this post was submitted on 16 Aug 2024

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How difficult would it be to fork and mantain a chromium version that still supports Manifest V2? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

25 comments fedilink hide all child comments

As Google tries to hinder ad-block extensions with their new platform Manifest V3, it seems to me Chrome or any Chromium derivatives are no longer a viable way to browse the web safely. So it got me wondering, how much big of a task would it be to still suport Manifest V2 on newer releases of Chromium? Maybe implement some legacy option for backwards compatibility with older extensions. I think it would be a great alternative to have, but I haven't seen anyone coming up with something similar.

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I think that using gecko based browsers like Firefox is the best thing to do in the short term. But having no competition is a bad thing. So supporting new web engines, like Ladybird, is important too: https://github.com/LadybirdBrowser/ladybird

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

And Servo

[–] [email protected] 64 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Just use Firefox already.

[+] [email protected] -15 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Remind me: who provides most of the funding that FF has?

[–] [email protected] 32 points 2 months ago

that only reinforces that you should use firefox… forcing google to pay more money to mozilla and giving mozilla more power to negotiate is a good thing

sure google has some power over them with the money they give, but by using chromium that power is absolute - no need to pay, ask, influence when you just get

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Your point?

[–] [email protected] -5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Because of incentives it's not impossible for the Mozilla foundation to drop support for manifest V2 eventually. If Google's paying 90% of their bills, it's not unreasonable to assume they also have a say in the direction of the browser

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 months ago

I've never seen any reason to believe Google has any say in the direction of Firefox. Google pays to be the default search engine, not more, not less.

This same argument could be brought up about Safari. All other browsers are based on Chromium anyway, so they are directly developed by Google themselves.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Right now - easy, with the difficulty going up over time as the main Chromium codebase continues to change (and especially as it gets security updates). I think I’ve read that some variants (Brave?) have committed to supporting ManifestV2 for as long as possible, for instance with their own fork.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 months ago (1 children)

For a year, but it will be extremely difficult for them to maintain mv2 after jun 2025.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Why that date specifically?

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Most of these browsers use the enterprise policy of chromium.

https://developer.chrome.com/docs/extensions/develop/migrate/mv2-deprecation-timeline

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Thank you for the clarification

[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Just wait for July 2025

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Why. What happens during that time?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

I have no idea. Another month passes

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago (1 children)

If I recall correctly, some Chromium browsers will continue to support Manifest V2. For example, Brave and Vivaldi, if I'm not mistaken.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Yeah, but their adblockers are built in ones.

Those are not store extensions.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Can they be disabled?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Why does it matter? You can always install the one you want.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

Disabling Manifest V2 will break a lot of extensions apparently.