Comment by stuff4ben
4 years ago
Other comments seem to say it's based on Webkit, but why not something like Mozilla Firefox? I stay as far away as I can from Chrome and Google, but Webkit doesn't seem like the answer. That being said, I may still try it.
A very long time ago, Mozilla decided it was too difficult to keep Firefox’s engine API stable and said it’s more important that we have developer velocity than we have other people releasing software based on our rendering engine.
A decade or so later they kinda backtracked on that stance with boot to gecko and FirefoxOS but it is my understanding that they never took that momentum to make gecko into something that can be used for electron like platforms or indeed a new browser.
Bottom line is that WebKit/blink gives you better website compatibility (because major parts of the web is only tested against chrome) and is easier to use as a library than trying to wrap something around Gecko.
I think this has been one of Mozilla’s worst decisions.
The "The Browser" episode from the Acquired podcast might shed some light on the reasons why. If one of the key figures in the development of Mozilla and JavaScript didn't choose it for his own new browser, why would anyone else? :(
The Browser (with Brendan Eich, Chief Architect of Netscape + Mozilla and CEO of Brave) https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/the-browser-with-brendan-ei...
As mentioned in that interview, Brave's biggest reason for switching away from Gecko was that they couldn't support Netflix DRM. Gecko-based browsers can support it today because Widevine works (see Librewolf).
It's worth noting that Brendan Eich is far from the most impartial party you could hear criticize Firefox. He used to be the CEO, and resigned after Mozilla employees discovered his political contributions.
Sure, one could argue that. But note that even Jon Stephenson von Tetzchner, the co-founder of Opera (who even built their own independent browser engine), also chose Chromium to build the new Vivaldi browser. Everyone avoids Firefox codebase because it is a mess (on purpose, so that others can't build a competing browser with it). As for Brendan Eich, I honestly believe that someone wanted him removed to weaken Firefox's growth and development, and they successfully used "cancel culture" to do so. After all, what does one's political beliefs have to do with one's technical and management skills (especially when they are able to compartmentalise and separate it from their professional life)?
You're wrong, as usual: The L.A. Times reported my Prop 8 support in 2012, Mozilla employees found out then, yet I did not resign then or for two years.
It seems you are also implying I'm lying about why Brave switched from Gecko to Chromium because of your animus toward me over something completely unrelated in the past. That says nothing at all about me or Brave, and too much (none good, IMO) about you.
You're one of three or four handles, along with rare green ones, that just can't stop talking (detraction, lying) about me, even when you're wrong and off target by any sane standard. Just recently, HN commenters noted how upside down threads involving my name tend to become, because of you and a very few others. I suggest it's time to stop.