3d ago

Notify Me When Firefox Gets…

I GENUINELY want to use Firefox, or at least give it another shot, but as a Microsoft Edge user as of 4 years ago when they really started refining features like vertical tabs and the overall experience, I jumped ship. Don’t get me wrong, I like Firefox and will use it…but until it gets these features, it’ll remain as a secondary platform. I just can’t make the switch as of now with the drop in usability it would bring. This is NOT a complaint against Mozilla or anything of the sort, more or less a “please notify me when Firefox gets these” or something like that.

Address bar tab switching on iOS: Safari did it best, but Chrome, Brave, and MS Edge have this, and supposedly Firefox on Android does as well. For whatever reason though, even after update 141 with the major visual overhaul, Firefox on iOS still lacks the ability to switch tabs by swiping on the address bar. This is an ESSENTIAL for multitasking, especially considering how (visually nice, but) slow the animations are for viewing tabs.
Actual, NATIVE PWA support on desktop: No, the addon doesn’t count, I’ve had limited success using it across different operating systems. Supposedly at least an alpha version of this feature exists under the name “browser tabs” or something of the sort, likely in the Firefox Nightly builds or something, but I would greatly prefer a native version to the likes of Chromium-based browsers.
Native split-screen: Okay, this one I’m okay with in the current state with the addon, but having it natively built into Firefox would be nice with all the potential refinements and all it could bring.
FULLY collapsible vertical tabs sidebar (and maybe separate from the actual BROWSER sidebar): Okay, not ESSENTIAL, and I know Firefox just recently got vertical tabs (I was one of the first to try it out with Nightly, just as I will be when Chromium does like how they quietly added split screen via a flag), but currently the address bar can auto-hide in full screen. The vertical tabs sidebar? You either have to deal with it permanently visible or entirely GONE unless you click the button for it. It’d be nice to have the option for the sidebar to autohide with the address bar, and even more if the vertical tabs bar was separate from the browser’s sidebar so both could theoretically be active.

That’s all. Again, massive respect to the Firefox developers, I’m just afraid I can’t quite switch to it as my daily driver… yet. Once these features are added though, please, by all means, let me know!

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25 comments

#1 is implemented on Android, interesting that it's not on iOS.
I have 3 and 4 on Zen browser. I know many people are not interested in the forks, I just think it's worth knowing.
- I was fully unaware of the tab swiping feature on android, and I've been using firefox forever. That's so useful, oh my god.
  
  yeah, I forget it myself all the time
  
  Oh yeah, and there are so many great ways they could implement it, too. I know you said you’re on Android so this is FUNCTIONALLY irrelevant for you, but when you get a chance, check out a video on how Safari handles this on iOS. Legitimately the BEST navigation of mobile browsers, hands-down.
  It’s slick and elegant, well-animated, snappy, and functional all in one. You can swipe up on the navigation bar to see all your tabs, then your tab groups are all available via a bar at the bottom to switch between quickly, and if you swipe all the way to the end of your tabs and swipe again, it automatically creates a new one for you. This, and a handful of other cool things, make it legitimately almost convincing enough for me to use Safari just on iOS and set up some complicated syncing method for my desktop and Android browsers, if it only supported extensions. (Orion does all of this + extensions as well and could become a viable alternative once it gets more platforms, if they can get a better implementation of vertical tabs on desktop.)
- I’m totally open to Firefox forks, and Zen’s great. Problem is, that doesn’t fix the Firefox MOBILE issue… no matter how great the desktop client is, if I can’t tab swipe, I’d be using two different browsers anyway. And sure, Zen uses Firefox sync so a theoretical Zen iOS app with tab swiping would fix the issue, but said iOS app doesn’t exist (yet).
  Thankfully, Mozilla said they’re looking into tab swiping on iOS, so hopefully it gets added sooner than later… hence why this post is called “Notify me when…” https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/swipe-between-open-tabs-on-ios/idi-p/2088
  
  Yeah, it's a weird feature parity miss from Android that's not related to not being able to have their own engine. I hope it gets implemented soon.
  
  I use zen on desktop and firefox on mobile, everything is synced so it's seamless. You don't lose Mozilla sync by switching to Zen. You don't get Mozilla's sync on iOS?
  
  Sorry, that’s on me for not clarifying well enough in my wording. What I mean is that:
  Yes, Firefox sync on iOS DOES work with Zen on desktop, so I could use it even without a dedicated Zen app on iOS.
  I DON’T use Firefox on iOS due to the lack of tab swiping, a major dealbreaker.
  I’d otherwise be fine with using Zen on my computer and Firefox with sync on my phone.
  
  ah, got it

25 comments