Should I be excited about Ladybird Browser ?
from 64bithero@lemmy.world to privacy@lemmy.ml on 19 Feb 19:12
https://lemmy.world/post/43337468
from 64bithero@lemmy.world to privacy@lemmy.ml on 19 Feb 19:12
https://lemmy.world/post/43337468
I hear it’s the first browser in a long while to come with a new engine. Completely independent and no revenue model. To me that would work well for privacy but I see no mention of privacy as any benefit. In fact I don’t see a privacy policy anywhere !
Is a goal of the browser to be telemetry free ? Should I as a person who cares about privacy be showing any interest?
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tbh I’m more excited about Servo.org. They’re also developing a fully independent browser engine and are funded by the Linux Foundation. Ladybird has corporate sponsors, so I’m a bit hesitant. But the more the merrier I guess.
Has something changed recently? Last time I looked at Servo it was just an engine, not a full browser. The servo project wants others to use their rendering engine to create browsers and use it as an alternative to Electron.
It’s just the engine, but it’s supposed to be a much more modern and smaller engine, so writing a new browser on top of it would be much easier than using gecko is. But you’re right, it’s not a browser. There is Verso as a prototype browser, but it’s far from functional.
That’s true, but they have a prototype “browser” you can download from their website. And I’m hoping for a fleshed out version in the end, either from them or someone else.
Servo is a bloated GUI framework?
It’s an HTML, CSS, JS renderer. The fact so many use Electron for bloated app GUIs doesn’t mean that’s what it is. Every browser is functionally the same thing as Electron (with even more stuff), but the use case requires it.
This surely will be used to make bloated GUIs, but that’s good if it replaces Electron and is faster. There is a use for Electron. It’s just over-used.
Not sure i agree. They take a engine made to render a Document Object Model and shoehorn GUI widgets on it, no? At least, every Electron tool i’ve used was laggy, heavy and reserved GBs of RAM.
And what, you count the major webbrowsers not as heavy and bloated?
Well, one example would be a web browser. I’m sure you can at least agree with the utility there. I would say it could also be a useful tool for a prototype, but the problem is, once you have a working prototype, that tends to become the final product.
I am paying attention to both Ladybird and Servo but am not yet “excited” about either. I am hoping they both continue to improve and become more usable (for me - YMMV) but do not expect the possibility of Daily Driver usage (again, for my use model) for at least another year.
My understanding is that they have no intent to violate user privacy, but they’re also not going out of their way to protect it. The goal is to have a completely independent browser, everything else falls second to that.
In terms of privacy, not really more than any other FOSS browser.
What’s more interesting about it is that they’re developing their own browser engine (meaning there will be another independent implementation of web standards) and licensing it (IIRC) more permissively than the existing ones. But that is of course not what this community is about.
To fix the web, we need something new, that is simple to implement but still flexible.
Depends on where you are on the political spectrum:
drewdevault.com/…/2025-09-24-Cloudflare-and-fasci…
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Just so you know, Drew DeVault is a pedophile apologist. He cannot even remotely be considered a reliable source of information.
Why do people keep referencing that dude? He’s just loud and blows everything out of proportion. He could write an entire book about how an ant letting a fart out is inappropriate, racist, bigoted, and antisemitic.
The founder of Ladybird (Andreas Kling) has the alt-right brain-worm, and let’s be honest: we know what those people are cheering for right now.
Is it FOSS? If not then I don’t care about the product. If yes then I don’t care who made it.
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They put the SS in FOSS
Had no idea. Did some research, very unfortunate. Appreciate the heads up.
Who cares lol, as long as it stays FOSS i don’t care
Considering who is behind it, I have no interest in it.
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It’s unremarkable and has baggage.
The Servo browser is where it’s at. It’s written entirely in rust so it has a leg up on stability and security over other browsers. The issue is that they’re not really interested in the most important part, which is things like bookmarks and dark mode. They are laser focussed on the engine and anyone who would use Servo would be fine with a few websites looking broken.
If Firefox released a Servo-based spin, I’d use that in a heartbeat.
No, Rust doesn’t make your code more stable. It can help you making it more secure however.
Security and stability are related. They’re both about preventing unexpected behaviour.
But also Rust can’t replace skill. A ruin in Rust is still a ruin. But it can help make the ruin more secure.
Never said it could, just that it gives them a leg up.
Sure, yes. Not like the “you can make safe C code, just need to (know how to) avoid the foot guns”, you’re right.
I’m hoping servo can be integrated into qutebrowser soon
Qute isn’t my kind of browser, so I probably won’t be following you to Qute.
Firefox suites my workflow basically perfectly. Except that it won’t let me duplicate a tab with a keyboard shortcut (because tabs freeze quite often).
Hmm… would be pretty neat if Playwrite could use the Servo engine too. I would start using that instead of the gecko driver, because why not?
are the servo creators as red pilled as ladybird’s creators?
No. It’s developed by the Linux Foundation Europe.
Eh everyone here acting all mighty because of whose behind it but they are still using gnu products. Stallman is not exactly a perfect model, why are people using gnu.
And what, dare I ask, is the problem with gnu?
Well, it’s nice the developement of a new independent engine, but I’m old and not sure to see the first stable and usefull release of it. The engine is by far the most complex part of the browser, with the need of an big team to develope it for several platforms (even linux distros are not always compatible one with another)
Nowadays Blink is the most advanced engine, because nobody else than Google has the infrastructure and the amount of devs working on it, even with the power to modify web standarts. This is at the same time also the problem.
Yes, Chromium is 100% FOSS and everybody can modify and gutting it to his like, but always depends on the update releases from Google. The only solution is an independent Chromium team and community.
A new browserengine would change nothing, because it comes 20 years late in a market of nearly 80% Chromium in an web optimized by it, like dozends of other indie browsers with a handfull users each or even abandoned out there (eg Otter and others) even the grandfather of Blink, Konqueror with the KHTML engine by the German KDE, forked by Google and Apple.
I am, sevro could be cool be they aren’t actually making a “web browser”
I’d be happier if Firefox received more support. A relatively equal duopoly of browsers is preferable IMO to 80% market share for one, and the remaining 20% broken up amongst half a dozen competing alternatives.
Lot of developer power out there that would be better spent improving what’s mostly already there (Firefox) rather than starting multiple different projects from scratch again. People will burn up any energy and spare time they had to help without even seeing a new browser render it’s first HELL WORLD
Users will eventually use what works for them and thats fine. Its upto firefox on what they want their browsers future to be
I won’t touch the transphobic browser for the same reasons I don’t use the homophobic browser