"Control" as a theme to inspire experience

[jpalais]

Hello everyone,

I'm a PM on Firefox and we are thinking about the different themes that we have in the browser and how to build for them more distinctly. One of the themes we are exploring is control. I would love your thoughts on the theme of "control" as a guide for the Firefox experience.

What features make you feel like you have control when using Firefox?

What would make you feel like you had more control?

Looking forward to your thoughts!

[suikaz]

I'd love to have more control than now without resorting to unsupported or half-supported methods. Literally all the buttons appearing on tabs are nothing but annoyance for me, having at the very least about:config settings for them (again) would be great, and if we (again) got these in the actual settings GUI that would be even better.

The recurring theme of configurable keyboard shortcuts also applies here, I don't know why my browser dances when I try to open the bookmarks library and I just don't like it, why can't it work as expected? Why doesn't backspace allow me to easily go back in history anymore?

Mouse gestures are another topic, due to API limitations extensions just can't do that reliably nowadays.

Another one I have on my mind would be allowing to move each bookmark from the bookmarks bar separately across all toolbars like Opera did, optionally, still allowing to move the whole group if someone prefers that.

And last but not least: when anything changes in the future make it change on the fresh install, but don't break already existing profiles, don't make long term users lost again and again

[jpalais]

Great feedback @suikaz, really helpful in understanding how you define control so we can build more specifically for this theme.

[Erwan]

So far, I feel very limited in control of FIREFOX

I do not control:

1. the updates and what it brings, even if it introduces AI when I don't want it.
2. updates that add new options or features, if I don't discover them on blogs, I can miss them and not activate them, or conversely, functions activated by default against my will after an update (example: "Allow websites to carry out advertising measurements while respecting privacy")
3. Mozilla's evolution towards an increasingly present advertising system over which we do not have much control.
4. Interfaces that change or disappear without my having a say (example: compact mode, which I still use despite everything)

Thanks to the plugin (I have 4 important ones) I already have a better handle on things:

1. Ublockorigin: choose, select, block certain elements
2. Privacybdger: Continuous and intelligent analysis
3. KeePass to manage my passwords (Firefox allows almost nothing, except being bothered by a general password that constantly comes to harass you at startup)
4. Decentraleyes

Another example: I would easily not use Google safebrowsing.

I really like the ease of using LibreWolf, especially its quick and easy cookie whitelist selection.

A lot of choices have to go through about:config, and that limits a lot of things. Same goes for CSS.

And overall, despite a strong presence in this forum, I find that I have absolutely no control over the future of Firefox and the directions it is taking today.

-------------------------------

Pour l'instant, j'ai très moyennement l'impression d'avoir le contrôle dans FIREFOX.

Je ne contrôle pas :

• les mises à jour et ce qu'elle apporte, même si elle introduise des IA alors que je n'en veux pas.
• les mises à jour qui ajoutent des nouvelles options ou fonctionnalités, si je ne les découvre pas sur les blogs, je peux passer à côté et ne pas les activer, ou l'inverse, des fonctions activées par défaut contre ma volonté après une mise à jour (exemple : "Autoriser les sites web à effectuer des mesures publicitaires en respectant la vie privée")
• Les évolutions de Mozilla vers un système publicitaire de plus en plus présent et sur lequel nous n'avons pas beaucoup de contrôle.
• Les interface qui change ou disparaisse sans que j'aie mon mot à dire (exemple : le mode compact, que j'utilise toujours malgré tout)

Grace au plugin (j'en ai 4 importants) je maitrise déjà mieux les choses :

1. Ublockorigin : choisir, sélectionner, bloquer certains éléments
2. Privacybdger : analyse continue et intelligente
3. KeePass pour gérer mes mots de passe (Firefox ne permet quasiment rien, si ce n'est d'être embêté par un mot de passe générale qui vient constamment vous harceler au démarrage)
4. Decentraleyes

Autre exemple : je voudrais facilement ne pas utiliser Google safebrowsing.

J'aime beaucoup la facilité qu'offre LibreWolf notamment sa sélection rapide et facile des listes blanche en matière de cookies.

Beaucoup de choix doivent passer par about:config, et ça limite énormément de chose. idem pour le CSS.

Et globalement, malgré une forte présence dans ce forum, je trouve que je ne contrôle absolument pas l'avenir de Firefox et les orientations qu'il prend aujourd'hui.

[DonutRush]

---

And overall, despite a strong presence in this forum, I find that I have absolutely no control over the future of Firefox and the directions it is taking today.

---

This is the biggest thing. This forum is where feedback goes to die - if you aren't on board with drowning Firefox in AI sludge features that contribute to our rapidly deteriorating climate, you will be ignored or berated. If you're ready to ride the LLM train over the cliff, you're celebrated.

Mozilla drank the Kool-Aid and then hooked up an IV of the stuff for good measure.

[jpalais]

Thank you @Erwan.  I'm looking to understand more about the experience of using Firefox and appreciate your help with this endeavor. I also hear that you aren't feeling like you have much control while using Firefox. Is that a change? Did you used to feel more control at some stage?

For what it is worth - I wanted to share with you what I think would be good news: We have 139 community ideas delivered and approx 70 in development. The top 4 requests on Connect are being worked on or have recently been delivered.

I'm pointing to these numbers not to change your mind about your experience, which is valid. But just to show that while we don't have control over all of the organizational decisions - and some are more popular than others - we do care about community input and bring your thoughts into our roadmaps when there is strategic business and user need alignment.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and for continuing to use Firefox even though you feel we aren't doing things perfectly. 🙏

[Erwan]

One last thing:

I would like to be offered things, new features, developments...

I don't want them imposed on me.

----------------

Une dernière chose :

J'aimerais qu'on me propose des choses, des nouveautés, des évolutions...

Je ne veux pas qu'on me les imposes.

[jpalais]

Thank you for this clarity.

[uniqueusername]

@jpalais  Many if not most users on Mozilla Connect are not native speakers. Terms like "PM" and "themes" are ambiguous. When people talk about Firefox themes, they usually mean the themes (skins) available at addons.mozilla.org.

As for ways to give us more control, please see these discussions. Users keep asking about these features on support forums:

• Please split "Sites you save and visit" into two options
• Quickly add cookies to exceptions
• Ability to edit context menus, remove unnecessary options
• Customizable hotkeys
• Hotkeys - yes please!
• Disable history search groups, show Android history

[jpalais]

Thank you for letting me know about the language differences. I will make sure to be mindful of this going forward.

For more clarity:

PM = product manager
Theme = I'm referring to a them of content and context rather than "skins" from addons.mozilla.org.

Thank you for all the links you shared! These are helpful resources for the exploration I'm doing.

[gerek]

(1) As mentioned above: more control about keyboard shortcuts
(2) command bar (instead of a pure address bar)

Thanks for keeping up the good work!

[jpalais]

Thank you for the reinforcement around keyboard shortcuts and command bar.

Appreciate the encouragement as well!

[myspace]

Thanks for the discussion! 

• New sidebar vertical tabs feature helps me feel more in control when using Firefox
• Being able to easily customize the UI a bit more would be a big plus 

[jpalais]

@myspace myspace I am also enjoying more control with vertical tabs! Great to hear this option offers you more control.

Noted that customizing the UI would be helpful. Any thoughts on specifics here?

[kxra]

I would love to see Mozilla help us take control of our data—knowledge & ideas—that we acquire, organize, and build upon from across the web. Right now that is left to various apps and platforms from Google Docs/Drive, personal wikis/notes apps (Obsidian, Logseq, Supernotes, Roam Research), or knowledge base platforms (Appflowy, Confluence, Lark, Notion, Anytype, etc.)

I drafted a big pipe dream outline of an "InfraWeb" space which combines notes, bookmarks, and tabs into one seamless personal or collaborative knowledge base: https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/𝗜𝗻𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗪𝗲𝗯-turn-tabs-bookmarks-and-notes-into-a-semantic-...

[jpalais]

@kxra thank you for linking to your detailed plan! I love the idea of reinventing some of the well worn paths to productivity (bookmarks, notes) that haven't always helped in the way we hoped they would. Collaborative knowledge base is interesting too. Appreciate it!

[Astral]

I hope you can take a look at these and understand how users want to control their browsers.

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/allow-ui-customization-without-css-in-quot-about-preferences/id...

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/add-firefox-css-to-the-store/idi-p/33048

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/innovative-proposal-for-firefox-introducing-css-ui-section-for/...

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/enable-css-support-by-default/idi-p/8737

Thanks.

[jpalais]

Thank you for the links @Astral! I will look at these conversations. 

[Astral]

Yes, for users who want an easier way to control as much of their browser as possible, it might be useful if we could customize the recently launched sidebar, context menu, or customize our own UI through the store instead of requiring css.

[jpalais]

I'm hearing that these updates would add more control for you and those who want deeper control:

• Easier, built-in or installable UI customization tools

• Including the ability to tweak the context menu

• Without relying on technical CSS hacks

[Windows_Vista]

@jpalais @mozpm @itskaren

Does anyone know about Zen Browser? Why write code from scratch when you can refine what the community has already built?

I am really frustrated with the current state of Firefox. I do not appreciate unwanted AI features being forced onto my browsing experience. When will we finally get a truly new user interface? https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/discussions/firefox-really-needs-a-ui-revamp-in-2025-26/td-p/91762 

And what about the Servo Browser Engine? Will Mozilla consider embracing Servo? Look at what Ladybird managed to achieve in nearly three years compared to Servo, which is being developed by Igalia and the Linux Foundation. https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/discussions/when-is-mozilla-gonna-ditch-the-gecko-browser-engine-for-...

Mozilla needs to listen to its community and collaborate with partners like Igalia and the Linux Foundation to make the web a better place. Right now the digital landscape feels like a dystopia controlled by corporate interests, and if Firefox falters, the open and free web could be in serious trouble.

We all know times are hard, and Mozilla must take our needs and criticisms seriously—especially as the Google Search Deal fades away. Look at Thunderbird, which made an inspiring comeback in 2022 after a long decline, fueled by passionate community support and donations. Meanwhile, Firefox seems to be going down a different path.

I only ask that the Firefox team show its genuine care for its users. The KDE team managed to generate overwhelming support with the release of Plasma 6. Perhaps Firefox should explore similar avenues or even develop its own alternative to platforms like Patreon and PayPal. The current trend of overreliance on AI is not the solution.

How about you give us more control of Firefox so that if we do not want a certain feature or change it is not forced upon us but remains completely optional.

[jpalais]

@Windows_Vista I am hearing this theme quite a bit in the feedback i.e. having control over which features you opt into. Thank you for sharing and for your passion for these issues. We are all navigating a lot of competing business requirements. Though our mission remains our shareholder and we are committed to ensuring the internet remains open and accessible to all.

Appreciate you caring enough to post here and share your thoughts and for continuing to use Firefox even when you may not agree with every decision.

[Astral]

Have you ever used zen? Although zen is not good at fixing some bugs, I won't use it as a primary browser for a while. But Zen enhances the original Firefox in every way, and to be honest Zen is more dynamic and promising than the current Firefox, and you often see interesting features coming out and improvements to old Firefox features. Let me briefly outline what I see:

1.PIP

The zen browser has a minimal function for PIP, we can easily close the PIP window instead of through the taskbar(Look at this: https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/discussions/regarding-firefox-labs-auto-pip-mode/m-p/91955 )

2.Media

I've noticed recent improvements to zen's functionality, they've added a media progress bar at the bottom of the vertical TAB bar, so you can easily see the audio status of background tabs, easily return to a playing TAB or pop a PIP. Some Firefox extensions can implement similar media management features, but they are not as polished as the native ones

3.More customization

Here are zen's enhancements to Firefox's custom interface:

Did you find anything? I can explain it to you. On Zen we have the option of attaching the extension icon to the sidebar instead of Firefox's current one, some extensions will force me to attach to my sidebar as soon as they are registered to use the sidebar, I don't want to see such an icon and have to remove the extension.

4.Fully customizable hotkeys

In addition, zen has upgraded the Firefox UI interface, and I like the current mica material and more modern and softer rounded corners.Above I highlighted the major "control" improvements that the zen team has made to Firefox. I hope Firefox follows it up, these make for a great user experience!

[jpalais]

I downloaded it but I haven't explored it much yet.  From the visual standpoint I know we are looking into rounded corners - the rest of what you list here I will need to investigate. I really appreciate this detailed walk through!

[onequest]

@jpalaisthanks for asking these questions. (Also nice profile image 👌)

The comments I'm going to make all relate to the Android experience since that's the only computer I use.

What features make you feel like you have control when using Firefox?

• Being able to choose if I want ads at all or how much. This is actually what drove me back to Firefox over a year ago. It's so refreshing to be able to explore anywhere on the web and enjoy the content without any ads disturbing the experience. I would be okay with ads if they were actually well designed, but the current experience is a slop heap that makes it impossible to enjoy going anywhere on the web unless you block them. I still prefer no ads, of course. But this really helped me take back control of a crucial part of my digital experience.
• The choice to use whatever search engine I want. Although, that experience could be improved cuz it's too technical for many people to add another if you don't like the options provided by default.

What would make you feel like you had more control?

• The most impactful spot in my Firefox experience that would help me feel like I have more control, is more intelligent adaptation of the UI, hierarchy, and information architecture.
• What do I mean by this? Currently I use my Android device everyday plugged in to an external display. It's a bit janky as Android's desktop mode is still under development, but it works fine enough. But I stopped using Firefox last year when I made this switch because the interface and IA seems to only be built for small screen mobile devices. There's no intelligent responsive design or improved organization when I adjust the display size.
• Websites seem to render the mobile view but blown up and it messes up the experience. Even if I toggle on Firefox's "Desktop mode", the web content doesn't adjust enough and feels off. Also, the desktop mode doesn't toggle on automatically at larger screen sizes despite having that setting turned on.

Hope this makes sense, but happy to explain more about anything, provide examples, pictures, videos, etc.

c

[jpalais]

@onequest you have a really interesting use case here with Android --->desktop external display. I'm so glad you shared this here so I can check on if we are working through any plans for optimizing this experience in the ways you are noting.

Your points around feeling more in control when you can choose your ad experience and search engine is helpful too -- and it sounds like we could work on the engine choice to make it more accessible.

Really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with me!

[Windows_Vista]

Hey my friend made a change.org peteion https://chng.it/6rkB8jsQwt for Firefox to switchover to Servo I need to get as many signatures on it as possible.

[kxra]

Can we have a petition for AOMedia to use Lapped Transforms from the Xiph.org's Daala codec in version two of AV1? You can't politically pressure an open source organization to magically have more resources / developers. Servo is awesome though.