cecexacjrgec

> Maybe I'm not enough of an Apple fanboy

Maybe you’re too preoccupied trying to discredit valid criticism as “fanboyism” to realise how important UI and UX are for products such as browsers.

Besides, Chrome itself is already an absolute mess of conflicting and downright distasteful UX choices and patterns. Firefox seems to be stuck in the past but Chrome seems to actively DESPISE being available on Mac.

If only privacy circles were big enough to matter.

Unfortunately “being the same everywhere” only works if your application is distinctive enough in functionality that it can’t be anything else but itself. Firefox is just a browser. Safari is also a browser. Chrome is also a browser. And none of these apps are more important or relevant than the operating system they are working under.

If my OS says windows and tabs close on the left, then I expect every single app to be a good platform citizen and not make me relearn default controls just to operate simple functions. Windows and tabs close on the left. End of story.

On their own? Nothing.

But Graphene doesn’t mean anything to the general public. People aren’t buying “an iOS device”, they are buying iPhones. People aren’t buying “an Android phone”, they are buying “a Samsung/Galaxy” or a “Pixel”.

Mind you, when I say people, I mean the general population. Not those actually interested in these subjects.

My point is: people don’t care about these specifics, people care about having a frictionless experience (or as close to frictionless as possible). Having to explain what Graphene even is is friction enough for most people to not even bother listening to your explanation.

Not only that, but general colours are system-like but offputtingly different (dark theme is different from Mac dark theme just enough to be unsettling). Spacing (padding, margins, etc) is uneven on a lot of options, toggles and fields. Swipe back/forth being a simple arrow on the corner of the screen instead of full page swipe (like Safari) in the year of our lord 2026 is a complete disgrace (yes, chrome does this too, yes chrome also sucks). Press CMD+F and just watch as a search bar that hasn’t been updated to modern visuals in about 20 years pops up at the bottom. Pretty much everything around Firefox feels like a random collection of Windows and Linux behavioural patterns mashed together like a digital Frankenstein monster.

And despite what many people here like to think: these things matter. UX improvements compound exponentially, and so do UX problems. Firefox has an opportunity here to be a first-class citizen on every OS it runs on. It has the opportunity to be the browser that respects your OS choices no matter what, but alas, Firefox seems rather content carrying its “ah yeah I remember using it back in ‘06” reputation.

Firefox is not a bad browser by any means, but it feels like Firefox is the browser equivalent of the “how do you do fellow kids” meme. An out-of-time experience pretending to blend in under the guise of “AI”.

> a few AOSP enthusiasts dropping off

> I did

Precisely my point.

Just because everybody does it wrong doesn’t make it right.

Yeah. It’s a tough balance to achieve but that’s the situation we’re in right now so Mozilla really ought to step up (and I totally wish they would).

My biggest pain point at the moment (entirely subjective mind you) is not even the AI nonsense, but how disjointed and alien the Firefox UX and general feel is to Apple platforms (what I use, at the moment). I don’t want Firefox to mirror Safari 1:1 but I do want the Firefox UI and UX to feel polished, well thought out and thoroughly in line with system HIG specs—given that I spend a lot of time in a browser, it shouldn’t feel like a stranger in a strange land amidst my other desktop applications.

Aggressive UI improvements would go a long way to restore some faith in the incandescent fox‘ mission—at least for me.

If only Graphene had a better marketing team. It pains me to say this but it is the absolute truth: the public does not know Graphene and does not care about Graphene. Even it’s name is absolutely awful. This is like the Linux distro hell: “you should use BingaBoingoKonohaOS_v34 or Peppermint_Cinn4monR0ll with the OutOfThisWorld DE, but steer clear of the Pancake package manager, use openMsPacMan with GrassFaceWhazzit frontend instead.” How is anyone (as in not us, the tech nerds) supposed to reason about this?

Things will keep as is for as long as they keep making these OSs FOR the tech nerds.

Downvote me all you want. You know it’s true. An OS made for nerds and by nerds will never reach mainstream and will not, ever, move the needle anywhere. Tech is no longer a hobbyist’s game.

> Many people bought Pixels due to this and it wasn't fulfilled.

Did they though? Or is this just conjecture? Because, honestly, Pixels are not even available worldwide so a few AOSP enthusiasts dropping off and going to Graphene hardly seems concerning for the mighty G.

AOSP reference was a tagline for a few nerds that still wanted the Nexus devices of yore, but it was clear from day one that Google wanted their Pixel phones to be their iPhones.

No one is forcing Mozilla’s hand (afaik) and no one is actually thinking “if Firefox had a chatbot that might convince me to move over”. Youre right that it is not a “both sides” thing, its a “Mozilla thing”. Through and through.

Me too. Too bad I had to abandon it because Mozilla seem more focused on making AI-nonsense than a browser nowadays. No, Firefox, you don’t need AI features. You do need a better UI. You do need smoother scrolling. You do need privacy focus (which automatically means you do not need AI features). You do need to feel like you belong on the platform you’re installed on and not wish everything were Linux. You do need better designers that understand UX is not just “add controls everywhere”.

> or turn to alternatives like Firefox as a new foundation.

With the way Firefox is heading, that might not be the best idea. Nowadays Mozilla seem more focused on riding the AI-hype wave than actually making an excellent browser people want to actually use.