Brave Browser - Ready for Prime Time?

[Slydude]

@krs I think she is referring to the option in Safari that can save a page to a reading list for later use. It's almost like a bookmark but not quite.

 

[krs]

Thanks Slydude,

I haven't used Safari for a long time, but just checked it and the "Reading List"
Seems like a great option - does any other browser have that?

 

[Slydude]

Not that I can think of but there are several browsers out there that I've either never used or used so long ago that they may have changed significantly.

When I wrote my previous post I was trying to think of a way to describe the difference between the bookmark list. For all practical purposes the reading list is essentially a collection of bookmarks. I have a collection of bookmarks going back more than a decade and I'm sure many of them don't work anymore. As a consequence I rarely bookmark things now because I'll never find it. I do use the reading list though to collect things thatI want to read later but will probably only read once or twice.

 

[lori5060]

@krs I think she is referring to the option in Safari that can save a page to a reading list for later use. It's almost like a bookmark but not quite.

yes that is exactly what I was talking about. it is an off line reading option.

- - - Updated - - -

I use both bookmarks and reading lists and find them both helpful. every now and then, I edit may bookmarks and delete ones I don't need or use anymore.

 

[krs]

More on the Brave browser:

Positive
I had DuckDuckGo as a tile on the home page and had it pinned
After using DuckDuckGo for a while, a second DuckDuckGo tile automatically showed up on the home page.
I felt that if a tile for a website exists already, the browser should not add a second tile for a website especially since the number of tiles than can be displayed is currently limited to six.
So yesterday, I wrote up a bug report and sent it to the Brave team.
In most cases, when one sends a trouble/bug report about a website or application, one never hears back, or at most gets a canned reply, like, thnk-youfor your interest.
Here, within an hour, I not only received a personal reply, I was also asked for more information and a screenshot (which I provided)
About three hours later I received another email from a different Brave team member explaining the reason why there were two tiles apparently the same.
One was the pinned one for DuckDuckGo with a URL to the DDg main page which I added, the other the Brave browser system generated based on my browser history, and it was a DDg URL of a search result that I had checked several times, so the favicon that showed in the browser was the same but the URLs were different.
I was pretty impressed with the quick response by the Brave team - actually impressed that I received a response at all

Negative
Two issues that I find problematic:
1. When I'm on a website and I try to modify the text in a field that has text already, I highlight the existing text I want to change and normally, I would just type in the new text, but with Brave, if I just move the mouse ever so slightly, and sometimes I think not at all, the text will scroll extremely fast up or down - much too fast to control.
This only seems to happen after I highlight existing text in a window on a webpage - scrolling too fast has been mentioned in the Brave discussion group
2. I sometimes have a problem opening a pdf on a web page - instead of the pdf showing properly, it shows the html code as if I opened the pdf with text wrangler.
If I copy the pdf link and paste it into FireFox, the page opens the way it should.
Strangely, that problem does not happen with every pdf.

 

[lori5060]

krs...too many tech things for me to understand fully. I'm still playing with duckduckgo and today found that I could see option to save as bookmark reading list. so all is well.

 

[krs]

Since search engines like Google and DuckDuckGo are a very different topic than browsers, and especially the Brave browser, I think they warrant a separate discussion thread:
https://www.mac-forums.com/forums/m...duckduckgo-startpage.html?353817=#post1836328

 

[Randy B. Singer]

Speaking of the Brave browser, here is an interesting review of it:

What is the Brave Browser, and How Does It Compare to Chrome?

 

[krs]

Nice article, Randy - thanks for posting the link.

Lately I found that I have to revert to Firefox more often than I would like.
I'm looking at a few options to renew my internet service and pretty much each company has their site set up in a way where I cannot select my location using Brave.
I have to go back to Firefox to do that and find out what plans are available at my location and their cost.

I think where Brave could do better is not necessarily allow that if this is blocked because of the ad/tracking of Brave works, but to at least indicate that this location function is blocked.
The way it is right now it looks to the user as if the website does not work.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

Lately I found that I have to revert to Firefox more often than I would like.

If you find that Brave isn't working for you, and that Firefox does, let me recommend an alternative.

Waterfox is based on the same codebase as Firefox, but it is more optimized for speed and security. Sort of like Brave, only based on the Firefox code.

Waterfox (free)
Browse the web YOUR way | Waterfox Web Browser

I hope that it is the best of both worlds for you.

 

[lori5060]

thanks randy.... will check i to waterfox also....

 

[lori5060]

randy.
I just clicked on link to download water fox. when the app downloaded it was water fox classic.
is there a difference between the original and classic version for just a home user?

 

[Slydude]

There appear to be two download spots for the Mac version on the page I checked. I didn't look at things in excruciating detail but here's the difference I noticed.

Waterfox Classic will run on Macs going all the way back to OS X 10.7 (Lion). If you scroll a little further down the page you will see a link for the more recent version of Waterfox. It requires at least OS X 10.9 and should run on your Mac.

 

[krs]

If you find that Brave isn't working for you, and that Firefox does, let me recommend an alternative.

Waterfox is based on the same codebase as Firefox, but it is more optimized for speed and security. Sort of like Brave, only based on the Firefox code.

Waterfox (free)
Browse the web YOUR way | Waterfox Web Browser

I hope that it is the best of both worlds for you.

Thanks Randy,

I actually have Waterfox in my dock but I have only used it recently when I want to use the "DownThemAll" feature which "broke" in Firefox when they went to Quantum.

Never gave it a try as my main browser, but I will have a shot at it.

First Test was uploading images in this forum
Waterfox has the same "issue" as Firefox - I suppose that was to be expected.
I see that forum issue also with iCab which is looking for 100% valid HTML code.

But Waterfox retains Video Download Helper which disappeared in Firefox, but it doesn't have the Firefox web page screen shot option, both of which I use regularly.

Auto login to this forum also works fine

For run-of-the-mill browsing they all seem to be fine - I'm going to have to make a matrix that shows which browsers to use for some of the more special capabilities I use regularly.

 

[krs]

This is getting crazy!

I juat wanted to deposit an e-transfer I received.

But it seems I live in the wrong province - Ontario is not listed as one of Canada's provinces.
At least not when I use Brave as the browser.

So before I toss out Brave I thought I would make sure it's a "Brave" issue - well....
Chrome shows the same list of provinces as Brave
Safari also shows the same list (image attached)
But Firefox shows the correct list, including Ontario and no duplicates, so does (as expected Waterfox)
The Maxthon browser tells me the site is not reachable
Almost forgot Opera - it is fine as well

 

[chscag]

But it seems I live in the wrong province - Ontario is not listed as one of Canada's provinces.
At least not when I use Brave as the browser.

That certainly is strange considering that Ontario has the most populous city in Canada (Toronto) and the capital of Canada is also in the province of Ontario.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

...it seems I live in the wrong province - Ontario is not listed as one of Canada's provinces.
At least not when I use Brave as the browser.

So before I toss out Brave I thought I would make sure it's a "Brave" issue ...

Whether or not you ditch Brave, it would probably be a good idea to file a bug report with them:

Browser Feedback - Brave Community

 

[krs]

In the end the problem was with the website.

Pretty amazing that a company that handles e-transfers across the country can't get the coding of their website right.
But I have noticed that a bit more lately, so I don't immediately blame the browser.

In this case Chrome had the same issue, logical since I think Brave and Chrome use the same rendering engine.
And when I went back last night again, everything was fine using Brave.

But I do have some other problems with Brave that probably warrant a bug report - mostly also with drop down selection type menus on a webpage.
In those cases it looks as if the website doesn't respond at all, but if I use Firefox everything works fine.

And when I went back

 

[krs]

I'm now running into a consistent issue with Brave on a number of websites.

Not sure what to call it - basically, if one is on a webpage where there is a field to fill in that then either offers a number of options where one needs to click on one, or in this example of the Virgin Mobile Internet page where one types in ones address to see if service is available - with FireFox for instance, when I start typing even just the street number, I start getting suggestions and once I have the street number and street it usually gives me the whole address including postal code.
None of that works in Brave - I get absolutely no suggestions and if (in the example) I then go to the next page on Virgin, with Firefox everything is filled in, with Brave nothing.
I turned off whatever options were on in Brave Shield - still the same.
With this type of problem on a number of different websites, Brave becomes somewhat unusable, so I'm wondering if the issue is me with the Brave privacy options set too strict.
Maybe someone who uses Brave could just try this...I don't want to write up a bug report on Brave just to find out I didn't have a setting right.
The sample website is this:
Order Home Internet - Virgin Mobile Canada

when you type in the beginning of an address, you should get a bunch of suggestions - I know it works properly with FireFox

 

[Rod]

Seems to me this happened with Ghostery when I first started using it. In the beginning I had all the filters on so I had to customize my preferences a bit and this was on Firefox. You say you turned off Brave's shield functions, did you also reload the page, I know I always had to do that with AdGuard.