, 23:22

Firefox policies have been developed for Business/Enterprise use. They let a sysadmin lock down Firefox in certain ways just like a sysadmin can lock down Windows.
Have a look at Enterprise Policy Generator add-on for Firefox.

I don't think you can find similar policies in Pale Moon, because Pale Moon isn't intended for large scale deployments managed by a sysadmin.
Also these policies are privacy/security focused like disabling Firefox built-in screenshooter etc. Pale Moon doesn't include those questionable features.

You don't need Firefox policies at home as a single user. Much more can be accomplished with user.js. If you want to lock down Firefox and disable telemetry this link might be useful:
https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js

If you are on Linux (and insist on using Firefox), just use LibreWolf browser that comes preconfigured with user.js and other tweaks.

The Firefox remote settings back-end is known as normandy and is built into Firefox. normandy can also be disabled with user.js.

The best "big name" browser is Brave (open source and privacy friendly/low on telemetry). I use Brave when Pale Moon doesn't work.

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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2021-03-30, 23:39

mr tribute wrote:
2021-03-30, 23:22
I don't think you can find similar policies in Pale Moon, because Pale Moon isn't intended for large scale deployments managed by a sysadmin.
Wrong.

Pale Moon can be configured by sysadmins to a great extent and completely locked down if needed. But NOT through a .json app-permission-model.
See Mozilla autoconf mozilla.cfg and the great articles written by Mike Kaply going over the details of what we have in UXP.
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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by moonbat » 2021-03-31, 01:12

There used to be a 'legacy' Firefox extension that let you create a custom profile with preset bookmarks, homepage and other settings, to be deployed in a corporate environment (to counter the IE Administrator Toolkit that did the same for Internet Explorer). No reason that couldn't work with Pale Moon.
IBM in the mid 00s mandated the use of Firefox as their official browser, forcing their vendors to update their web applications to follow web standards (back when those standards were a stable thing and didn't change every fortnight) and move away from IE. I bet they would've found something like this useful back then.
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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by micwoj92 » 2021-03-31, 01:12

Off-topic:
mr tribute wrote:
2021-03-30, 23:22
The best "big name" browser is Brave (open source and privacy friendly/low on telemetry). I use Brave when Pale Moon doesn't work.
Why do people say that, just use chromium or ms edge if you are on windows.

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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by moonbat » 2021-03-31, 01:19

There are exactly 3 browser engines in existence - Blink, copycat Chrome Gecko and Goanna. So it is moot if you use Brave, Vivaldi, Edge, Opera, Kiwi browser, UC Browser and all the rest.
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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by mr tribute » 2021-03-31, 18:20

Off-topic:
Go to:
https://www.infosecurity.us/blog/2020/3 ... phone-home
Click on "study" and download the pdf.
We find that the browsers split into three distinct groups from this privacy perspective. In the first (most private) group lies Brave, in the second Chrome, Firefox and Safari and in the third (least private) group lie Edge and Yandex.

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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by New Tobin Paradigm » 2021-03-31, 19:55

Fake News.

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Re: Firefox policies.json manipulations...palemoon alternatives.

Unread post by Moonraker » 2021-03-31, 20:12

@mr tribute.
Off-topic:
That site is hogwash.Chrome in the second tier.?.lost it's creedence with that.
Just as bad as neocities which claims ALL browsers are spyware.
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