Is it possible to implement profile management functions in Pale Moon for Android?

[jd2066]

Hey,
With Pale Moon for Windows, Linux and Mac OS X, I can pass the -p flag to the executable to open the profile manager and create different profiles for different browsing tasks.
I can also go in the file system to backup and restore the profiles via File Management tools.
On Android, there is only one profile available to use, you can't create new profiles and switch to them.
Also only when you have root access on Android can you access the profile to backup and restore it.
If possible support for multiple profiles could be done that would be nice.
It would be very helpful if Pale Moon for Android could implement a backup and restore system of the profile to the Internal Storage or External Storage on the phone or tablet for those without root access.
Justin

[Moonchild]

Pale Moon for Android has been discontinued several years ago. No further development will happen on it.
It is also vulnerable to multiple security issues that are being exploited in the wild; nobody should be using it in 2019 for their daily browser.

[RoestVrijStaal]

@jd2066

I have such a setup by using a combination of IceCat (you want to disable GNU LibreJS and related addons), DuckDuckGo Privacy Browser and Privacy Browser for the browser and Better Open With to choose the browsers per usecase.

Unfortunately, no UXP code comes into play

[jd2066]

Oh, ok. Did not know that.
I'm actually using Dolphin Browser at the moment in part because it has an import/export feature but if there were profile management features available in an open source browser like Firefox, Waterfox, Pale Moon and such that would good.
I'm a bit surprised that none of the Mozilla codebase based browsers for Android have an import/export feature due to the nature of most open source programs that include a way to backup the program's configuration if needed.
Sometimes it's just easier to use Google Chrome though as it's really the browser that is completely integrated with Android so it's quick and convenient to use but I would like to avoid using a sync service just to backup my browsing history, open tabs, bookmarks, etc.

[Isengrim]

Oh, ok. Did not know that.
I'm a bit surprised that none of the Mozilla codebase based browsers for Android have an import/export feature due to the nature of most open source programs that include a way to backup the program's configuration if needed.

Off-topic:
Likely because Mozilla wants you to sync your profile with them rather than backing it up externally, and they don't want to make it easy to leave their browser for another.

[jd2066]

@jd2066

I have such a setup by using a combination of IceCat (you want to disable GNU LibreJS and related addons), DuckDuckGo Privacy Browser and Privacy Browser for the browser and Better Open With to choose the browsers per usecase.

Unfortunately, no UXP code comes into play

Thanks for the link to the Better Open With App, I've been wanting a better open with dialog for a long time now, I didn't know that app existed.
I'll check out IceCat, I thought IceCat was just Firefox without the official branding (I think it was Debian Linux that couldn't use the official branding for their build of Firefox so it was called Ice something if I recall right) but I could be thinking of something else.

Off-topic:
Likely because Mozilla wants you to sync your profile with them rather than backing it up externally, and they don't want to make it easy to leave their browser for another.

Well both Google and Mozilla do not have import/export options in the Android versions of browser built using their codebases in favor of the sync option.
I don't think it's so much that they want to force you to use their sync features as much as they both believe they sync systems are sufficient for that purpose.
I don't think they are, there are some configurations and such you can setup in a browser that is just not synced so copying the whole profile would be good.

Also this seems to be how most all Android and Windows App Platform (UWP) apps work (I would guess iOS apps work the same but I don't use any Apple products so I don't know for sure), the platform sandboxes the app and it's appdata and apps need to use a cloud server or offer an import/export option to the user to save the appdata.
Without either of those, you need a rooted phone or you just lose the appdata for that app if you phone malfunctions.

Off-topic:
Another extreme example of this: the Android, iOS and UWP versions of Microsoft Office OneNote will only let you open/save notebooks to OneDrive or Microsoft SharePoint.
The Microsoft Office OneNote 2016 version like the versions before it use Win32/Win64 APIs so only Windows laptops / tablets could use it, not mobile phones but it could do things that sandboxed apps can't easily do like save notebooks locally, to a Windows File Share, a WebDav server and any other method supported by the Win32/Win64 File Open and File Save APIs.
With Microsoft Office 2019, Microsoft decided that the UWP version of OneNote will be the active version going forward and OneNote 2016 will be supported until such time as they can get feature party or close enough in the UWP version.
The top most requested feature for the new UWP version is the same support for local notebook and such that OneNote 2016 has but Microsoft has firmly held their ground on this and said no.
I don't know why this doesn't apply to any of thei98r other mobile Office apps or why OneDrive is being pushed so hard as the only place to store OneNote Notebooks.

[Isengrim]

Also this seems to be how most all Android and Windows App Platform (UWP) apps work (I would guess iOS apps work the same but I don't use any Apple products so I don't know for sure), the platform sandboxes the app and it's appdata and apps need to use a cloud server or offer an import/export option to the user to save the appdata.
Without either of those, you need a rooted phone or you just lose the appdata for that app if you phone malfunctions.

Not sure about iOS, but It's actually very easy for an Android application to write a backup out to a file. It merely has to declare the intent to read from/write to storage, and the user has to grant permission for that access, which is typically requested on first startup. Compare to network access, which is implicitly granted to most applications without user interaction. Sure, file system access is one extra step, but IMHO it's a small one and not a significant enough technical reason to not offer a local backup option.

[Moonchild]

Keep in mind that on Android, profile data separation is handled at the application level, so short of external storage, importing/exporting and synchronizing on the device itself quickly becomes difficult due to strict app data separation.