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Comment by adfkbuvasdas | Hacker News Reader

Game changer! Now from my POV Firefox is the best desktop browser, period. No caveats.

Is there a good transition path for someone who uses a lot of Google products? In particular, I use Chrome across all my devices, and I depend on the ability to search my history/recent tabs/etc from anywhere. Will Firefox give me the same ability? Is the transition literally just: Install Firefox everywhere and start using it instead?

Firefox Sync let's you syncronize Bookmarks, Open tabs, Logins, History, Add-ons and Preferences across devices by logging in once with username password

Couple of questions about this: does FF import Chrome logins? Also, can Mozilla read the data or are they doing client-side-encryption?

I'm not sure about the former, but the answer to your second question is yes, they do client-side encryption: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-firefox-sync-keeps-...

Yes, it can now import logins/passwords from Chrome/Chromium on macOS, Windows support already existed for some years.

> Passwords can now be imported from Chrome on macOS in addition to existing support for Windows

https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/70.0/releasenotes/

Wow. That's the final bit. Thank you!

Can each of those be turned on or off per device, and dont get sneakily turned back on during upgrades?

by way of logging in/out, yes

edit: Sorry for anyone I misled. You can't opt a particular kind of data out of syncing per device. You can only enable/disable for the whole account.

Yes, each (bookmarks, history, passwords, tabs ) can be turned on or off per device basis.

This is incorrect AFAIK. The sync toggle for a data type is for the whole account, not per-device.

You are right. Always thought it worked like that but indeed it is for the whole account and not per device. My bad.

Here’s the Sync security FAQ to answer javajosh’s follow up question, which I can’t reply to directly.

“How Firefox Sync keeps your data safe even if TLS fails” https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-firefox-sync-keeps-...

If you click on the 'x hours ago' part of the comment next to the username you will get a parent link and can then reply to and save individual comments.

Pretty much, yes. You’ll have to make a Firefox account, but then tabs and plugins will sync everywhere you log in.

Also, passwords.

As long as you use it everywhere in the same way you presently use Chrome everywhere, yes. You can also import a certain amount (history & bookmarks, not, I think, current & recent tabs) to get started.

> Is the transition literally just: Install Firefox everywhere and start using it instead?

Yep. I did this about a year ago. You have to create a Mozilla account (if you haven't already) in order to sync your tabs and history across devices, but that should be a given.

I find the Firefox sync a bit clunky compared to Chromes though. I think Chrome sends udpates to Google on each change whereas Firefox polls and updates on a schedule which means sometimes if you put a device to sleep (or if you're on iOS and the app gets suspended) your history and tab state won't be propagated and it'll be missing on your other devices which can be frustrating when you're away from those devices.

> Will Firefox give me the same ability?

Yes.

> transition literally just: Install Firefox everywhere and start using it instead?

Almost. You will have to create a firefox account and export/import your bookmarks. That's it.

The only feature you may miss is auto-fill of credit card info. It's saved my ass abroad before.

A good password manager will handle that easily.

Firefox has credit card auto-fill capabilities: https://blog.mozilla.org/firefox/online-shopping-autofill-cr...

Agreed to what everyone else said, but to me the killer feature of Firefox Sync is that you can send tabs from one browser to another, so I can find links on my work computer and ship them directly to my home computer or phone to read later, and they'll just show up when it syncs next.

I'm actually not sure if this is a native Chrome feature, but I can instantly send tabs to my other devices with right click > "send to your devices" > list of devices with a Google account signed in (Which is my phone and laptop for me on my desktop).

It's exactly the same in FF: https://i.vgy.me/vBP4rF.png

I'm doing this but it's painful. I am still stuck on GMail.

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