More info: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48056110

Thought this interview was interesting:

• He's very bullish on AI, but specifically wants open-source AI and wants to lower dependence on the AI giants which... fine, I guess
• He seems neutral on the AI Off Switch in Firefox. Seems to understand that it's important to users, but doesn't say anything about its future. (He says he sees Mozilla's job as helping "lead our users through this transition" which kinda sounds like it might go away some day)
• Talks up Mozilla Data Collective & any-LLM, which I wasn't familiar with but sound... OK, maybe? Data Collective sounds fine.

Konform Browser is a web browser with the goal of promoting user freedom and access to the rights of security, privacy and anonymity. It is intended as a general-purpose browser fit both for daily online browsing as well as targeted deployments in secure or untrusted environments. Has stronger security with hardened defaults, better privacy and fingerprint protection while keeping user in control.

About

Source

Release notes

New in latest version:

• Respect tab groups
• Allow sorting by container
• Highlight selected option

https://github.com/monomon/sort-tabs-advanced

On my system, I wanted Firefox profiles to feel like their own browser instances. Meaning, their own app icons and to not be grouped together. Almost like how it is on MacOS.

To do this, I had to make multiple .desktop files. Here are the contents of that file. This targets flatpak, but it should work for traditional Firefox installs too.

I called this profile "Personal". Note that this says --profile "/home/USERNAME/.var/app/org.mozilla.firefox/config/mozilla/firefox/personal". In this, "personal" is a symlink to the real profile folder name located in the same directory.

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Exec=/usr/bin/flatpak run >--env=MOZ_APP_REMOTINGNAME=Personal >--branch=stable --arch=x86_64 --command=firefox >--file-forwarding org.mozilla.firefox --profile "/home/USERNAME/.var/app/org.mozilla.firefox/config/mozilla/firefox/personal" --name org.mozilla.firefox.Personal >--class org.mozilla.firefox.Personal @@u %u @@
Terminal=false
X-MultipleArgs=false
Icon=/home/USERNAME/.local/share/icons/firefox-heart.png
StartupWMClass=org.mozilla.firefox.Personal
DBusActivatable=false
Categories=GNOME;GTK;Network;WebBrowser;
MimeType=application/json;application/pdf;application/rdf+xml;application/rss+xml;application/x-xpinstall;application/xhtml+xml;application/xml;audio/flac;audio/ogg;audio/webm;image/avif;image/gif;image/jpeg;image/png;image/svg+xml;image/webp;text/html;text/xml;video/ogg;video/webm;x-scheme-handler/chrome;x-scheme-handler/http;x-scheme-handler/https;x-scheme-handler/mailto;
StartupNotify=true
Actions=new-window;new-private-window;
Name=Firefox (Personal)
Comment=Fast and private browser
GenericName=Web Browser
Keywords=Internet;WWW;Browser;Web;Explorer;
X-GNOME-FullName=Mozilla Firefox

[Desktop Action new-window]
Exec=/usr/bin/flatpak run >--env=MOZ_APP_REMOTINGNAME=Personal >--branch=stable --arch=x86_64 --command=firefox >--file-forwarding org.mozilla.firefox --profile "/home/USERNAME/.var/app/org.mozilla.firefox/config/mozilla/firefox/personal" --name org.mozilla.firefox.Personal >--class org.mozilla.firefox.Personal --new-window @@u %u @@
Name=New Window

[Desktop Action new-private-window]
Exec=/usr/bin/flatpak run >--env=MOZ_APP_REMOTINGNAME=Personal >--branch=stable --arch=x86_64 --command=firefox >--file-forwarding org.mozilla.firefox --profile "/home/USERNAME/.var/app/org.mozilla.firefox/config/mozilla/firefox/personal" --name org.mozilla.firefox.Personal --class org.mozilla.firefox.Personal --private-window @@u %u @@
Name=New Private Window

OC by @novafunc@discuss.tchncs.de

After seeing a lot of backlash over Waterfox adding Brave's adblock engine:

It looks like Waterfox is piggy-backing off of Firefox’s implementation (great!).

And it's been there for a little while.

Mozilla bundled adblock-rust (Brave’s Rust-based adblock engine, the same one my team works on) into Firefox. Pretty exciting to see them finally start taking ad & tracker blocking seriously; I didn’t think I’d see this day. It landed in Firefox 149 via via Bugzilla Bug 2013888.

...evidenced by the stale mothballed bug report (linked). This should be an easy bug. It should be a no-brainer that triggers a Mozilla dev to say “of course, no problem.. job done”.

It’s kind of like when Trump was asked to condemn the KKK. He had to pause and think.

Or when Peter Thiel was asked:

“Hey, what do you think? Should humanity survive?” And it took him five, six, seven seconds to say, ‘Yes, I guess so’.” (from Rutger Bregman’s lecture)

A year after the bug was raised, Mozilla has not made a decision.

There used to be a feature whereby a bookmarked page could be flagged for offline use. Then when you visit that page, it instantly renders the page regardless of whether you are online. Was that removed?

There is a «File→Work Offline» tickbox, but that’s apparently something different because it gives no way to specify which pages should function offline.

With Firefox 148 hitting the stable channel across all supported platforms, Mozilla has promoted the next major version of its open-source, free, and cross-platform web browser, Firefox 149, to the beta channel for public testing.

Firefox 149 looks like a minor update that only introduces the long-anticipated native Split View feature, allowing users to view two web pages side-by-side in one tab. The Split View feature can be enabled by right-clicking on a tab, and you can also add a split view to a new group.

The Split View feature has been in testing in Firefox Nightly until now, and we can only hope it will land in the final Firefox 149 release since it’s a welcome addition for increased productivity. Split View can be enabled in Firefox 147 and Firefox 148 from about:config by setting the browser.tabs.splitView.enabled option to true.

Mozilla has released Thunderbird version 148 of its widely adopted free and open-source desktop email client, now available for download.

In this update, one of the most visible changes is that the “Favorites” folder can now be selected directly as a destination when using the “Move To” and “File” actions.

On the authentication front, NTLM is now available for Exchange Web Services accounts, plus Yahoo, AT&T, and AOL accounts have been migrated to PKCE.

A month after releasing version 147, Mozilla has launched Firefox 148, the latest update to its popular open-source web browser, now available for download.

The main new feature is the AI Controls section in Settings, which gives users a clear and central way to manage or completely block AI features in the browser.

A visible “Block AI enhancements” switch lets users turn off both new and existing AI functions. By default, AI enhancements are blocked, but users can enable specific features if they want. Mozilla says more AI controls will be added in future updates.

Mozilla has released Thunderbird version 147 of its widely adopted free and open-source desktop email client, now available for download.

One of the most visible additions is a new “Show Full Path” option for the folder pane when using compact view modes. This makes it easier to navigate complex mail setups by displaying the full folder hierarchy instead of truncated names.

Alongside this, Thunderbird 147.0 introduces a new preference, mail.useLocalizedFolderNames, allowing users to control whether special folder names are localized. In addition, special folders are now localized using a restricted and more predictable set of names.

Beyond the Firefox browser to see more changes under its new CEO, the Thunderbird mail client is also expected to see some big changes in the new year.

Thunderbid today published their 2025 year in review while also offering a look ahead to 2026.

This year brought Thunderbird 140 as their newest Extended Support Release (ESR), native Microsoft Exchange email support in Thunderbird 145, continued work on their mobile story, and also the introduction of Thundermail and Thunderbird Pro.

Especially as demand for video grew, the web needed a next-generation codec to make high-quality streaming faster and more reliable. H.265 promised efficiency gains, but there was no guarantee of another OpenH.264-style arrangement. The risk was another fragmented ecosystem where browsers like Firefox couldn’t play large portions of the web’s video.

To solve this, Mozilla joined other technical leaders to form the Alliance for Open Media (AOM) in 2015 and started ambitious work on a next-generation codec built from Google’s VP9, Mozilla’s Daala, and Cisco’s Thor.

Last year, the Firefox team set out to test something fans requested: choosing a custom app icon. The experiment was simple. Offer a small set of options and see how people use them.

Thunderbird’s plans to expand beyond the desktop client took another step forward this month as the project published its latest progress report on Thunderbird Pro – the new Mozilla initiative to offer an open-source alternative to Gmail and Office 365, for which we informed you about at the beginning of April. Here’s where things stand so far.

Testing of Thundermail, the project’s email hosting service, has reached production level. Internal users have begun onboarding, allowing the team to validate account setup, support workflows, and delivery reliability. The refreshed Thundermail dashboard is also in place, giving users controls for custom domains, aliases, and account settings.

We recently shared how we are approaching AI in Firefox — with user choice and openness as our guiding principles. That’s because we believe AI should be built like the internet — open, accessible, and driven by choice — so that users and the developers helping to build it can use it as they wish, help shape it and truly benefit from it.