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Comment by catalogia | Hacker News Reader

In which ways is the Firefox context menu "garbage"? How does it behave differently?

I never even noticed that it's not native until I read your comment, and looking carefully at it now the only difference I can notice is the corners are square (and that is certainly nothing worth complaining about.)

Maybe I'm just an oblivious idiot, but it sure seems to me that a lot of MacOS users on HN love to blow trivial matters completely out of proportion. Application lags for a split second? "Utter garbage, the developers should be shot, I'm going back to Safari." Where is the perspective? If there is something glaringly broken about these context menus, by all means correct me. But to my eye they look damn close to native and they seem to work perfectly fine.

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> it sure seems to me that a lot of MacOS users on HN love to blow trivial matters completely out of proportion

Don't be so dismissive. Apart from anything, that breaks one of the HN guidelines for discussion.

Not having access to built-in and user-defined (Applescript/Automator) Services is not trivial; these are a powerful part of what makes macOS unique and a major reason why I continue to use macOS. Their lack of availability is entire down to using faked-up menus rather than proper widgets.

Having widgets behave improperly is also an accessibility issue. There are multiple accessibility APIs built into the system that practically every macOS app built using Cocoa or Carbon hook into automatically; apps that use non-native widgets that don't take enough care to (a) perfectly emulate the behaviour of native widgets or (b) sufficient expose themselves to the built-in accessibility APIs not only make for an unexpectedly unpleasant experience but also potentially are showstopping for people with disabilities.

> But to my eye they look damn close to native and they seem to work perfectly fine

In other words, it's not a problem for you, so it shouldn't be a problem for anybody else.

> Not having access to built-in and user-defined (Applescript/Automator) Services is not trivial

It's under the Firefox menu. I use it frequently to trigger an Automator service for TTS, which pipes the text through a sed script to fix common mispronunciations. I use this stuff too.

Should it be in the right click menu? Yes. Is firefox crippled by it's absence? No, because that functionality still exists, just in a different location (and if you have your services bound to keyboard shortcuts it becomes a complete non-issue.)

I stand by what I said. I'm not being unreasonably dismissive. Many mac users on this forum in particular have a habit of blowing the slightest defect completely out of proportion. Maybe they're trying to emulate Steve Jobs' infamously toxic approach to critique. Calling firefox "garbage" because of defects these minor is a prime example.

> Is firefox crippled by it's absence?

I’ve used Firefox since Chrome started threatening to block ad blockers. I have stopped recommending it.

This specific bug confused the hell out of not only my parents, but also multiple nieces and nephews in their teens. (They thought it crashes.) These age groups both spend most of their time on mobile. When a desktop app behaves unusually, it’s a massive burden.

Not fixing these bugs seems to be a cultural problem at Mozilla, albeit one that’s getting better.

Both of your parents and multiple teenagers thought firefox was crashing because Services wasn't in the right-click menu?

Forgive me for being incredulous, but what are they using it for? While I use Services, I'm not under the impression that it's particularly common. Perhaps Mozilla haven't prioritized the matter because they, like myself, are wrong about that? (And maybe calling Firefox garbage isn't the best way to correct their cultural blindspot?)

They don't close when you release right-click, they don't contain services, they don't select the word you are on.

That's the stuff I've noticed in the couple of days I've been using Firefox.

One of the things that I use a lot that isn't on there is the "Look up" function/service to get the definitions of words from the dictionary, wiki, etc. Super useful and I miss it so much after switching from Safari.

If you hover the cursor over the word and hit command control d, you’ll get the definition in Firefox.

That's helpful. Thanks. Would still like for it to be in the context menu, though, but this will do in a pinch.

Another trick if you have the new "Magic" trackpads: Select the word, place three fingers on the pad, press down (force press), and you can see the definition of the selected word (will be highlighted in yellow).

Only one finger needed

Here's one: try right clicking and dragging out. Firefox's menu will open and stay open.

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