What is Reddit's opinion of
GNOME Web?
From 3.5 billion Reddit comments
21 reviews of this app found across Reddit:
> based on the popular WebKit engine
You're right, GNOME Web is Webkit. Although, other threads on it have pointed out it depends on outdated and/or broken libraries. (I can't remember which.)
happy to help :) good luck moving forward.
someone else already suggested that an alternate browser might help in a situation like yours. i just recently found out that gnome web (https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Web) let's me sync my firefox account. i don't use ubuntu so don't know if it is available in your software manager. if not you could install the package epiphany-browser (https://packages.ubuntu.com/focal/epiphany-browser) in a terminal.
Midori is pretty standard though, isn't it? GNOME's Web seems a bit more interesting. Especially [web applications](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_(web_browser\)#Web_Applications_mode).
Well, if you're on Linux you can try GNOME Web. I believe it's based on WebKit, which should make it less resource hungry than Firefox and Chromium-based browsers.
And of course; if you're on Mac, there's Safari.
To be fair the official GNOME browser is Web and it is a steaming pile of shit. Resource hungry, not privacy friendly and likely insecure, zero features. Good thing distros never set it as the default.
GNOME team would better ditch this crap and work on Firefox integration.
> Mozilla and Firefox have been pushing bloatware, trackers, a shit ton of privacy and security issues down their throats for years, and they are still like "best privacy browser" LOL.
Any sources?
Out of all the browsers out there Firefox still remains to be free, open source and hackable and not led by a mega corp like Google, Apple or Microsoft. Brave can be questionable because Brave Inc needs to make profit. The only other alternative for Firefox I know of is Gnome Web (Epiphany).
Went ahead and installed Epiphany to confirm whether Gnome provides a way for users to install add-ons/extensions and I confirmed that they do unfortunately not provide a way for users to install add-ons on their browser.
GNOME Web, I use it because it integrates nicely with the rest of my system. And it has a built in adblocker, so the lack of extension support isn't really an issue for me
From their FAQ:
>Does Epiphany support extensions?
No. Epiphany did support extensions in the past, but they were fragile as they required access to browser internals and broke very often when new versions of Epiphany were released. To avoid these problems, we would love to support WebExtensions, the same extensions standard that is implemented by both Chrome and Firefox. Contributions would be highly welcome. Regardless, Epiphany aims to obviate the need for most extensions by having the functionality of most important extensions, such as adblocking, built-in and enabled by default.
It's better integrated in GNOME than Firefox is. Whether it is a good browser is subjective. Its lack of extensibility is probably a deal breaker for many. I don't use it myself, but I would qualify it as adequate.
Safari's not but the Webkit Engine itself may still run on Windows. Apple themselves haven't ported Safari to Linux but there's WebkitGTK which is used by GNOME's Web. It could probably be made to run on Windows too if somebody put the effort into it.
Currently there's no extension support in Web, as stated here, they're looking for contributors to help add it but I fear this is not going to be a trivial task. I would be using Web too if I could use Vimium with it :(
It doesn't require a lot of investment. Right now, GNOME Web is powered by WebKit, works on Desktops, phones, and supports PWAs. Only one guy named Michael Catanzaro that works at Red Hat is building it.
I'm not talking about reinventing the wheel, I'm talking about building a stripped down version of Firefox that is more mobile friendly, and with better support for PWAs.
GNOME WEB: https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Web
From Epiphany's web page (FAQ):
>Does Epiphany support extensions?
>
>No. Epiphany did support extensions in the past, but they were fragile as they required access to browser internals and broke very often when new versions of Epiphany were released. To avoid these problems, we would love to support WebExtensions, the same extensions standard that is implemented by both Chrome and Firefox. Contributions would be highly welcome. Regardless, Epiphany aims to obviate the need for most extensions by having the functionality of most important extensions, such as adblocking, built-in and enabled by default.
>
>Note that Epiphany does support plugins, which are completely different.
Source: https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Web/Docs/FrequentlyAskedQuestions#Does_Epiphany_support_extensions.3F
I am completely unable to contribute to Epiphany in that way. But I agree that the lack of extension support is a real pain, especially for stuff like password managers.
In the meantime, you can always resort to Firefox sync (with your passwords) or the Bitwarden appimage, although it is much less convenient than an actual extension.
> Web is the web browser for the GNOME desktop and for elementary OS, based on the popular WebKit engine. It offers a simple, clean, beautiful view of the web featuring first-class GNOME and Pantheon desktop integration. Its code name is Epiphany.
You may install Web from the software repositories of most Linux operating systems, where it is normally packaged as "epiphany-browser" or "epiphany".
> HTTPS Everywhere
Web has HTTPS Everywhere built-in as well, see https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Web/Docs/FrequentlyAskedQuestions#Does_Epiphany_support_extensions.3F
> uMatrix
Not quite the full functionality of it, but Web does block cookies from third party sites by default. Better than nothing I suppose.
> uBlock Origin
The built-in ad blocker in Web works fairly well for me, but I can't speak for in comparison to uBlock.
> YouTube Enhancer
I personally primarily view YouTube in the Videos application in GNOME. The search tool has a drop down to search YouTube (pasting URLs works too), and I find the player works better than YouTube's default player on Web. Of course this doesn't allow you to access your subscriptions, video comments, or any other YouTube functionality other than playback.
> Bitwarden Password Manager
I use Password Safe and just use the copy password to clipboard functionality and paste my passwords into Web. Not as convenient as an extension that auto-fills passwords though.
There are a plethora of little browsers implementing various toolkit's webkit backends for niche users.
One of the most popular is qutebrowser, and also Gnome web (formerly epiphany).
Yeah, more webkit implementations, but it's a blip in usage statistics. With enough users they could put pressure on the upstream project.
Indeed, I use GNOME Web (Epiphany), not Firefox.
However, Reddit is an open forum, and I'm absolutely entitled to criticize Mozilla's decisions about Firefox regardless of whether or not I use it, just as you're entitled to downvote me about it.
Gnome Web is your friend. Gnome Web is love. Gnome Web is life.
Yes, I know it's annoying when people suggest switching browsers or distros to fix a problem, but I just had to. Web doesn't remotely get the amount of love it deserves.
I like epiphany (gnome-web) enough, but midori's a close second. If you want something a little more /r/unixporn, check out luakit. They're all pretty modern webkit browsers, so they'll handle most websites, but they're very lightweight.
If you're looking for something even lighter, I think your only option is going to be a text-only browser like w3m or lynx.