Is there something I’m missing? I have Firefox on my iPhone, I live in India. Is it not “proper” Firefox or is Firefox now available in US App Store?
Comment on iPhones in the EU get ability to set more default apps, delete more built-in ones
30p87@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
Who knows, maybe one day you can run actual Firefox on them too? :p
You could, in the EU. But as the EU is only a small portion of the market (Apple did not succeed as much with brainwashing here), Mozilla said it would be too costly to literally recreate FF from scratch for iOS, only for the EU market.
dutchkimble@lemy.lol 3 weeks ago
30p87@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
Any browser on iOS/iPadOS etc. is just a reskin of Safari. It might add new features - VPN, closing-all-tabs-feature, sync - but the underlying browser engine is still webkit, including all its limitations. Those limitations are, for example, limited debugging and no plugin support. Whereas I can install almost all desktop addons on my FF nightly on Android, I can’t even have adblock on “Firefox” iOS. And even after Apple opened up the browser stuff, so FF can now be based on gecko, Mozilla would need to create and maintain a whole new App - for the EU, because other countries won’t get those possibilities ever.
So FF on my iPad is just a way for me to access website-only stuff. In my Android phone, I also use eg. youtube/piped, deepl, maps in FF. That would be a pain on iOS due to missing Addons.
dutchkimble@lemy.lol 3 weeks ago
Ah! I never knew that! Thanks for the detailed explanation
NGnius@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
All browsers on iOS are basically reskinned versions of Safari since they all have to use WebKit
lemmyvore@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
You know, I hadn’t realized this before. Thanks to Apple’s decade-long policy, alternative browsers for iOS literally don’t exist, they’ll have to be ported. It will take years for that to happen, if anybody even bothers. Well, Google will.
And that’s how Apple will have managed to shoot themselves in the foot and have iOS fall under Chrome domination too.
At this point if they were smart they would sponsor the ports of alternative browsers that are not Chrome, but I doubt they have it in them.
uranibaba@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
There is a new one, Orion. kagi.com/orion/
Kidplayer_666@lemm.ee 3 weeks ago
WebKit, isnt it though?
uranibaba@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I think so. As someone said, safari with another gui.
helenslunch@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
Huh? Chrome is just Apple’s WebKit.
AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Right. Like Apple’s webkit is just the reskinned KDE browser?
OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml 3 weeks ago
That was a longggg time ago. Also a good reason why you should chose GPL as your code license.
lemmyvore@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
For now, but the EU will force Apple to allow non-WebKit engines on iOS. At which point only Google will have enough money to spare porting an entire engine to a small market.
db2@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
What year do you think it is right now?
helenslunch@feddit.nl 3 weeks ago
Is there a point you’d like to make?