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Waterfox web browser—what is this crap?

Blue Mountain

Resident Skeptical Hobbit
Blue Mountain
Joined
Jul 2, 2005
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Waging war on woo-woo in Winnipeg
Waterfox is a web browser that advertises itself as a "Fast and Private Web Browser. Get privacy out of the box with Waterfox."

So I thought I'd give Waterfox a spin on Windows to see how well it works for a local web page. I had problem, though, in that the Windows system doesn't have access to the web, so I had to download it from another computer. That was my Linux system.

The Download links (there are 4 of them on the main page) only supplied a download for the detected operating system. I tried to find the download page for Windows, but didn't see anything on the usual set of links available at the bottom of the web page.

So I thought I'd let them know about their sub-optimal page setup. There isn't a contact us page in the site.

I checked the documentation to see what it had to say. All I got was "Pardon the emptiness. We’re still working on updating the docs for the new site."

RANT! W T F ? ? WHO PUTS CRAP LIKE THIS ON THE WEB? Why do people make their idiot web pages so bloody difficult to find things? And why is no one interested in feedback? It's almost as if they're living in their own little lala land.











I finally found the main download page for the browser—it's hidden behind the stupid hamburger menu! Sorry, but on a desktop page I shouldn't have to check a bloody unintuitive web interface widget to navigate the site. That's what text menus and links are for!
 
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That web page is clearly running on a Linux server. You described the sort of introduced inconsistencies I normally run into installing the next dot-point release of some free-to-air Linux OS's. ;)
 
This makes me want to check on my coldmail.com account.
 
I mean, their website UI is a little subpar. And this is a weird problem to have in 2023, when there's well-established conventions for laying out download pages. What's really getting to me, though, is the absurd level of outrage Blue Mountain is bringing to what should really be a very minor peeve.
 
Yalius said:
I did a Google search for Waterfox

Clicked the very first result, https://www.waterfox.net/en-US/

Clicked the yellow button "Download Waterfox."

I'm on Firefox, Windows 10. It has links for Win, Mac and Linux.
Click to expand...

For me, the big yellow Download Waterfox button did not have links for Windows, Mac, and Linux. It determined my OS from what my browser reported and gave me the version it assumed I was looking for. Except it wasn't the version I was looking for: I wanted a version for a different OS.

My complaint is there was no visible link on that page to the page for versions for other operating systems. The idiot who designed that page hid the link behind a Javascript hamburger menu in the header area. I usually ignore the header area and skip straight to the content.

For me, that burger menu was window dressing. There's nothing to indicate it's an active control—it's exactly the same colour and relative size as the rest of the inactive text on that page. Unlike, for example, the "Download Waterfox" button, which has a noticeably different background colour and a clear indication of what it does.

Like I said in my earlier post, I don't like having to play "hunt the Wumpus" just to navigate a site.



P.S. I never use Google. They're an obnoxious 900 pound gorilla and one of the worst things to happen to the Web in the last 20 years.
 
This is what it looks like:
1586964f79cc379b8d.jpg


The yellow button goes to a download for the OS I'm running, but the the link at top left goes to a download page where I can choose.
 
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theprestige said:
I mean, their website UI is a little subpar. And this is a weird problem to have in 2023, when there's well-established conventions for laying out download pages. What's really getting to me, though, is the absurd level of outrage Blue Mountain is bringing to what should really be a very minor peeve.
Click to expand...

In retrospect, I agree with you: my level of outrage is absurd. But to me this isn't a "minor" pet peeve.

I'm constantly hitting web sites where the designers have a serious case of "bling," "form over function," and "Oh, shiny!" In my opinion, these pages come at the expense of their primary function, which should be giving access to information and resources the visitor is looking for.

There's a reason things like books, business letters, automobile controls, traffic signals, and dozens of other things in life have evolved a more or less consistent form over the years. It reduces confusion, makes them easier for people to use, and reduces the stress of modern life.

What would your reaction be if you visited a restaurant and they didn't tell you they hid their menus under the chairs? Or you got 5 page tax bill from your city, most of which is glossy print extolling the city's services, the council and mayor, and the real information—how much you owed—is in light grey 8 point type in the footer of page 4? Or the city you live in decides to rotate all street name signs 90 degrees so they take up less space (like a book spine), then can't figure out if they should be rotated clockwise or counterclockwise?

To me, that's the modern web.
 
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zooterkin said:
This is what it looks like:
(image removed)
The yellow button goes to a download for the OS I'm running, but the the link at top left goes to a download page where I can choose.
Click to expand...

Oh! The web page displays the hamburger menu if the window is less than 1280 pixels wide. For historical reasons, I usually run my browsers at about 1100 pixels wide (it used to be 1024, but I bumped it up a bit.) I don't like really wide windows because many sites—to their credit, I might add—follow the HTML standard of letting the browser determine the layout, and I find it difficult to read lines of text that wide.

Assuming I'm on mobile if my browser window is less than 1280 pixels wide is unexpected, but looking at a couple of lists of screen sizes of tablet computers confirms many have screen widths greater than that.

Yikes, I remember when 800 x 600 was a standard. That's a long time ago, now.
 
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Hmm...

If you think putting options under a menu icon is 'hiding' them, I suspect you may have a very different interpretation of 'hiding' to me.

Seems like a bit of a weird dummy spit.
 
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