Iceweasel Replacement or complete removal

[ozitraveller]

Good to know Ozi... thanks for the input

Midori only uses and must have libflashplayer.so to play flash whether it be a direct install or the nspluginwrapper which also installs libflashplayer.so

I can find no settings in Midori regarding flash at all... it is assuming you know what to do to get flash working.

I am not going to worry about flash at all and Midori does fit the bill

I don't need flash work for my needs with my live-build. I just need a browser to display an info page.

But I came across this:
https://wiki.xfce.org/midori/faq#flash_doesn_t_work

[jedi]

Your right as usual, no Chrome in the welcome script.  Midori will suffice to allow a user to jump onto the web in the event they need to while booted to the LiveCd.  After the install it should be up to the individual user as to what they use to browse.  It is probably the most used program a user will use, (the browser) so allow them to get familiar with 'apt-get'!

If your interested in some history;
Adobe announced the decision on Feb. 22, 2012 to no longer support Flash in the Linux environment, calling version 11.2 "The End"  (my words).  To top it all off, they advised all Linux users to switch to Google's Chrome browser.  The Chrome dev's came up with the PPAPI, which we've come to know as "Pepper", and Mozilla, in all their wisdom, decided that they would NOT adopt or pursue the use of "Pepper" in Firefox.  Looking back on it now, it is easy to see how deeply Adobe is in bed with Apple and MS!

[PackRat]

@ozi -

that looks like a reprint from the midori FAQ page. The gstreamer section just below that concerning HTML5 etc ... is a also a good one to review.

@vastone - I've been messing around with opera today since I have it installed. Just for informational purposes, it's nice, but basically an aesthetically redesigned chrome browser.

I'll have to give Midori some more attention based on your results.

[VastOne]

@ Ozi... that libflashplayer.so and it's location are already VSIDO standards just for Iceweasel to have working flash OOTB.  Midori sees that fine and flash works as soon as I install (except everyone is blue) ... as soon as I delete that file for purposes of testing, Midori can no longer handle flash.  The bottom line is that if Midori wants any future, it needs to find a way around this issue because there is no one maintaining libflashplayer.so. That file is 3 years old now and is horrendously behind and IMO it is a miracle it still works at all

The SID version of Midori I installed is version 0.4.3+dfsg-0.2... the latest released version is 0.5.8-1 ... a monster difference and one that makes no sense as there is a debian package maintainer for Midori.  I have installed the latest version and it does at least have spell checking (but does not seem to work)

I now have 9 tabs open and 4 apps and cpu is at 4% and the memory is at 747... this is impressive and I KNOW in my bones it is because that file (libflashplayer.so) is no longer in play

Also an interesting situation... If i use Google search to find something say (midori + '(null)' can't be found) and click on a google search find, I get that error ...  '(null)' can't be found ... but if I right click on the search find and select to open it in another tab, it opens fine... If I open the same search in Duck Duck Go, everything works fine...

Regarding DDG, is it me or does that search system SUCK?  I never get the responses I expect

[ozitraveller]

@ Ozi... that libflashplayer.so and it's location are already VSIDO standards just for Iceweasel to have working flash OOTB.  Midori sees that fine and flash works as soon as I install (except everyone is blue) ... as soon as I delete that file for purposes of testing, Midori can no longer handle flash.  The bottom line is that if Midori wants any future, it needs to find a way around this issue because there is no one maintaining libflashplayer.so. That file is 3 years old now and is horrendously behind and IMO it is a miracle it still works at all

The SID version of Midori I installed is version 0.4.3+dfsg-0.2... the latest released version is 0.5.8-1 ... a monster difference and one that makes no sense as there is a debian package maintainer for Midori.  I have installed the latest version and it does at least have spell checking (but does not seem to work)

I now have 9 tabs open and 4 apps and cpu is at 4% and the memory is at 747... this is impressive and I KNOW in my bones it is because that file (libflashplayer.so) is no longer in play

Also an interesting situation... If i use Google search to find something say (midori + '(null)' can't be found) and click on a google search find, I get that error ...  '(null)' can't be found ... but if I right click on the search find and select to open it in another tab, it opens fine... If I open the same search in Duck Duck Go, everything works fine...

Regarding DDG, is it me or does that search system SUCK?  I never get the responses I expect

@vastone - I think the jessie build I did used the same version as sid from memory. I use DDG as well, I turned off the safe search when I realised results didn't look right.
That memory usage a excellent, and make browsing when running live awesome. I don't think I will worry about flash, I'll let the user install whatever they prefer.

[PackRat]

Regarding DDG, is it me or does that search system SUCK?  I never get the responses I expect

I have never had this problem with it.

[VastOne]

^ then I must be doing something wrong or need a settings tweak

[VastOne]

I have completed the swap out of Mozilla completely ... Midori 5.8 is setup as the default and in eliminating Iceweasel and libflashplayer.so I have knocked 50 MiB off the size of both ISO's making the x32 452 Mib and the x64 at 436 MiB

On another note, there is a Webkit based browser that was developed 3 years ago by Google devs called Arora... it does not need libflashplayer.so to play flash on YouTube...

It is in SID for anyone wanting to check it out... I would use it (and may still) if it was not so old since it has been touched... Y'all check it out and tell me what you think of it  .. I actually like it better than Midori

I still have not made up my mind... if it is worth 50 MiB savings to change everything we have known for 3 years as VSIDO... but then I fire up Iceweasel and see how horrible the CPU is using libflashplayer.so... If any of you want to test it, completely disable and remove libflashplayer.so from /usr/lib/mozilla (and any local you may have setup in your /home) ... what you will discover is Iceweasel without libflashplayer.so uses no runaway memory and zero cpu and see that it is not my decision

Lets have input...

[PackRat]

Arora is Webkit but QT based so if you decide to go that route you may actually pull in 50MiB of qt-based dependencies. I want to say KDE incorporated a bunch of it's code into KDE 4.x but I would have to verify that. People that use it give it good reviews.

Isn't there an add on for iceweasel/firefox that plays all flash video in HTML5 so that the flash plugin is no longer required? Another option, perhaps?

Edit - yes, the Youtube All HTML5 plugin. I removed flash plugin and installed this add on, YouTube works fine; a bit hit and miss with embedded video on news sites. CPU use returns to pre-video state when it's done playing.

[jedi]

This might take a minute...    (this post was made with the thought in mind, that some users abhor non-free software, the original reason for using Iceweasel in the first place, I think)

Personally, I think, in the end, there is no good answer to this thread.  We've always been proud of how small the ISO's are for VSIDO, when compared to the largess of the distro as a whole.  IMO, 50Mb is too small of an amount to seriously sway the conversation one way or the other.  I have not burned a CD in ages.  That doesn't mean others are not.  I think as long as the ISO's stay of a size where they will fit on a CD is a big plus/winner for VSIDO.  None of the big (as in lots of packages and bling and WM's and DE's) distro's can make that claim, nor have they been able to for a long time.

I think the user should make the decision in the end.  VastOne, you've created a distro as close to perfection, IMO, that is possible.  As long as there is something available to browse the web while booted into a Live environment, all should be good.  Midori fits this description, so all in all, a good solution.  That said, it still relies on libflashplayer.so.  As noted below, this solution is really only viable for the next 2 years at most.  Vulnerabilities in Flash will render the use of libflashplayer.so moot at that point.  That means it will not work for VSIDO due to security issues at that point in time, and another choice will have to be made.  That is all well and good too, as 2 years from now, this whole conversation may have been rendered moot...

I have spent a few days reading/studying the question about Flash.  (really, when you boil it down, that is the real issue here, and the only reason we're having this conversation)

Adobe made a terrible decision to stop supporting it (Flash) in 2012.  Worse, they are only providing security updates for 5 years from that date.  (On or approximately Feb. 22, 2012)  So, for Iceweasel/Firefox that means, at the most, 2 more years of safe use.  What I find remarkable in all of this is that Google seems to have really made the decision for everyone.  When it comes to OOTB Flash use, Google's PPAPI (henceforth called "Pepper") is only available to the Chrome browser.  (Yes, I'm aware that IE and Safari are also supported, however, that is not relevant to this thread)  Mozilla is never going to implement it.  Ever!  So, with that said, what to do?

These are the two BIG browsers everyone is most familiar with.  (OK, I might should add uzbl in there as well   )  Google has fired a shot across the bow, so to speak, by stripping support for NPAPI (the N in NPAPI stands for Netscape, the predecessor of IW/FF) from their browsers.  Mozilla refuses to even try working with Pepper.  (for good reason IMO)  In effect, giving each other the finger, and leaving us (the Linux community at large) the worse off for it.

Found here; https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=729481#c83  It is a long read and this is the succinct essence of Mozilla's thinking when considering the Pepper API.

This has been discussed to death on the technical discussion mailing list.  Let me summarize the most salient points of that discussion, for those not willing to go read it themselves:

1)  There is no actual clear definition of the Pepper API.  It's basically defined by Google's implementation.  There's API documentation, but that doesn't cover edge cases, and it's quite likely that actual plugins written against the API rely on the edge cases.

2)  Google's implementation is very much tied to Blink and is not designed to work with any other rendering engine.

3)  The Flash plugin in particular uses a ton of non-public Pepper APIs that are not even mentioned in the Pepper API documentation.

Anyone commenting on this bug who hasn't bothered to go read those discussions and understand these points and their implications is wasting not only their own time but also that of everyone cced on this bug.

Given the number of people who seem to be intent on doing that, at least 7 people (counting myself as of this comment) have removed themselves from the cc list of this bug in the last few days, because we don't particularly like having our time wasted.  The end result here is likely a "why isn't Mozilla adding support for Pepper?" echo chamber, because I doubt new people showing up here will bother to read either this comment or the mailing list discussion....

Thus, the end result being that the user decides what and how they will view and play on the web.  My reasoning for letting new VSIDO users choose their own browser.

I happen to like a few of Google's features.  I also happen to hate a few as well, but this is not a Google "HATE" thread.  (Google Drive in particular, I use a LOT)  With that in mind, as well as finally being able to watch Netflix natively in Linux, I have switched to Chrome.  It pains me, as I have always loved and used Iceweasel/Firefox.  (And yes, Netscape before that)  I firmly believe that Chrome should not be the default browser in VSIDO.  This was a "personal" choice for me.  It is a choice I would make no matter what distro of Linux I was using for the reasons stated above.

VSIDO is about FOSS at its core, (yes, yes, I know, SID is the reason!  ) and adding anything non-free should be left to the user.  VastOne has been a FOSS advocate for many years now, and look at how lucky we are because of that!  If I'm not mistaken, VSIDO has never had any non-free software installed since day 1.  Google Chrome is definitely "non-free" software, and why, IMO, it should not be installed on the ISO.  I'm pretty sure this is true of Chromium as well, when you read the fine print.

Iceweasel is/was "free"!  As in, free software, or free beer...   

[VastOne]

^ Thanks for that incredible research and intel Jedi... There is no one better at digging

There is a standard tool for checking for non-free packages and it is a default standard on VSIDO called vrms

I have done everything I can to keep VSIDO as compliant as RMS would desire but it is all but impossible to do so ...

Here is the list of non-free installed on a brand new install of the latest ISO... you will see that 99.9 percent of these 14 files are just to get those pesky wifi's to work OOTB

Code Select Expand

vrms
               Non-free packages installed on vsido

amd64-microcode                     Processor microcode firmware for AMD CPUs
firmware-atheros                    Binary firmware for Atheros wireless cards
firmware-brcm80211                  Binary firmware for Broadcom 802.11 wireless cards
firmware-ipw2x00                    Binary firmware for Intel Pro Wireless 2100, 2200 and
firmware-iwlwifi                    Binary firmware for Intel Wireless cards
firmware-linux                      Binary firmware for various drivers in the Linux kerne
firmware-linux-nonfree              Binary firmware for various drivers in the Linux kerne
firmware-ralink                     Binary firmware for Ralink wireless cards
firmware-realtek                    Binary firmware for Realtek wired and wireless network
intel-microcode                     Processor microcode firmware for Intel CPUs
unrar                               Unarchiver for .rar files (non-free version)
w64codecs                           win64 binary codecs

                Contrib packages installed on vsido

b43-fwcutter                        utility for extracting Broadcom 43xx firmware
firmware-b43-installer              firmware installer for the b43 driver
firmware-b43legacy-installer        firmware installer for the b43legacy driver
iucode-tool                         Intel processor microcode tool

  12 non-free packages, 0.9% of 1337 installed packages.
  4 contrib packages, 0.3% of 1337 installed packages.

I am happy with these results and stand by the conviction that we are doing the best that we can to make RMS proud, albeit failing

[jedi]

Isn't there an add on for iceweasel/firefox that plays all flash video in HTML5 so that the flash plugin is no longer required? Another option, perhaps?

Edit - yes, the Youtube All HTML5 plugin. I removed flash plugin and installed this add on, YouTube works fine; a bit hit and miss with embedded video on news sites. CPU use returns to pre-video state when it's done playing.

There is also the "Fresh Player Plugin" which also works, and is available now through the web upd8 ppa's.  More on that here > http://www.webupd8.org/2014/05/install-fresh-player-plugin-in-ubuntu.html

Just pretend the 'buntu part isn't there...   

[superwow]

-VO-

I happen to like FF and Iceweasel, but, you're right, they do have some issues, especially recently. But since you ask, here's my 2 cents:

1. Chrome is pretty outstanding because it connects 100% to my Googleverse including Hangouts, which I LOVE, and gives me Netflix. BUT, I do not want Chrome to ever be installed default on a linux box. Google is ... questionable ... in that way that it is ... questionable. So, Chrome install should 100% be user choice.

2. Chromium is pretty outstanding too. Again, the Google glob applies. But it is a better default choice than Chrome.

3. Opera is great, but also a giant proprietary glob.

4. My vote and the background behind it. I love this whole linux experience. It has really caused me to become fascinated with computing. And each distro does it a little differently. I tend to like the bleeding edge distros with the least bloat. And once I get on the distro I masochistically try NOT to install anything I don't need and do it all the way the minimal distro does it. You may know of my recent troubles with VSIDO and my corrupted apt that snowballed. I then hopped on GRML for a while (it is a great resource for system recovery, and a bit like a candy shop) but eventually installed a minimal Debian with some GRML, #!, bbq, & VSIDO configs. I have intentionally not installed an extra gui based browser and have found my brain pleasantly exploded by the simplicity of terminal browsers like w3m and elinks. W3m works better in xterm and framebuffer terminals (has a right click menu in framebuffer terminals), though if you prefer a javascript enabled terminal browser, maybe elinks is better. So I say leave a distro related choice to either your personal needs, VastOne, or the Debian default of w3m. One caveat though (or two), add the Debian menu to the default VSIDO Fluxbox menu so that the app list is automatically generated. That way, a "Network > web browsing" item comes up and w3m is there, and will be opened by  the terminal (you can configure it to open in xterm, which allows a right click menu, unlike other fuller featured terminals like lxterminal or roxterm). Or, simply add xterm calling w3m or whatever terminal browser directly to the fluxbox menu. The menu item will inform unfamiliar new users.

Btw, GRML is another fluxbox distro, but they don't have a gui browser and each time w3m is called, it goes to a tutorial page on how to use it.

Beyond that, I am betting user who have wandered to VSIDO knows a bit about apt-get and can choose for themselves.

[Digit]

i've had an uneasy relationship with firefox for years, even since before their major versioning acceleration.  even ended up getting installed on a minimal system i had kept clean n minimal for over a year.   but for the iso, great, get rid.

midori's maybe the obvious choice (edit: and a worthy one at that ~ it seems to keep improving as the years go by), though i wonder if xombrero got considered.  (((or even dwb)?)).  quite plush, low-bloat (afaik), nice to use n grow with, and not too weird to begin with (which of course matters as the browser on the iso.)

so... this cd i hold in my hand is the last vsido to have fatfox.     feels momentous n historic.

i know after a fresh vsido install i'll end up inevitably installing firefox myself, to varying degrees of reluctance, just as i would from any ground-up install from scratch i do myself, but glad to see this decision made.

[VastOne]

@Digit and superwow... thanks for the excellent feedback, I appreciate it

Edit - yes, the Youtube All HTML5 plugin. I removed flash plugin and installed this add on, YouTube works fine; a bit hit and miss with embedded video on news sites. CPU use returns to pre-video state when it's done playing.

I have used this and like this option... It is IMO the best solution forward with little change to the footprint that is VSIDO now

It seems to work for all sites except those that specifically require adobe flash... I can live with that