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Mozilla Will Not Release an iOS Version of Firefox Due to Apple's Limitations on Third-Party Browsers
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This isn't the same. Nintendo works within the limitations that they give their developers. The Wii's hardware doesn't magically improve when you insert a Nintendo disk instead of another developer's disk.
Apple, however, uses a faster JS interpreter in Safari than they allow developers to use in UIWebView. Thus Safari will always be a better browser from a JS performance perspective than any other browser.
Having said that, I am working on a browser for iOS and OS X which looks nothing like any web browser before it as a school assignment.
I don't think a company "whines." I think a company states challenges. People whine. And a lot of them in this thread alone.
Mozilla is making the best decision for them. iOS doesn't even need any more wrapped browsers.
I'm not sure I'd call it a loss for iOS since it wouldn't be able to be built the way it needs to.
This shouldn't be a reason to restrict competition.
Apple should trust developers.
There is no reason why they couldn't allow others to make their own JavaScript interpreter - even if it was restricted in terms of how it could run.
If it's Apple's crippled interpreter vs. someone else's crippled interpreter, I bet the latter would win.
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Webkit is not a javascript rendering engine. Neither is Gecko.
The fact that chrome uses webkit as its RENDERING ENGINE means nothing. Chrome uses its own build, and doesn't share the one built into iOS. You can even compile chromium from source for iOS.
There is no limitato on iOS that prevents Gecko from running, other than Mozilla's own codebase possibly not being optimised enough for the iOS hardware.
This is not true.
If you want to do a web browser on iOS, it MUST use Apple's WebKit rendering engine - the one provided through UIWebView.
That's why Chrome for iOS is missing features that the Android and Desktop versions have.
I've never jail-broken any of my iOS devices (although the temptation to do so grows every time I read an article like this one). Is there any compelling-ly better browser available on Cydia (including some kind of semi-homebrew Firefox remix)?
IceWeasel for jail-broken iOS devices, anyone?
I'm not sure about that, but I do know that you can remove the Nitro engine restriction on jailbroken devices. You can also decide which browser is the main or default one.
This ability to make this option will be enforced sooner or later. Here in Europe Microsoft have been fined a couple of times now simply for not putting more effort to allow alternative web browsers. Just need the EU to step up!
The thing is Mozilla has such limited resources that it is forced to be streamlined at all times. Fighting Apple on this is like jumping off a building and trying to fight gravity. Their energy is better spent elsewhere.
I bet the real reason is because it would be another vector for jailbreaking.
Apple is not that serious about security. They are more concerned with control over their devices. Look at how much effort Apple goes to make jailbreaking difficult. Example- some hardware feature has made currently made it impossible to downgrade iOS in newer iPads and iPhones.
Mac OS X doesn't have such restrictions and its security is great.
Don't be so naive and think Apple is doing it out of the goodness of their hearts.
Please. It is a way of keeping a monopoly on the device. Opening up Android style security holes and running unsigned code-you know, jailbreaking-would be a user choice. Apple refuses to allow anything on that might allow users of iOS devices to bypass the App Store, plain and simple.
This! I wish more people had a bit more of a clue about these sorts of things. Perhaps apple should allow apps to mark memory as executable then everybody would get to bitch and moan about the potential problems it could create. But hey at least there'd be a lucrative market in anti-virus for ios.
Release it on Cydia with Nitrous as a dependency.
Nitrous basically does that for every browser. It removes the restriction that Apple put on other browsers and makes it as fast as safari.
I've never jail-broken any of my iOS devices (although the temptation to do so grows every time I read an article like this one). Is there any compelling-ly better browser available on Cydia (including some kind of semi-homebrew Firefox remix)?
IceWeasel for jail-broken iOS devices, anyone?
Nitrous basically does that for every browser. It removes the restriction that Apple put on other browsers and makes it as fast as safari.
Welcome in our walled garden!
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These problems exist already in iOS. The world calls the results: Jailbreaks.
That's nonsense. Safari on iOS is not 100 % secure. Not even the App Store connections were secure. So much for Apples secure platform.
iLOL
Shorter Mozilla org: "Wah, wah, wah, mean Apple won't let me..."
Maybe it would be an issue if mobile Safari was horrible, but it's not. If consumers are really jonesing for mobile Firefox then they should give the Galaxy S III a look. It's just that simple. That's how the marketplace works. A product doesn't offer a major feature you want, you look elsewhere.
Maybe it would be an issue if mobile Safari was horrible, but it's not. If consumers are really jonesing for mobile Firefox then they should give the Galaxy S III a look. It's just that simple. That's how the marketplace works. A product doesn't offer a major feature you want, you look elsewhere.
iOS is so 1984.
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Microsoft really didn't impose any browser restrictions, but Internet Explorer was installed on default and due to Microsoft's dominance that became an issue. So it's really not comparable to what Apple's doing, anyone could and can install another browser in Windows.
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Microsoft really didn't impose any browser restrictions, but Internet Explorer was installed on default and due to Microsoft's dominance that became an issue. So it's really not comparable to what Apple's doing, anyone could and can install another browser in Windows.
Running unsigned code and jailbreaking are not synonymous. Running unsigned code and increasing your risk of getting malware are.
I do, however, agree that the person you quoted's reasoning is flawed. If a security vulnerability is acceptable in Safari, why wouldn't it be acceptable in WebKit?
Maybe Apple will loosen the reigns with iOS 7 and allow other web browsers to displace Safari...
Oh gee, how's about being able to open a 9th page on my phone without an existing one being silently tossed?
I have both Atomic and Chrome on my phone in addition to Safari. They all work just fine. Any time I have to let someone else use a browser I fire up one or the other, so they can't blow away stuff I have up and want to stay up -- something I find that people habitually do on any device despite me telling them not to.
You say that like it's a bad thing.
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Having been the victim of core leaks in Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox for years I assert that streamlining and Mozilla have little to do with each other.
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HAHAHAHAHA. "Developers" routinely write software that can't even handle an apostrophe in a name, as if they've never heard of Europe. Developers are among the last people I'd trust to not do something stupid.
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I have three browsers ON MY FSCKING PHONE. All three more or less work (given how broken Chrome is on OSX I haven't used it much on iOS). In what way am I losing?FFS, stop eating scabs off your foot, and grow the fsck up. Apple provides a mobile OS designed to give the user a positive experience. Part of that positive experience is being functional. Another is not having to run fscking AV on one's @#$@! phone because the manufacturer mistakes it for a desktop system. One facet of this is not trying to be all things to all people. If you want to dick around with your device rather than using it, and don't like OS updates, then WTF are you doing here instead of wrestling with some lame-ass Android POS?
Seriously? Examples of people who don't give a rat's ass about which of two Javascript things is used instead of the other:
o My wife (that's right, there are actual *GIRLS* in the world outside your mom's basement)
o 99+% of everyone else
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Exactly. Why believe a technical explanation by someone who knows what he's talking about when there is a perfectly good conspiracy theory.
It's not a vulnerability, it is an attack vector. That means, an attacker would say "so this browser is compiling Javascript and executing the compiled code. Maybe there are some bugs to be exploited that allows us to make the browser execute the code that I want it to execute", and then the attacker looks for vulnerabilities in this area. Apple apparently believes that they can avoid such vulnerabilities in Safari, but they don't trust other developers to do the same.
Well, that article claims what attackers could do in theory, but there is no evidence that attackers could do anything in practice. For example, the article claims that "in theory" an attacker could steal passwords; in practice, they couldn't.
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I thoroughly enjoy the Firefox experience on my Nexus device...thanks to the Android OS.
Apple is a huge put off for me because of the limitations it puts on iOS.
Apple is a huge put off for me because of the limitations it puts on iOS.
I would have liked to see a Firefox type browser. Although I rarely if ever use firefox on OS X anymore.
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If there were no whining and making excuses, there would be no macrumors forum
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If there were no whining and making excuses, there would be no macrumors forum
2 things:
Firefox sucks. So who cares? Most people are fine with Safari, which has always worked perfectly well for me, and there other options.
Second, and this has already been put forward, but: if you don't like Apple's limitations of their iOS platform, don't get an iOS device! Get an Android, and find an app that will listen to your whining and utter consoling phrases from time to time. This is one of the core ideas that differentiates between companies like Apple and Google, and why the heck would Apple completely change their philosophy? Seems to be doing OK for them.
Firefox sucks. So who cares? Most people are fine with Safari, which has always worked perfectly well for me, and there other options.
Second, and this has already been put forward, but: if you don't like Apple's limitations of their iOS platform, don't get an iOS device! Get an Android, and find an app that will listen to your whining and utter consoling phrases from time to time. This is one of the core ideas that differentiates between companies like Apple and Google, and why the heck would Apple completely change their philosophy? Seems to be doing OK for them.
people should be allowed to opt out of the walled garden
hopefully, europe can force this to happen
hopefully, europe can force this to happen