Change in system requirements (AVX)

[Kris_88]

If you run special hardware, you need special builds. Simple as that.

Both Windows and Linux work on this hardware and do not require special builds. MS Edge and Firefox work on this hardware and do not require special builds. Only for Pale Moon this hardware is considered "special". But in fact it is not special hardware, but the most ordinary one. Simple as that.

[moonbat]

Special here would be 'several years obsolete', and comparing a web browser on a Google controlled internet where specs change every 5 minutes to an operating system is absurd to say the least.

[Kris_88]

Special here would be 'several years obsolete',

Operating systems and other browsers don't consider this hardware obsolete. Only Pale Moon wants to be holier than the Pope. Okay, I'd understand that if Pale Moon were perfectly compatible with the latest Internet standards. More compatible than all other browsers.
But that's just not the case...

[Pentium4User]

Special here would be 'several years obsolete',

Operating systems and other browsers don't consider this hardware obsolete. Only Pale Moon wants to be holier than the Pope. Okay, I'd understand that if Pale Moon were perfectly compatible with the latest Internet standards. More compatible than all other browsers.
But that's just not the case...

SSE2 builds are announced, so where is your problem?
You can use them on this specific hardware, like builds for x86 and x64 exist. This was the same argue years ago when vendors decided to abandon x86.

[Kris_88]

If you're interested in low-power architectures, Gracemont CPUs came out last year.

athenian200, thank you.
This is very useful information for me.

[Kris_88]

SSE2 builds are announced, so where is your problem?

I have no problem. I'm just reporting that the developers have chosen a bad direction of development. Almost completely unjustified.

[Pentium4User]

SSE2 builds are announced, so where is your problem?

I have no problem. I'm just reporting that the developers have chosen a bad direction of development. Almost completely unjustified.

The decision is just to make the default builds AVX because most people have such CPUs. SSE2 builds will be available, so those users will simply use them.
Other developers simply say: You have unsupported stuff, get new one.
This is different here.

[Moonchild]

But in fact it is not special hardware, but the most ordinary one. Simple as that.

The Q1900-ITX with soldered-on Intel® Quad-Core Processor J1900 is definitely not ordinary hardware for desktop PCs. Don't claim it is just to argue your point.
Also, that processor is from 2013, so not only ULP (10W), but also 11 years old.

MS Edge and Firefox work on this hardware and do not require special builds.

If you would have taken the time to look at changes in Firefox (can't do that with Edge because it's not open), you would have seen that for use on the modern web, Mozilla has done a lot of piecemeal AVX implementation on a component by component basis. This kind of dual path implementation is simply not feasible for a project as small as Pale Moon, so to take advantage of the hardware it's run on, we have to leverage compiler capabilities, instead.

Okay, I'd understand that if Pale Moon were perfectly compatible with the latest Internet standards. More compatible than all other browsers.

That will never, ever happen because of who writes these standards drafts. And it is really besides the point, anyway. Setting demands for us to "be allowed" to change system requirements is also extremely entitled. Just don't do that.

And if you don't like it, use your "perfectly ordinary hardware" to build your own Pale Moon from source exactly the way you want it. Oh wait, you're saying that takes many hours and you don't want that? Well, maybe the hardware isn't so ordinary after all then!
Otherwise, just accept that you'll have to move to a community build. There's nothing wrong with that, and I'm grateful for these builds existing to help out.

[Moonchild]

I'm just reporting that the developers have chosen a bad direction of development. Almost completely unjustified.

Go re-read the discussion thread (pretty sure you've seen it before because you were actively posting at the time that discussion happened -- not like you were on hiatus). You'll see the justification laid out very plainly. Well, that is, if your mind is actually open to accepting my arguments.

[Drugwash]

Well, it's been nice while it lasted. Thank you and so long.

[UCyborg]

I honestly can't tell if I'm running SSE2 or AVX build with naked eye without looking at about:buildconfig. I only use one computer with AVX capable CPU regularly, the one at work, a laptop from 2018 with some Core i5 CPU, I always forget the model. You could replace the Pale Moon build without my knowledge on that computer and I wouldn't know.

Maybe I'd buy newer computer at home if I got into playing modern games, but for the boring tasks such as web browsing, new hardware hasn't been worth the bother for the last 15 years IMO, at least if you bought something half-decent back then. So far, it really looks like I'll be using this old champ with Phenom II X4 920 until the motherboard short-circuits or all capacitors on it blow up at once, LMAO.

Funny thing, I only recently switched to 64-bit build of Pale Moon. Generally, I've been' using a mix of 64-bit and 32-bit software, though leaning more towards 64-bit in recent years. Somehow it didn't come into my awareness for the longest time that Pale Moon wouldn't be acting all weird eventually if I switched sooner. Sometimes I get a bit overboard with tabs, though even closing existing tabs can cause a spike in memory usage, 32-bit build could just lockup and spin forever, looking at the stack of the hung thread with System Informer would hint at some memory allocation routine, but with 64-bit build, the worst that happened was a few minutes long hang, but then it snaps out of it and continues working, beats losing the session. Yeah, I know they were saying even in Firefox 52 era that 64-bit biuld is more stable, again, my mind just ignored it. I guess it's logical 4 GB address space is rather small in this age.

For new Windows 11 24H2, they're saying it really wants a CPU with SSE 4.1, just an old AMD model that happens to have POPCNT instruction is apparently not enough. That will probably be the first OS that won't run on this computer, so in that sense, new official Pale Moon 64-bit builds won't be the only ones that won't run (if we go make comparisons with operating systems).

[ron_1]

Sigh, i already said(iirc even not once) that i will swap my AVX build with SSE2 one. So any panic is completely uncalled for.

I assume you will have SSE2 builds for Linux also? It appears my cpu doesn't support AVX. (My cpu supports Intel® SSE4.1, Intel® SSE4.2, which I assume an SSE2 build will run on? I don't know much about this.)

[null_ID]

Sigh, i already said(iirc even not once) that i will swap my AVX build with SSE2 one. So any panic is completely uncalled for.

Well, thank you for being such a good sport. Much obliged. Now, I assume your builds will be fully vetted, supported and endorsed by the Pale Moon team proper, so we can be sure that there won't be any background shenanigans going on that might adversely affect my use of your builds? We live in an era, where you really have to be careful with all things 3rd party, so nothing personal, kid.

I'm still saying that this is going to be a bad idea. There will be people, quite a lot of them, who are not going to understand what is going on. They won't understand your reasoning behind all this, nor will they care for that matter. What I'm saying is, expect to receive a lot of hate mail, because me thinks you're going to have another big bite of some fecal matter with this one. The fallout from this might even rival the infamous MyPal dookie storm from few years back, if you're not being careful, so don't say that you weren't warned.

My advice: Promote Nuck's builds with a vengeance.

[FranklinDM]

Contributed builds are still considered official builds. They use official branding, and to quote (emphasis mine):

The following list is a list of endorsed third party builds of Pale Moon. If the browser is not in this list, it is not an authorized redistribution/build.
...
To be listed here, you have to contact me and get permission. It is the only way to be authorized to redistribute a modified binary version of Pale Moon with the official name and logo in any way, shape or form.

On a side note, given that Nuck-TH will provide SSE2-compatible binaries, I think that it might be better to include these builds more prominently in the main downloads page to increase visibility? Or could a migration path be made for affected users so that they would be automatically updated to this new build instead of having them reinstall?

[athenian200]

Well, thank you for being such a good sport. Much obliged. Now, I assume your builds will be fully vetted, supported and endorsed by the Pale Moon team proper, so we can be sure that there won't be any background shenanigans going on that might adversely affect my use of your builds?

On a side note, given that Nuck-TH will provide SSE2-compatible binaries, I think that it might be better to include these builds more prominently in the main downloads page to increase visibility? Or could a migration path be made for affected users so that they would be automatically updated to this new build instead of having them reinstall?

*long sigh*

It sounds like people are getting ready to demand a quality guarantee regarding the community builds that we really didn't intend, and are wanting to us to not only provide SSE2 builds, but also to hold our feet to the fire on the quality of those builds and make the process of switching to them automatic if incompatible hardware is detected or something. Which would defeat the entire point of them being community builds in the first place.

Well, guess we'd better brace for the incoming drama. :/

[suzyne]

Sigh, i already said(iirc even not once) that i will swap my AVX build with SSE2 one. So any panic is completely uncalled for.

Now, I assume your builds will be fully vetted, supported and endorsed by the Pale Moon team proper

I have been using the @Nuck-TH versions of Pale Moon for a while now, and my understanding is that they are as close to "official" as you can get, to the point of being available on and updated from the Pale Moon FTP server. I expect that signal of assurance and implicit endorsement will continue with the SSE2 version.

[jobbautista9]

Regardless, the fact that it can use Pale Moon's official branding should be enough for a "quality guarantee", imo.

[Kris_88]

The Q1900-ITX with soldered-on Intel® Quad-Core Processor J1900 is definitely not ordinary hardware for desktop PCs. Don't claim it is just to argue your point.
Also, that processor is from 2013, so not only ULP (10W), but also 11 years old.

Even if the mini-itx segment is less common now than gaming computers with the size and power consumption of a refrigerator, mini-computers are the future. This is essentially a thin client that can be turned on 24/7 and used to access the Internet, email, edit documents, watch videos, etc. And yes, it is an ordinary computer, nothing special. And yes, common operating systems do not see the difference. On a J1900 with four cores and 16 GB of memory, Windows boots in about 6 seconds and I have never used more than 8 GB of memory during my work. And by the way, I gave an example of a 2019 processor that does not support AVX. Similar examples were given in that voting thread. (I did not pay attention to that thread at the time, otherwise I would have spoken out there). But despite these examples, some continue to talk about "outdated equipment". If Q4 2019 is outdated, then demand to immediately update the hardware every year to use Pale Moon.

And if you don't like it, use your "perfectly ordinary hardware" to build your own Pale Moon from source exactly the way you want it. Oh wait, you're saying that takes many hours and you don't want that? Well, maybe the hardware isn't so ordinary after all then!

Yes, it is not difficult to build your own assembly. But it is difficult to create the necessary environment. I do not like Visual Studio at all. As soon as you install it, the computer starts to boot several times slower, because it clutters the registry. When you used VS 2015, I used "Visual Cpp Build Tools" instead, which is much more lightweight. Yes, I had to change the configs a little. But then you switched to VS2022 and I did not try to create a new environment.
Anyway, storing and maintaining such an environment is not something I need for my daily work. I think it's much easier in Linux, but that's not my case. In general, it's a bad idea to force users to compile Pale Moon themselves. It's not a viable idea...

Otherwise, just accept that you'll have to move to a community build. There's nothing wrong with that, and I'm grateful for these builds existing to help out.

A natural question immediately arises here:

Well, thank you for being such a good sport. Much obliged. Now, I assume your builds will be fully vetted, supported and endorsed by the Pale Moon team proper, so we can be sure that there won't be any background shenanigans going on that might adversely affect my use of your builds? We live in an era, where you really have to be careful with all things 3rd party, so nothing personal, kid.

And then a natural response arises:

It sounds like people are getting ready to demand a quality guarantee regarding the community builds that we really didn't intend, and are wanting to us to not only provide SSE2 builds, but also to hold our feet to the fire on the quality of those builds and make the process of switching to them automatic if incompatible hardware is detected or something. Which would defeat the entire point of them being community builds in the first place.

There is a big difference between the official build and the community build. Also, the issue of signing executable files has already been mentioned, and therefore the reaction of antiviruses. What will happen if the community suddenly stops creating builds? That is, numerous questions arise regarding reliability and responsibility.
In short, community builds are not a solution to the problem, but a temporary substitute.

[athenian200]

There is a big difference between the official build and the community build. Also, the issue of signing executable files has already been mentioned, and therefore the reaction of antiviruses. What will happen if the community suddenly stops creating builds? That is, numerous questions arise regarding reliability and responsibility.
In short, community builds are not a solution to the problem, but a temporary substitute.

I think you're asking for far too much even from the official build.

If you're at the point of demanding guarantees about reliability and responsibility if something goes wrong, you should be using corporate software that is capable of providing those guarantees. A project our size cannot reasonably provide those things in a meaningful way even at the official level. If that is what people require, then no, they should not be using Pale Moon, and probably never should have been using it. The kind of expectations you're putting on us would require us to be capable of providing a far more polished and streamlined offering than we are actually capable of providing.

There's not really a problem to be solved here, at least not on our end. We've said what the requirements for the official build will be from here on out. Nuck-TH felt bad for people stuck on SSE2 systems and decided to make builds for them. If he stops making builds for them, then they either have to upgrade their hardware or do without. If you think that arrangement is unacceptable, then sorry, but it is what it is. That's the offer, take it or leave it. If you require a "proper" solution to this "problem," then Pale Moon is not for you.

Also, I'm not saying the low-power Intel systems from 2019 are outdated, what we're saying is that they are very much a rare edge case like outdated hardware that we are choosing not to allow to hold us back any longer.

[Pentium4User]

There is a big difference between the official build and the community build. Also, the issue of signing executable files has already been mentioned, and therefore the reaction of antiviruses.

Who has control over your operating system?
You or the vendor of your AV software?
If the latter, remove it and get one that gives you control about it.

What will happen if the community suddenly stops creating builds? That is, numerous questions arise regarding reliability and responsibility.
In short, community builds are not a solution to the problem, but a temporary substitute.

Most FOSS stuff is provided as-is, which means there is no guarantee for anything. Fullstop.

Although, often there are many people who voluntarily help and create stuff that users demand, although not in every case and often limited. This is the case here too, even for the official builds.
Some community members already stepped out and don't provide builds/packages for certain situations. Stuff comes and stuff goes.

If you like to change that, you have to step in and do it yourself or help out with money etc.

All of the work costs time and also money.