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Comment by datatan | Hacker News Reader

So much for my hopes of them removing it from Firefox. Uhg.

In case you didn't know, you can remove it from the toolbar via "Customize", or completely disable it by toggling `extensions.pocket.enabled` in `about:config`.

That being said, I started using it extensively after being a big fan of Instapaper. The browser integration (especially the easy tagging) has been really helpful in keeping my tab count down.

I use a simple bookmarklet for Pocket. This consumes zero resources and works just fine.

https://pastebin.mozilla.org/8980504

That's how Instapaper did it back when I used it (may have a full-fledged add-on now, but I don't know for sure).

The only drawback, for me, was the added bulk of the Bookmarks bar. I like to slim it down, so having the single button has been great. (Also, being able to add the tags, but maybe the bookmarklet is capable of that?)

I remove the bookmark's name so only the Pocket icon shows. It's very slim, but you do need the bookmark bar for that. I suppose it would work from the bookmarks menu too.

When you click the bookmarklet a little dropdown banner shows and you can add tags from there.

You might like the "Custom Buttons Bookmarklet Maker" I use it to have a button for adding videos from a page to my Plex queue, removes the need to have the bookmark bar on screen. I found it rather arcane to set up however.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/custom-button... ... ah, and now I see it's unmaintained and recent version isn't working for some, carry on, never mind (works for me though).

When people say that they want to "remove Pocket from Firefox", they don't mean just hiding a toolbar button or disabling it using about:config.

They don't want it there at all, in any way. They don't want it using any of their computing resources, no matter how minute this usage might be.

They tend to see it as something that should be available as an add-on that's installed on-demand by those who actually want the functionality.

I disagree. People wanted to get rid of it, because they viewed it as an untrustworthy component, which it now is not anymore. The few kB that it takes up are really not a problem that anyone could rationally complain about.

You can have hope for a better integration than that odd toolbar button and the silly login page that asks you to make Yet Another Password instead of using the Sync/Mozilla account one.

Aren't you able to log into Pocket using your Mozilla account for a while now?

No, it still requires you to create additional passwords for Pocket.

What is the resistance to having it in at this point? Every browser has a cloud-backed page snapshot feature.

My own reason for disliking it was that it's a closed-source piece of an otherwise-FOSS browser. Hopefully this acquisition means a change for the better on that front.

Pocket will become FOSS, so yes. Follow [0] for status updates.

[0] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=open-pocket

I always thought that complaint was kind of odd. It's essentially the same as their Search input. Google/Yahoo/etc. are proprietary but Firefox lets you talk to them directly from their browser. Similarly, the code for the Pocket button (component) for where it handles the user clicking the button, along with what it does to talk to the Pocket server, was all in the open and if you build from source you could just remove that entirely. I was more against it for the same reasons I'm against any UI 'upgrades' when I upgrade the browser. The "share this page" button that suddenly appeared annoys me equally as much. Fortunately I can just remove it from the menu but I'd rather Mozilla didn't mess with my UI customization. (I don't know what I'm going to do when I can't use treestyle tabs anymore. I guess move to Pale Moon.)

Mozilla replaced Reading List (which was client-side encrypted and theoretically self-hostable) with Pocket (which is neither). Search engines need search terms to function; Pocket uses user data to support a particular business model.

Reading list was seriously underfeatured.

Pocket is now Free Software, which might make those elements from RL you liked possible again.

Reading List was still in development when it was canceled. Anyone who preferred Pocket was free to install it.

Continuing the current revenue model and supporting Context Graph seem at odds with improving user privacy. Pocket isn't now Free Software, but hopefully it will be feasible to self-host whenever they do release the source.

"I don't know what I'm going to do when I can't use treestyle tabs anymore. I guess move to Pale Moon."

I hear ya, being in a similar boat. My hope is that Netsurf ends up being a decent contender here by the time Mozilla kills XUL. Else, hopefully TST will indeed be made possible with Firefox-specific WebExtension APIs.

TST will be possible with WebExtensions. For hard evidence, even the Add-Ons Engineering Manager is working on his own, personal vertical tabs webextension to suss out what APIs we need: https://github.com/andymckay/sidebar-tabs

We may not land everything we need by the time Firefox 57 releases, but we'll get there. If we miss, you have options: you can decamp to Firefox ESR for a few months, where TST will keep working, or someone could theoretically convert TST to a WebExtension Experiment which would work on DevEdition and Nightly builds of Firefox.

That's very good news. TST is one of the few things that makes web browsing even vaguely viable these days.

I've noticed (on the rare instances I'm on desktop, mostly Mac these days) that Vimperator is also borked (only parts of it seem to be functioning). That's another lifesaver to me, and whatever it takes for it to come back to life and/or an alternative to provide effectively similar functionality ... would be peachy.

If I can lure you to another bit of developer / user advocacy, a bit from about 3 years ago on the content management problem:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/256lxu/tabbed_...

The search plugin feature is an open standard. Anyone can create their own search engine and plugin for it.

So FOSS should be pure?

Ideally, yes. I can understand some exceptions there to get, say, driver/firmware support for FOSS-unfriendly hardware, but integrating Pocket - at the time - was not such a situation.

Now there's a different, much better story.

You want them to remove one of the most useful feature of Firefox?

You can remove it easily, but I'd advise you to try using it.

It personally helps me go through interesting news and "pocket" it if I don't have the time to read it now, or want to keep my time for more important articles but still think it's an important piece of news.

I have both the desktop Pocket application and the mobile Pocket application. They download the web view offline, like that I can read articles wherever I am, when I have some down time.

It's been a huge time saver when it comes to only reading what is important during the day. Having less tabs. And being able to see what I deemed important to read after a while.

The existing bookmark system does pretty much all of that already (with the sole exception of offline viewing, but Pocket's implementation is reportedly buggy anyway), and then some. It also syncs across one's devices.

the offline viewing is the only reason I use Pocket.

"You want them to remove one of the most useful feature of Firefox?"

Completely subjective. Also pointless as it could easily just be an addon. It's just bloat however and my own subjective POV is it's useless. I've never once used it, have no desire to use and don't even know anyone who uses it.

So yeah, there ya go

I use pinboard.in I never had an issue with Pocket because I never used it and just uninstalled it.

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