What you need to know about add-ons in Waterfox 68

Waterfox 68 will be the next major release of the web browser that is based on Firefox code; it will replace the current branch, Waterfox 56, eventually after its release. The developer of Waterfox, Alex Kontos, plans to support the Waterfox 56 branch for some time after the release.
The upcoming Waterfox release launches with add-on system changes that will render older legacy extensions unusable but part of them can be updated so that they run in Waterfox 68.
Waterfox 68 is based heavily on Firefox 68 which means that it is a big jump feature jump from version 56. Mozilla will release the next ESR version of Firefox on July 9th, 2019, and that version will be Firefox 68.0 ESR.
Firefox versions newer than version 57 don't support legacy extensions anymore and Kontos had to find a way to keep legacy extensions supported in Waterfox as support for these is one of the features of the browser that sets it apart from Firefox.
The Thunderbird team is in the same boat and the development team went to work to make sure that legacy extensions, overlay extensions and bootstrap extensions, are still supported in the email client. Kontos was able to use that code -- Thunderbird and Firefox share some code as well -- and integrate it into the upcoming Waterfox browser.
Waterfox 68 and Extension Support
Legacy extensions may require changes so that they can be used in Waterfox 68:
- All extensions need to be updated to reflect changes made to the add-on system in Firefox's engine. Kontos lists using HTML code instead of XUL, and renaming or replacing API calls.
- Overlay extensions need to "engage the new overlay loader" next to that. It is used to apply XUL code to the user interface.
Some popular extensions have been ported already. The list includes DownThemAll, S3 Download, Greasemonkey, Private Tab, Save File To, or Stylish.
Most Waterfox users probably cannot modify extensions to make them compatible with the Waterfox 68 release. Popular add-ons may be ported by volunteers or Kontos himself but there is the chance that less popular ones may not.
It seems that other types of legacy extensions won't be supported anymore. It is unclear how many are affected.
An Alpha version of Waterfox 68 will be released in the near future. As a Waterfox user, you may want to test your extensions in the coming Alpha version to find out which work fine and which may need updating (or cannot be used anymore).


Doesn’t Windows 8 know that www. or http:// are passe ?
Well it is a bit difficulty to distinguish between name.com domains and files for instance.
I know a service made by google that is similar to Google bookmarks.
http://www.google.com/saved
@Ashwin–Thankful you delighted my comment; who knows how many “gamers” would have disagreed!
@Martin
The comments section under this very article (3 comments) is identical to the comments section found under the following article:
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/15/netflix-is-testing-game-streaming-on-tvs-and-computers/
Not sure what the issue is, but have seen this issue under some other articles recently but did not report it back then.
Omg a badge!!!
Some tangible reward lmao.
It sucks that redditors are going to love the fuck out of it too.
With the cloud, there is no such thing as unlimited storage or privacy. Stop relying on these tech scums. Purchase your own hardware and develop your own solutions.
This is a certified reddit cringe moment. Hilarious how the article’s author tries to dress it up like it’s anything more than a png for doing the reddit corporation’s moderation work for free (or for bribes from companies and political groups)
Almost al unlmited services have a real limit.
And this comment is written on the dropbox article from August 25, 2023.
First comment > @ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm
For the God’s sake, fix the comments soon please! :[
Yes. Please. Fix the comments.
With Google Chrome, it’s only been 1,500 for some time now.
Anyone who wants to force me in such a way into buying something that I can get elsewhere for free will certainly never see a single dime from my side. I don’t even know how stupid their marketing department is to impose these limits on users instead of offering a valuable product to the paying faction. But they don’t. Even if you pay, you get something that is also available for free elsewhere.
The algorithm has also become less and less savvy in terms of e.g. English/German translations. It used to be that the bot could sort of sense what you were trying to say and put it into different colloquialisms, which was even fun because it was like, “I know what you’re trying to say here, how about…” Now it’s in parts too stupid to translate the simplest sentences correctly, and the suggestions it makes are at times as moronic as those made by Google Translations.
If this is a deep-learning AI that learns from users’ translations and the phrases they choose most often – which, by the way, is a valuable, moneys worthwhile contribution of every free user to this project: They invest their time and texts, thereby providing the necessary data for the AI to do the thing as nicely as they brag about it in the first place – alas, the more unprofessional users discovered the translator, the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, the greater the aggregate of linguistically illiterate users has become, and the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, as it now learns the drivel of every Tom, Dick and Harry out there, which is why I now get their Mickey Mouse language as suggestions: the inane language of people who can barely spell the alphabet, it seems.
And as a thank you for our time and effort in helping them and their AI learn, they’ve lowered the limit from what was once 5,000 to now 1,500…? A big “fuck off” from here for that! Not a brass farthing from me for this attitude and behaviour, not in a hundred years.
When will you put an end to the mess in the comments?
Ghacks comments have been broken for too long. What article did you see this comment on? Reply below. If we get to 20 different articles we should all stop using the site in protest.
I posted this on [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/] so please reply if you see it on a different article.
Comment redirected me to [https://www.ghacks.net/2012/08/04/add-search-the-internet-to-the-windows-start-menu/] which seems to be the ‘real’ article it is attached to
Comment redirected me to [https://www.ghacks.net/2012/08/04/add-search-the-internet-to-the-windows-start-menu/] which seems to be the ‘real’ article it is attached to
Article Title: Reddit enforces user activity tracking on site to push advertising revenue
Article URL: https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/
No surprises here. This is just the beginning really. I cannot see a valid reason as to why anyone would continue to use the platform anymore when there are enough alternatives fill that void.
I’m not sure if there is a point in commenting given that comments seem to appear under random posts now, but I’ll try… this comment is for https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/
My temporary “solution”, if you can call it that, is to use a VPN (Mullvad in my case) to sign up for and access Reddit via a European connection. I’m doing that with pretty much everything now, at least until the rest of the world catches up with GDPR. I don’t think GDPR is a magical privacy solution but it’s at least a first step.