You are here

Home » Forums » General Forums » Request Apps

Waterfox (64-Bit variant of Firefox)

16 posts / 0 new
Log in or register to post comments
Last post
January 31, 2012 - 1:43am
#1
VSG
Offline
Last seen: 9 years 9 months ago
Joined: 2008-04-21 13:37
Waterfox (64-Bit variant of Firefox)

Hi guys!

And foremost thank you for the great effort you put into PortableApps! I'm very proud to say I stuck with you long before my friends (who also keep switching to portable applications) or all the magazines around the world who are referring to you now.

I searched the whole site for this app that I'm requesting now, but couldn't find any information.
Firefox still is the most versatile browser, but the more intense usage you put into it, the more you will cripple it's performance. Unfortunately there are only nightly builds from Mozilla themselves with 64-bit support, but it will most likely never reach the end user (unless you agree to be an eternal alpha-tester).

However, I recently stumbled upon Waterfox (http://waterfoxproject.org/), that has since even been accepted by Mozilla.
I'm using version 9 that I made portable myself by copying the program-folder inside one from your portable Firefox installation. It runs smoothly and even after days and days of usage (with two dozen open tabs) a lot faster with a lot less RAM-usage (a constant 1.3 to 1.5 GB, whereas Firefox climbed up to 2.2 GB) than Firefox.

I was just wondering whether you would be interested to adopt this into your portable portfolio? I'm not a developer but not opposed to generate my own portable version with the means that I have, but maybe it would attract some more users. Both for Waterfox and PortableApps.

Thanks for your time and once again for your effort!
Best regards,
VSG

Top
February 2, 2012 - 9:45pm
dboki89
Offline
Last seen: 8 years 8 months ago
Joined: 2009-11-30 20:44
1. John dismissed it on IRC.

1. John dismissed it on IRC. Don't ask...
2. Regardless, with the current stance about 64bit apps on PA, don't count on it. Maybe once we see 64bit Java, you might start expecting 64bit browsers coming. Emphasis on might...

Edit: read 64-bit Software: Where It Fits Into Portable Apps.

My posts are old and likely no longer relevant.

Top
February 3, 2012 - 8:01am
(Reply to #2)
VSG
Offline
Last seen: 9 years 9 months ago
Joined: 2008-04-21 13:37
Ok.

Hi!

Thanks for the reply. Well, I can understand his POV although I don't necessarily like it. Wink
There is a Java 64-bit by the way, but I'm sure I just don't get what you mean exactly. I for my part don't just use PortableApps simply on a USB-drive, but for everyday use. It is much easier to maintain, update and if necessary migrate to a new machine than normal installations.

I'm just going to stick with my custom made Waterfox. That might not be the most sophisticated way, but it works.
Maybe we'll see it someday on PortableApps.

Keep up the great work!
Best regards,
VSG

Top
December 8, 2012 - 7:15pm
(Reply to #3)
mxbug
Offline
Last seen: 10 years 9 months ago
Joined: 2012-12-08 18:30
Why wait?

Is Java really so much of a prerequisite anymore ? It's been years since I actually needed it inside a browser. Even the usual slowbies (education aids, online banking, etc.) have more or less adopted Javascript (and to a lesser degree, Flash) as the outlet for all their interactive content.

Top
December 8, 2012 - 7:32pm
(Reply to #4)
John T. Haller
John T. Haller's picture
Offline
Last seen: 3 hours 8 min ago
AdminDeveloperModeratorTranslator
Joined: 2005-11-28 22:21
Old Topic, We Have Lots Of 64-Bit Apps

This is a very old topic. Since this was posted, Mozilla has cancelled Firefox 64-bit nightly builds for Windows as they are very broken (memory leaks, stability issues, plugin interaction issues, etc) and there's no real performance gain. They will likely begin doing them again late in 2013. As WaterFox is based on the broken Firefox 64-bit Windows build, I don't think it's a good candidate for inclusion at this time.

We do lots of 64-bit apps now wherever they net a good performance boost relative to the app size increase (7-Zip, PeaZip, etc), offer better features or functionality (RawTherapee, AkelPad, Notepad2, etc) or are required to properly support all machines (jKDefrag, PeerBlock, Explorer++, etc). It's just all handled automatically and transparently, so users don't need to worry about it.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Top
December 9, 2012 - 2:58pm
(Reply to #5)
mxbug
Offline
Last seen: 10 years 9 months ago
Joined: 2012-12-08 18:30
Has anyone here actually

Has anyone here actually tried running Waterfox since then? The fork happened several years ago and has been continually improving in stability and performance, and indeed in my own and others' experience it appears to succeed Firefox by a comfortable margin in these departments. In fact, I would be quite surprised if Mozilla did not base their supposedly upcoming 64-bit replacement on Waterfox.

I would understand if this a packaging issue, though, i.e. requiring what is supposedly the same app to be listed under two different names.

This is perhaps not the most critical of issues since Waterfox has its own portable distribution, but as VSG said there are other reasons for desiring a PortableApps version than portability itself.

Top
December 9, 2012 - 3:07pm
(Reply to #6)
John T. Haller
John T. Haller's picture
Offline
Last seen: 3 hours 8 min ago
AdminDeveloperModeratorTranslator
Joined: 2005-11-28 22:21
Waterfox is just Firefox 64-bit rebranded

Waterfox is not a fork that happened several years ago. Waterfox takes current Firefox builds (the broken 64-bit ones) and adds in other stuff including specific compiler directives, specifically: "Intel's Math Library, SSE3, AVX for supported Intel processors, jemalloc, Profile-Guided Optimisation and the /O3 switch".

Looking through the documentation suggests that it has no additional bugfixes at all, just existing Firefox code compiled as 64-bit with certain compiler directives and rebranded as Waterfox. So, it would suffer from all the issues in the current Firefox tree that affect 64-bit builds including the memory leaks, plugin communication bugs, etc. All the reasons that Mozilla turned off nightly 64-bit bugs.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Top
December 17, 2021 - 1:52pm
(Reply to #7)
shankho.chatterjee
Offline
Last seen: 9 months 2 weeks ago
Joined: 2013-06-26 07:15
[deleted]

[deleted]

Top
January 12, 2014 - 12:17pm
(Reply to #8)
ByteMyAscii
Offline
Last seen: 5 years 6 months ago
Joined: 2012-12-02 15:30
That is by design. You can't

That is by design.
You can't do that without the source code, changing that and then recompiling it yourself.
There is likely a good reason for that design.

If at first you do not succeed, use more sticky tape.

Top
December 17, 2021 - 1:51pm
(Reply to #9)
shankho.chatterjee
Offline
Last seen: 9 months 2 weeks ago
Joined: 2013-06-26 07:15
[deleted]

[deleted]

Top
January 13, 2014 - 2:50am
(Reply to #10)
John T. Haller
John T. Haller's picture
Offline
Last seen: 3 hours 8 min ago
AdminDeveloperModeratorTranslator
Joined: 2005-11-28 22:21
Different Interpretations

Firefox, for instance, treats all instances of firefox.exe as "Firefox" regardless of where they are run from and what branding they have on them. Normally, when you run firefox.exe, it starts up and sees if another copy is already running. If it is, it just hands it off to that running process. Chrome does the same. This is by design of the apps themselves. It is not a feature of Windows.

In addition to that, there is also the PAL features and functionality as I explained it in the other thread (which is actually where I would prefer we contain it rather than re-opening this over year old thread as well).

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Top
December 17, 2021 - 1:50pm
(Reply to #11)
shankho.chatterjee
Offline
Last seen: 9 months 2 weeks ago
Joined: 2013-06-26 07:15
[deleted]

[deleted]

Top
January 13, 2014 - 3:00am
(Reply to #12)
John T. Haller
John T. Haller's picture
Offline
Last seen: 3 hours 8 min ago
AdminDeveloperModeratorTranslator
Joined: 2005-11-28 22:21
Sure

Sure thing. If you have additional questions, please post them in the other thread. Overall, you may not be able to cleanly do what you want. Firefox, for instance, will run side by side with itself but only grudgingly. It breaks the ability to open URLs from outside the app entirely (Firefox can't figure out which running process to hand off to). As for Chrome/Chromium, I'm not as familiar with it, but I'd wager similar issues. Iron will run alongside, though, even though it's basically a rebranded Chromium build, so that might help you.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Top
April 30, 2014 - 7:07pm
Rick Taylor
Offline
Last seen: 9 years 4 months ago
Joined: 2011-07-27 20:59
waterfox

I have waterfox portable on the flash drive
Would you consider making a menu for it?

If not would you consider emailing me your portable version 9

I can email your my email address

Top
May 1, 2014 - 9:14pm
(Reply to #14)
ByteMyAscii
Offline
Last seen: 5 years 6 months ago
Joined: 2012-12-02 15:30
Can add other applications to the menu.

https://portableapps.com/support/portable_apps_suite#addingotherapps

Basically just need to copy it to the same folder, and the platform should pick it up.

If at first you do not succeed, use more sticky tape.

Top
June 5, 2017 - 4:33pm
Drazick
Offline
Last seen: 16 hours 41 min ago
Joined: 2010-09-06 06:36
Waterfox in PortableApps Format

They now have Waterfox in PortableApps format:

https://www.waterfoxproject.org/downloads

It seems to be quicker (Not page loading, but just using it).

Any chance to bring into the suite?

Top
Log in or register to post comments