Floorp Browser

[Night Wing]

I use three linux browsers in all three linux distros I run everyday. These linux browsers are Pale Moon, Waterfox and Firefox running in Linux Mint, MX Linux and Linux Debian. I am always on the lookout for other browsers. All three of these linux distros are using my preferred desktop environment, Xfce.

This past year I have used the linux browsers named SeaLion and Mercury. Recently in another topic thread, Moonbat posted a link to the Floorp browser and it runs in linux. I decided to check it out and compare it to the Mercury browser.

I do not install any third party browser in any distro which offers Xfce. My linux Pale Moon (default) and Waterfox (backup) browsers are not installed. I wanted to see if I could use the same method to use Floorp without it being installed. Turns out I can and I did.

So I used one of my two Mint SSD's to experiment with Floorp and it runs very well. It is "highly" customizable. Instead of comparing it against the Mercury browser, I decided to switch gears and compare it to the Waterfox browser. Both are very good browsers.

I did make one mistake since I deleted something I think I shouldn't have but it does not matter since Mint 22 will be released sometime in January of 2025. I will do a clean install of Mint 22.1 when that happens.

One of the biggest advantage to using Floorp, you can change user agents by going in to Preferences. But when I got Floorp up and running, Preferences was not listed. It is listed as Settings. And the User Agent check choices were not there either.

I think the User Agent settings are not listed anywhere, unless it is there and I cannot find it, is because the Floorp browser must be "installed" for these User Agents choices to show up and my Floorp is not installed.

In closing. Below is a screenshot of my 64 bit linux Floorp 11.21.0 browser running in, at this time, 64 bit linux Mint 22 (Wilma) Xfce. I used the Light Purple color extension for Floorp's theme. And I also I re-arranged some of my program launcher icons on my Panel.

This post was made by me using the Floorp browser.

[Michaell]

I had Waterfox as a secondary browser for years. I gave up on it ~ 2yrs ago. I just don't see what it offers. Librefox suits me better for privacy out of the box without having to constantly update user.js. But I end up customizing every browser anyway. From what I read about Floorp, I decided it wasn't as good as itself and others claim. Mercury required me to customize most of the settings to my preferences so not much different from Firefox. Most of the Firefox (and Chrome) forks seem to offer very little improvement over just configuring the original to suit.

Off-topic:
Why 3 versions of Linux? Seems to be complicating life unnecessarily.

[Night Wing]

Off-topic:
Why 3 versions of Linux? Seems to be complicating life unnecessarily.

Off-topic:
I do not like to have all of my eggs in one basket if you get my drift. I'll explain below.

Some sites in Pale Moon do not render properly because they are geared heavily towards Chrome. I do not like Chrome. Chrome does not appeal to me since it is a data mining browser. Waterfox is a better backup browser to Pale Moon than Firefox is. With that said, "Why"?

Firefox in Mint is still as I type this, still on version (132.0.1). Firefox 133.0 was released this past Tuesday. But on MX Linux, someone was on the ball since I received the update for Firefox 133 Monday night. This is just one reason. There are others which I will not go into.

Since I have a Hotmail email account, Microsoft discriminates against Pale Moon since Hotmail does not render properly. The scrollbar for my folders is "missing" so I could not scroll to see the rest of my folders when using Pale Moon. Been this way for years.

I had to use Firefox 132.0.1 to access my Hotmail account. But since last Sunday, Microsoft will not allow me to access my Hotmail account using Mint's Firefox. Said something vague about Security when it came to this version of Firefox in Mint. And as I type this, Mint still has not sent the update for Firefox (133).

But Waterfox 6.5.2 did allow me to get to my Hotmail email account. In order to access my Hotmail, after entering my username and password, I was taken to a page which was nothing more than a "glorified" ad page showing me all of the Microsoft products they wanted me to have and use.

And none of the products on that page run on linux such as Office 365, etc, etc, etc. I guess Microsoft's AI or whatever algorithm it is using, does not like to use the word, Linux or does not understand the word Linux.

But at the bottom of said page, there was the link for "Outlook". So I clicked on the link and it took me straight to my Hotmail email account which rendered perfectly. But that link turned into a tab. So I had two tabs open. The glorified ad page and my Hotmail tab.

I decided to piss Microsoft off by terminating the tab for the glorified page by "xing" out of it because if I just logged out of that page, Microsoft was going to re-direct me in that tab to where they wanted me to go.................and I was not going to comply.

When I was through with Hotmail, I logged out, used my mouse to tap my Home button in Waterfox and bypassed the redirect page to MSN thereby taking me to my Home page which is Startpage.

Now for LibreWolf and not "Librefox" which is the word you used. BTW, you need to learn the difference, specie wise, between a wolf and a fox.

LibreWolf does not render Hotmail properly. Microsoft discriminates against LibreWolf too. In LibreWolf, Microsoft serves up "Hotmail Lite" and that is what they name it. It is absolutely useless when it comes to Hotmail.

As for Mercury, the guy Alex who maintains it, the present version was updated on Sept 17th (version 129) which is a little more than two months ago. That is not too good. But the previous update for Mercury was on Mar 5th (123) so that was just a little over six months ago.

Update wise, that is unacceptable to me. I know Mercury is not Alex's bread and butter, but it seems Alex updates Mercury when he "feels like it or has time for it".

As for Floorp, I am going to compare it to Waterfox and see if I like it enough to keep it. I know you think having three linux browsers is overkill, but I "like" overkill. With four browsers, the more the merrier.

As the old adage goes and I'm paraphrasing; "Better to have them and not need them, than to need them and not have them".

[moonbat]

I think the User Agent settings are not listed anywhere, unless it is there and I cannot find it, is because the Floorp browser must be "installed" for these User Agents choices to show up and my Floorp is not installed.

There's no difference between the installed and the archive version - I don't have this option either on my installed setup. And rather stupidly - the built in updater isn't removed and I had to use policies.json to disable it.

[Night Wing]

@ moonbat

While using Waterfox today to access my Hotmail email account, I got a new "wrinkle" from Microsoft. After typing in my username and password, I was again take to the glorified "ad" page.

But all of a sudden a large rectangular window appeared covering the middle of my 32" external monitor. Microsoft was asking me to give Microsoft my...................phone number. I did not comply since I hit the "X" button at the top right corner of the window. Then continued on to my Hotmail.

Tomorrow's experiment will be me using Floorp to see if I can get into my Hotmail account and also seeing if my Hotmail renders properly in Floorp. BTW, I'm not fond of Sidebars so I went into the settings and unchecked the mark for the Sidebar.

With a 32" external monitor for my two desktop towers computer, I know I am being "picky". But if I decide to keep Floorp, the Sidebar is going to take up a lot of vertical viewing space on my old 14" HP (dv4-5113cl) laptop so the Sidebar definitely needs to be removed.

Thanks for the heads up for the Updater since I didn't allow it to automatically update Floorp in the Settings. I update all of my browsers which are not installed (Pale Moon, Waterfox, Mercury, Floorp) on this one SSD.....manually.

[moonbat]

Microsoft was asking me to give Microsoft my...................phone number.

That's strange, unless they're trying to get you to enable 2 factor authentication. Which again is better with an authentication app rather than relying on SMS codes.

Thanks for the heads up for the Updater since I didn't allow it to automatically update Floorp in the Settings

It makes no sense for an updater in a repository installed version anyway - the updater would need root privileges to do its job, and using a repository means your package manager is handling updates.

[andyprough]

Microsoft discriminates against Pale Moon since Hotmail does not render properly. The scrollbar for my folders is "missing" so I could not scroll to see the rest of my folders when using Pale Moon. Been this way for years.

You can use the Shift-Tab key combination about 7 times to navigate to the Hotmail folders in Pale Moon, and then scroll through the folders using the up-down arrows on your keyboard.

I know you think having three linux browsers is overkill, but I "like" overkill. With four browsers, the more the merrier.

Two others are worth mentioning:
IceCat is a build of Firefox ESR that only contains freely licensed software and that strips out telemetry and strips out anything that would communicate with a Google server: https://icecatbrowser.org/index.html
Abrowser is similarly a build of Firefox (not ESR) that only contains freely licensed software and that strips out telemetry and strips out anything that would communicate with a Google server: https://packages.trisquel.org/aramo/abrowser
So maybe you will eventually end up with six GNU/Linux browsers.

[Night Wing]

That's strange, unless they're trying to get you to enable 2 factor authentication. Which again is better with an authentication app rather than relying on SMS codes.

But I do not own a smartphone. Just an old clam shell flip style cell phone. It basically sits in the drawer. I take it out of the drawer to charge the battery every two weeks. And the phone is not connected to the internet either.

I use a land line phone at my home so it will not do texting. As for the password I use for Hotmail, it is 18 characters.

[Night Wing]

You can use the Shift-Tab key combination about 7 times to navigate to the Hotmail folders in Pale Moon, and then scroll through the folders using the up-down arrows on your keyboard.

Seems like a lot of effort and jumping through hoops to get around Microsoft's discrimination of Pale Moon. I think it is just easier to use a browser which works without all the hassle.

[Night Wing]

Just an update.

Went to Hotmail using Floorp a little while ago and it was easy getting to Hotmail. Everything worked as it should in Hotmail.

[andyprough]

Seems like a lot of effort and jumping through hoops to get around Microsoft's discrimination of Pale Moon. I think it is just easier to use a browser which works without all the hassle.

Kind of depends on your perspective. I'd personally rather mash a few more keys than open up a second browser for just one site. I'm always concerned about system resources, and opening up a second browser and going to hotnail is going to instantly cost me 1.2GB of memory or more.

[suzyne]

Off-topic:

Seems like a lot of effort and jumping through hoops to get around Microsoft's discrimination of Pale Moon. I think it is just easier to use a browser which works without all the hassle.

Kind of depends on your perspective. I'd personally rather mash a few more keys than open up a second browser for just one site. I'm always concerned about system resources, and opening up a second browser and going to hotnail is going to instantly cost me 1.2GB of memory or more.

Conversely, if you already have another browser open to play the DRM protected content on Spotify (or whatever other essential web app doesn't work well on Pale Moon) the incremental increase in memory consumption is a total non-issue.

[moonbat]

Off-topic:
As more sites enforce 2FA - you might take a look at RealityRipple's SecondFaqtor program for desktop users, so it's useful for those who don't use smartphones.

[Night Wing]

Seems like a lot of effort and jumping through hoops to get around Microsoft's discrimination of Pale Moon. I think it is just easier to use a browser which works without all the hassle.

Kind of depends on your perspective. I'd personally rather mash a few more keys than open up a second browser for just one site. I'm always concerned about system resources, and opening up a second browser and going to hotnail is going to instantly cost me 1.2GB of memory or more.

"Perspective".........is a two way street. Just depends on where you want go or what do you want to use when pertaining to system resources.

I am on my number one desktop tower. It has a lot "oomph" in it if you get my drift when it comes to memory. So I will just concentrate on memory. The motherboard has four memory slots in it.

There is only one memory stick in one slot. The memory stick is 32 GB. Which means this motherboard can access up to 128 GB. And this is the reason why I chose this motherboard when I rebuilt this desktop tower. Lots of memory capacity if needed in the future. The only thing I kept was the original case.

Below is the system information for it. Scroll all the way down to the "Info" heading at the end and look at the memory I am using. Then to the right of that, you will see what percentage of memory is being used.

And I do not mind opening a second browser (Waterfox) up because I will close the first browser (Pale Moon) down . And I would wager you are using more memory, percentage wise, than I am using.

Code: Select all

System:
  Kernel: 6.8.0-49-generic arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 13.2.0 clocksource: tsc
  Desktop: Xfce v: 4.18.1 tk: Gtk v: 3.24.41 wm: xfwm4 v: 4.18.0 with: xfce4-panel vt: 7
    dm: LightDM v: 1.30.0 Distro: Linux Mint 22 Wilma base: Ubuntu 24.04 noble
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: Micro-Star model: MAG B660M MORTAR WIFI DDR4 (MS-7D42) v: 1.0
    serial: <superuser required> uuid: <superuser required> UEFI: American Megatrends LLC. v: 1.20
    date: 02/28/2022
CPU:
  Info: 12-core (8-mt/4-st) model: 12th Gen Intel Core i7-12700K bits: 64 type: MST AMCP
    smt: enabled arch: Alder Lake rev: 2 cache: L1: 1024 KiB L2: 12 MiB L3: 25 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1884 high: 4917 min/max: 800/4900:5000:3800 cores: 1: 4917 2: 800 3: 800
    4: 800 5: 800 6: 800 7: 4900 8: 4900 9: 800 10: 800 11: 800 12: 800 13: 4200 14: 800 15: 800
    16: 800 17: 800 18: 3797 19: 3776 20: 800 bogomips: 144383
  Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel AlderLake-S GT1 vendor: Micro-Star MSI driver: i915 v: kernel ports: active: none
    empty: DP-1, DP-2, HDMI-A-1, HDMI-A-2, HDMI-A-3, HDMI-A-4 bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:4680
    class-ID: 0380
  Device-2: AMD Turks [Radeon HD 7600 Series] vendor: PC Partner / Sapphire driver: radeon
    v: kernel arch: TeraScale-2 pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 16 ports: active: HDMI-A-5
    empty: DVI-D-1,VGA-1 bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 1002:675b class-ID: 0300 temp: 35.5 C
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.11 with: Xwayland v: 23.2.6 compositor: xfwm4 v: 4.18.0
    driver: X: loaded: modesetting,radeon unloaded: fbdev,vesa dri: r600 gpu: radeon display-ID: :0.0
    screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x285mm (20.00x11.22") s-diag: 582mm (22.93")
  Monitor-1: HDMI-A-5 mapped: HDMI-4 model: ViewSonic VX3276-FHD serial: <filter> res: 1920x1080
    hz: 60 dpi: 70 size: 698x393mm (27.48x15.47") diag: 801mm (31.5") modes: max: 1920x1080
    min: 720x400
  API: EGL v: 1.5 hw: drv: intel iris drv: amd r600 platforms: device: 0 drv: r600 device: 1
    drv: iris device: 2 drv: swrast gbm: drv: kms_swrast surfaceless: drv: r600 x11: drv: r600
    inactive: wayland
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: mesa v: 24.0.9-0ubuntu0.2 glx-v: 1.4
    direct-render: yes renderer: AMD TURKS (DRM 2.50.0 / 6.8.0-49-generic LLVM 17.0.6)
    device-ID: 1002:675b
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Alder Lake-S HD Audio vendor: Micro-Star MSI driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel
    bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:7ad0 class-ID: 0403
  Device-2: AMD Turks HDMI Audio [Radeon HD 6500/6600 / 6700M Series]
    vendor: PC Partner / Sapphire driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel pcie: speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 16
    bus-ID: 01:00.1 chip-ID: 1002:aa90 class-ID: 0403
  API: ALSA v: k6.8.0-49-generic status: kernel-api
  Server-1: PipeWire v: 1.0.5 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse status: active
    2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin
Network:
  Device-1: Intel Alder Lake-S PCH CNVi WiFi driver: iwlwifi v: kernel bus-ID: 00:14.3
    chip-ID: 8086:7af0 class-ID: 0280
  IF: wlo1 state: down mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8125 2.5GbE vendor: Micro-Star MSI driver: r8169 v: kernel pcie:
    speed: 5 GT/s lanes: 1 port: 4000 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:8125 class-ID: 0200
  IF: enp3s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Intel AX201 Bluetooth driver: btusb v: 0.8 type: USB rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1
    bus-ID: 1-14:7 chip-ID: 8087:0026 class-ID: e001
  Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 0 state: up address: <filter> bt-v: 5.2 lmp-v: 11
    sub-v: 363c hci-v: 11 rev: 363c class-ID: 6c0104
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 1.35 TiB used: 19.06 GiB (1.4%)
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Samsung model: SSD 870 EVO 500GB size: 465.76 GiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    tech: SSD serial: <filter> fw-rev: 2B6Q scheme: GPT
  ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: SanDisk model: SSD PLUS 480GB size: 447.13 GiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s tech: SSD
    serial: <filter> fw-rev: 04RL scheme: GPT
  ID-3: /dev/sdc vendor: Samsung model: SSD 870 EVO 500GB size: 465.76 GiB speed: 6.0 Gb/s
    tech: SSD serial: <filter> fw-rev: 2B6Q scheme: GPT
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 456.89 GiB used: 19.05 GiB (4.2%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdc2
  ID-2: /boot/efi size: 511 MiB used: 6.1 MiB (1.2%) fs: vfat dev: /dev/sdc1
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 2 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2 file: /swapfile
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: hi-speed hub with single TT ports: 16 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1
    chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-2:2 info: Micro Star MYSTIC LIGHT type: HID driver: hid-generic,usbhid
    interfaces: 1 rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 500mA chip-ID: 1462:7d42 class-ID: 0300
    serial: <filter>
  Hub-2: 1-3:3 info: Genesys Logic Hub ports: 4 rev: 2.1 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1
    chip-ID: 05e3:0610 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-5:4 info: Logitech Illuminated Keyboard type: keyboard,mouse
    driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 300mA
    chip-ID: 046d:c318 class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: 1-6:5 info: HP HP Wireless Mouse type: mouse driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 1
    rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 100mA chip-ID: 03f0:2141 class-ID: 0301
  Hub-3: 1-11:6 info: Genesys Logic Hub ports: 4 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 100mA
    chip-ID: 05e3:0608 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-11.3:8 info: Realtek 3-in-1 (SD/SDHC/SDXC) Card Reader type: mass storage
    driver: ums-realtek interfaces: 1 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 500mA
    chip-ID: 0bda:0153 class-ID: 0806 serial: <filter>
  Device-2: 1-14:7 info: Intel AX201 Bluetooth type: bluetooth driver: btusb interfaces: 2
    rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 power: 100mA chip-ID: 8087:0026 class-ID: e001
  Hub-4: 2-0:1 info: super-speed hub ports: 9 rev: 3.1 speed: 20 Gb/s lanes: 2 chip-ID: 1d6b:0003
    class-ID: 0900
  Hub-5: 2-2:2 info: Genesys Logic USB3.2 Hub ports: 4 rev: 3.2 speed: 10 Gb/s lanes: 1
    chip-ID: 05e3:0625 class-ID: 0900
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 32.0 C mobo: N/A gpu: radeon temp: 35.5 C
  Fan Speeds (rpm): N/A
Repos:
  Packages: pm: dpkg pkgs: 2274
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list
    1: deb https: //mirrors.cicku.me/linuxmint/packages wilma main upstream import backport
    2: deb https: //dal.mirrors.clouvider.net/ubuntu noble main restricted universe multiverse
    3: deb https: //dal.mirrors.clouvider.net/ubuntu noble-updates main restricted universe multiverse
    4: deb https: //dal.mirrors.clouvider.net/ubuntu noble-backports main restricted universe multiverse
    5: deb http: //security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ noble-security main restricted universe multiverse
Info:
  Memory: total: 32 GiB available: 31.13 GiB used: 2.23 GiB (7.2%)
  Processes: 391 Power: uptime: 4h 54m states: freeze,mem,disk suspend: deep wakeups: 1
    hibernate: platform Init: systemd v: 255 target: graphical (5) default: graphical
  Compilers: gcc: 13.2.0 Client: Unknown python3.12 client inxi: 3.3.34

[Night Wing]

Off-topic:
As more sites enforce 2FA - you might take a look at RealityRipple's SecondFaqtor program for desktop users, so it's useful for those who don't use smartphones.

Off-topic:
I will definitely keep that in mind.

[andyprough]

And I would wager you are using more memory, percentage wise, than I am using.

That's true, although I am usually using a laptop with 64GB of memory, I also use a lot of memory on virtual machines, so I have to pay attention to browser memory usage.

[Night Wing]

Just an edit.

Mint has updated their default Firefox browser to the 133.0 version. I went back to Hotmail and this time, Microsoft (Outlook) let me access my Hotmail email account whereas I could not access Hotmail when using Mint's 132.0.1 version.