manually re-enabling plugins in Waterfox

Diosoth · 04 Feb 2021

One reason I migrated to Waterfox was because they didn't just randomly disable plugins because they felt like it- of which I had to abandon Firefox 56 when they ignored all my settings and remote killed most off what I was using regardless. I really can't stand modern browser' junky layout, I prefer classic themes and Firefox killed support for Classic There Restorer deliberately. No other browser has similar that I can find, and Chrome annoys me with how many other useful plugins it doesn't have. As such I switched to Waterfox to keep support of the plugins I like.

Unfortunately that now seems to be ending as I found Flash player & others disabled, with no option to manually enable them. Supernova is Chrome only with apparently no chance a Firefox version is coming(they've been "promising" one since 2019). There are a lot of Flash games I can't play because apparently my PC isn't mine and companies can remote kill switch things I choose to install without consent. I've gone through about:config, tried to set things to allow manually enabling these plugins, they don't work.

Does anyone have any ideas?

And I don't mean "Flash is not secure, you shouldn't use it, Adobe ended it for a reason", that's not an answer. I'll take the risks to run the games I wish to play. Nor do I believe there is such a thing as "secure" software when the antimalware industry makes billions a year.

file3456 · 04 Feb 2021

You might want to check out Pale Moon. Your add-ons that your used to using are more than likely coded in XUL code, and the big browsers don't use the tried and true XUL code for add-ons anymore, they all run Web Extension code which is basically like a script which has hack potential with security and privacy.

Now the thing with Pale Moon is that the browser does use XUL-based add-ons, but Pale Moon is starting to shift away from the ability to use the old classic XUL add-ons from Firefox. I use Pale Moon now and still use a lot of the old classic add-ons for my needs and they do work for the most part, but Pale Moon is gearing up to change things so only a Pale Moon made XUL add-on will work in the browser. Pale Moon will give you a warning about an old classic Firefox add-on, but it'll still probably work as of now. But that won't be the case one day in the future. So either you change the add-on GUID (which is what I will do), code it for Pale Moon, you request it be made for Pale Moon or you find an alternative to that add-on at Pale Moon's add-on page.

Pale Moon for Windows downloads

Pale Moon - Add-ons - Extensions

Frequently Asked Questions (F.A.Q.) - Pale Moon forum

Pale Moon forum - Forum index

Classic Add-ons Archive - Pale Moon forum

Now since Pale Moon is a niche browser, websites and Google Recaptcha will discriminate your browser. If you go to solve a Recaptcha it just won't work. That's why I keep an updated version of Firefox installed and I also keep an updated version of "Chrome" installed except this version had been stripped of everything Google. I don't add extensions to it or anything. It is plain vanilla Chromium for testing things. It's called UnGoogled Chromium.

You can also have several versions of Firefox or Chrome with their portable versions.

Mozilla Firefox, Portable (browser) | PortableApps.com

Google Chrome Portable (web browser) | PortableApps.com

About Flash. Yes, it's a hack potential. Back in around 2015 there was a new update at least once a week. You can see all the CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) here. Over 1400 to date. Now compare that to something like HTML5. Only 45 to date. If my math is correct, That's 4 CVEs a year thus far for HTML5 and 114 CVEs a year for Flash. I figured for each going back to 2010 to make it fair.

What is HTML5? HTML5 is what has now replaced Flash. It renders right in the browser so no plugin needed. No plugin updates either so you're not having to run separate software. YouTube et al all use HTML5.

Now your analogy of how the anti-virus software companies makes "billions" a year may be correct, but I did some research. Avira = ~ 79 million, Bitdefender = ~ 155 million, Malwarebytes I'm not too sure about, based on the California location ~ 17 million, and Kaspersky Labs is a big one. In London about ~ 690 million. Source: https://www.dnb.com/ Total earnings of all anti-virus companies I posted here: ~ 941 million. So not "billions."

Is anti-virus software in large part a bunch of crap? In my opinion, yes. Why? It's based on definitions and polymorphic viruses like ransomware will slip right on by. Plus, these products are in large part full of fluff and so much code that they can and will hose you over. It could be with their next update. Just like how lack of QC (Quality Control) updates for Windows. One day everything is fine and dandy then along comes an update that messes your computer up. I've read the posts for years and years. Read signature below.

I don't even use updates or an anti-virus product. Okay, a handful of updates for software and hardware purposes. I use Sandboxie for my browsers, and scan ALL downloads at Virus Total. I also periodically clone my hard drive once every month or so. Have I been owned and tea bagged by a black hoodie wearing hacker sporting a Guy Fawkes who's mask is owned by Time Warner? Nope! Because I'm not an idiot and browse the Internet and other things like an idiot.

Is the anti-virus industry making money on computer therapeutics like big Pharma in the real human biology scheme of things? Yep!

But, it doesn't mean you should do this or that because of this or that. It's like using a vice for a virtue. If the games or what ever it is you use are using Flash and are not coded with HTML5 yet, then I guess you have no choice to use Flash. That's just your thing, but Flash IS a vulnerable plug-in. Now I personally believe ALL plug-ins have a hack potential so in my browser I don't allow Java to execute unless I'm asked by my browser that such and such site wants me to use Java. If I happen to be browsing a website and it wants Java permission (not to be confused with Java Script) and I know the website doesn't need Java to function I'll say no way Jose. Same goes for Silverlight and the rest of the crap which I have no need for. Java is installed for a few programs I use that were coded for it.

Anyway, check out Pale Moon, chime in on their forum if you have questions. If you do, tell Tobin that if his new code paradigm existed computers would smoke.

Diosoth · 12 Feb 2021

After a number of tweaks in about:config it appeared to reactivate the plugins... but that's it, "appeared to". They didn't actually work.

I installed Pale Moon. Finding matching plugins that I use was a bit annoying, it needed special versions of uBlock Origin, NoScript & Privacy Badger installed. This version of PB didn't support importing settings even though the old Waterfox install can export. Even so, like with WF, Flash installed and appears to be active yet doesn't work at all, at least on websites. It CAN run a local .swf file which is a slight step up but that's all. I would have to download offline copies of those games, which I believe many are getting archived, but file storage alone is going to be a major issue and you either have to spend hours on manual single downloads or get a hefty archive pack.

While Palemoon doesn't support classic theme restorer, it does have a Netscape-inspired theme plugin and enough internal tweaks to really not need it. However it may not be possible to transfer my WF settings over- bookmarks, history, passwords, cookies, etc- which is really going to be a problem. I'd be tempted to just switch over if I could but doing all that manually is going to be obnoxious and time-consuming.

And what really annoys me is that Idle Online Universe put out a new update that somehow locks up Waterfox and crashes the tab. It works in Palemoon, which makes no sense aside from WF being stuck as an "unrecognized" browser by many companies as it's based on older Firefox code, so many sites treat it as outdated. User Agent Switcher helps to some degree but isn't perfect.

Diosoth · 13 Feb 2021

... and as of today, eBay's mouseover zoom for images isn't working in WF at all. Updating to latest didn't fix any issues the browser is having. I suspect new things are rolling out at various sites that WF can't reliably handle, so I need to look into how to swap everything to Palemoon so I can use it instead.

file3456 · 14 Feb 2021

Pale Moon and Waterfox are both niche browsers and since some websites blatantly discriminate on browsers unless it's the big four; Edge, Firefox, Chrome or Safari.

Check out Librewolf once and see how that goes.