I don't think that being called as acting silly is an attack.
I do think that being called silly is a attack.

Can you grasp the difference between "you said something silly" or "you did something silly", and "you are silly"?

PS and OT: I have worked in Detroit during 8 months back in 1987. I keep good memories of my stay and people I worked with.

Sadly, I am silly. I'm monolingual but can understand stuff that uses a lot of latin derived words. Anime is very slowly teaching me Japanese.

Maybe threads like this wouldn't happen if people had sort of an idea of the road map in Current to Slackware 15, Sweet 16 or whatever it will end up being. Then users could make decisions regarding packages themselves. Then again they might try to dictate the road map themselves.

That does still stray from the official package provided by Pat. Some may not desire to do that because it is more work. You'd have to recompile it every time a newer version came out, and possibly incorporate any changes that Pat adds into the SlackBuild.

Most of the "anger" in this thread seemed to be from Darth Vader, which is his normal posting format. There might've been a few posts that did have some wrong information in it, but the majority of the thread was explaining that we don't know why Pat hasn't chosen to upgrade this package yet (except for the post he made a few months back about not being a fan of rust). The fact that the old Firefox was resource hungry is not an untruth or exaggeration. It is true that the package provided by both Mozilla and Patrick both can eat a lot of resources when you have a lot of tabs open. Not everyone is willing to tinker with the SlackBuild to try and compile it using defaults that even Mozilla didn't choose to use in their official builds. If it was the solution, then Mozilla would've used it in their official builds. Why haven't they? I don't know, but I would assume there's probably some possible instability using jemalloc that some users might see.

A lot of users chose Slackware because of the stability that Pat provides with his packages. Rebuilding a stock package to use some untested-by-the-masses option may be something that a lot of users who value stability may not want to do. The same can be said with these newer v55 builds. We've already seen it get two patch releases within 10 days of releasing and it's only been 5 days since the last patch level was released. Some may prefer to stick with the known stable ESR and not compile it with relatively untested jemalloc.

It was covered in this thread before (there was a link posted) that Pat wasn't a fan of rust. It was mentioned several months ago when someone requested moving Firefox in -current to a rust-based build. Whether that is still the case is unknown. But Pat doesn't always respond to requests on why something hasn't been done (in fact, most of the time he doesn't). So, I don't know if anyone has bothered to ask recently (other than posting this thread and not getting a response from him).

As has been said before, Pat needs to evaluate options with stability. He needs to look at each update and see whether the potential for instability outweighs the possible improvements. With a newer ESR release, it's probably pretty easy to say instability isn't likely, but otherwise, the potential for issues goes up and that may not be something he wants to introduce to the OS. He still may ultimately decide to, but until he chimes in or pushes an update, we will just have to wait and see.

But as is the case with Slackware, you're always free to take his scripts and modify them to build the version of Firefox (or any other program) to your specifications, but you shouldn't knock others' choices in deciding to not do what you do. I used to build my own kernels and configure the crap out of them. But I found the time it took to do it eventually wasn't worth the result I got from doing it. That's the same reason I leave a lot of my software on Slackware stock. For me, my time is usually better spent elsewhere. As I get older, I've found I prefer to not tinker as much as I did when I was in my youth.

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bassmadrigal thats fair and indeed everyone runs their system abit diff.
however saying that jemalloc is untested is an ignorant statement. dont believe me.
look it up for yourself. its very tested and aknowledged by mozilla. their choice not to make use of a better memory allocator doesnt mean that memory allocator is untested or no good.
my thought is that many distros simply dont provide jemalloc by default. slackware does include jemalloc in the base vanilla install and it has been proven to fix most of the leaks that firefox is known so well for. ive used it for years with great results. my advice to others is to use it. people may decide for themselves to make use of it or not. i never said it was the only way to go

http://jemalloc.net/


edit: actually upon further inspection it looks like they are using it
now
https://dxr.mozilla.org/rust/source/src
looks like it madee it in on rust?

In comparison to non-jemalloc builds, it is "relatively" untested (I specifically used the word relatively), in that there's probably orders of magnitudes more people running the non-jemalloc builds. Not that it is untested, but in comparison to non-jemalloc builds, it is a very small minority of the amount of Firefox builds out there.

And, while I'm not familiar with it, I'm assuming this is only a build time requirement and not a run-time requirement? If so, then other distros not having it wouldn't prevent Mozilla from using it in their official builds, which they aren't. So there must be some reason behind it, either being possible instability or they haven't tested it enough to push it out to the masses (or something else I'm not thinking of).

1 members found this post helpful.

run-time dynamic allocation of memory

Why should be the Rust compiler an "issue" for Slackware or any other distro, after all?

The Rust is just a Mozilla thingy, specially developed for writing the Servo, aka The Mozilla Parallel Web Engine, which started its development in A.D. 2012.

Dear Forum Scholar, if we want to play Gurus, let's at least to put the things right: first appeared the concept of Servo, then the Rust compiler, and they are children of same mother (Mozilla Foundation).

Why was a need for a massive multi-threading web-engine? Simple:

Because a web-browser ended long time ago to be just a rich-text viewer for HTML documents. There appeared (and are heavily used) concepts of Web Services, as (javascript) scripting, WebWorkers, WebRTC, WebMedia (Audio and Video), WebStorage, and so on...

I know that maybe looks strange, but today is trivially for one to write a Video-Chat like Skype, using, well just... javascript.

Long story short, even a single web-browser page could run a lot of threads on background, for giving that wanted (by many) Web 3.0 experience. And opening several (or hundreds) pages (either windows or tabs) can make only the things worse, as easily arriving on running thousands of threads in the same unique application.

BUT, if you played a bit with the GUI development (i.e. with Qt), you will noticed that you can have thousands of background tasks, but the interface should always run in a single one. Call those as being limitations of C/C++, of X11, of APIs, as how you want, but that's the story.

And, the truth is that C/C++ is not natively multi-threading, as programming language. Surely, you can do well multi-threading or multi-tasking on C/C++, with the help of additional libraries or APIs, BUT you arrive to having to do complicate operations on passing data between threads (or tasks) and so on...

I can enter here in details, and to make a 100000 words explanation how multi-threading works on Qt or GTK, and how they pass the data around, but make no sense as only few would understand it for real, even we are on the Slackware Forum, where everyone is a genius, and precisely more intelligent than that those poor people who handle companies which worth billions, all of them from around the World...

To keep the things simple, I would say that, in my humble opinion, they hit the limitations of C/C++ programming language on the Firefox development, and they needed to invent another one, with the multi-threading on mind: the Rust.

The fact that SAMSUNG joined the Rust party, as well other dozens companies, only made the Rust development faster. But that does NOT change the facts that Rust is a Mozilla thing, and I believe that we should treat it as is.

So, the Rust "issue" is at least a laughable idea, as today the Rust is basically a part of Mozilla ecosystem, nothing less, nothing more.

And we should bear in mind that since version 53, basically the Firefox is written in Rust, with a C/C++ shell, and looks like it never would go back to a full C/C++ implementation.

IF we do not accept the Rust compiler, in any form, then in several years, the Firefox shall be put down like a wounded horse.

And, maybe, depending on how long this current development cycle would last, the Slackware 15 (or how would be called the next version) would not ship Firefox anymore, because meantime Firefox 52.3 may will go EOL.

If you do not noticed, Slackware is a distribution which is supposed to ship binary packages, and usually you cannot (re-)compile it from scratch, anyways...

Yep, it have. As a programming language which efficiently use all the CPU cores from the system and not only...

So, you suggest that your competences are higher than the CEOs of Mozilla Foundation, SAMSUNG and dozens other companies who bet on Rust?

Then, how many billions you earned this year, IF you dare to claim that? Oh, wait! You are Mark Zuckerberg?

Amazing, BUT Cargo use versioning and releases as well, for its crates. That looks that you have no competences to understand how it do it, that's another story...

Anyways. Please, see there before spreading false information: https://crates.io/

The Rust compiler is not just a dependency for the today Firefox, but it is basically written in the Rust language, for some precise reasons.

Not to be pedantic, but I would consider saying "you are being silly" more or less equivalent to "what you said was silly" in terms of how offensive (or not) it is. Both are temporary descriptions of something said or done, not a description of someone's character. Kind of like if someone was about to jump off a cliff and I said "you are being stupid," that would not be the same as saying "you are stupid." It is a description of the action of jumping off a cliff.

Since are years already from when we argue in this Forum, I thought you already figured out that I never ask something for me personally, and living in the European Culture, I have no habit to whine, as us usually we enter in the mode: Search & Destroy when we want something. Read: never stop until you resolve yourself.

Oh, wait! To be honest, I asked in the near past for help, as someone to confirm a VMware Player issue in -current.

In the particular case of this thread, as usual, I really believe that using the latest Firefox on -current is for whole community good.

Myself I compile it since 53 was released. And I seen that it does not eaten my dog, yet...

Of course, guessing that I do not ask too much, considering that there: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...-a-4175561577/ are today 182 pages of latest versions requested, and always the latest versions, for everything you can imagine on -current.

wrong! wrong! and moar WRONG!
1) you most certainly and easily can build slackware from source and there are even instructions for this included complete with slackbuilds and source code
2)you cant build new firefoxes without rust anymore. its partly written in rust. if you can please share with us how. but you refuse to build your own firefox i thought

dont sit there and condescend to degrade another persons intelligence when you barely have any yourself


ERROR: Rust compiler not found.
To compile rust language sources, you must have 'rustc' in your path.
See https://www.rust-lang.org/ for more information.

Well, not. At least according with Patrick Volkerding, as himself said there: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...3/#post3978712

Also, according with the Slackware DOCS: https://docs.slackware.com/slackware...d_from_scratch
But, if you know better...

I built and used daily every Firefox release since version 53, of course using the Rust compiler and its Cargo (from Slackbuilds.org), before to start this thread, BTW...

Oh, wait! I should stay here and to look smiling how someone spread false information and acts like he's smarter and more competent than Mozilla Foundation's CEO, for example?

At least, I for one, I do not claim to be more competent than all CEOs of those companies: https://www.rust-lang.org/en-US/friends.html (organizations running Rust in production)

There you go:

https://slackbuilds.org/repository/1...elopment/rust/
https://slackbuilds.org/repository/1...lopment/cargo/

Build and install those, then try again...

PS. I attached a screenshot with my current Firefox, to be ensured that I use exactly WHAT I claim in the original post...

Attached Thumbnails

 

1 members found this post helpful.

I lived in Europe for 5 years... whining is found everywhere.

I would've responded if I used -current (I don't under most circumstances) or VMware Player (I use VirtualBox -- I prefer to know that the source is available for my virtual machines). If you are using software that isn't as common, on a version of Slackware that isn't that common, you may not always get a response from the community.

I don't doubt that you think it is good, but your presentation for the request does not invoke sympathy on behalf of the Slackware team, rather it imposes hostility. While you may consider yourself in "Search & Destroy" mode, others don't always perceive it that way. Just because it may be normal to be that direct where you're from doesn't mean that is the case everywhere else. As is obvious, this is an international forum. We have people from all areas of the world. While your harshness and abrasiveness may be normal where you're from, it can be taken in a completely different light in other areas of the world. Politeness can go a long way.

We don't know what the criteria is to get a package upgraded. All someone can do is provide a request. When you say the Slackware team "surrendered" just because they haven't incorporated rust and the latest non-ESR Firefox into the system, it can put people into the defensive rather than the inquisitive. If you make people curious, they're a lot more likely to start researching your claims. If you make people defensive, they tend to stick with their tried-and-true knowledge.

The below is your first post in this thread:

Some simple rewording can make a mountain of difference in how the request can be perceived.

Can you see the difference between the two? The first is quite demanding and off-putting, the second is informative and probably makes a person more intrigued to try out this latest version and see the benefits themselves.

All that being said, I'd imagine Pat and team stay up-to-date on new releases of major pieces software like Firefox and PHP. As could be ascertained from the original request of a newer version of a rust-enabled Firefox in the Requests-for-current thread, Pat had already been researching rust before the request for Firefox v53 was added into the thread. Believe it or not, Pat has managed to ship a relatively up-to-date Slackware many, many times for over 24 years. I think he knows what he is doing...

7 members found this post helpful.

Who needs a Linux_newspaper when one has LQ

Enjoyable read, kudos to all involved, and kind thanks for the headsup (Rust).

1 members found this post helpful.

@bassmadrigal Excellent comments on how to ask for help and/or put forward requests. Thank you for the courtesy and instructions for how to receive or provide effective help on these forums.

As for Firefox and the dependencies. It seems that Slackbuild enthusiasts have already provided the ability for those who are sticking with Firefox to get the latest and build it themselves. I appreciate Pat focusing on the main system. Browsers are a user part of the system, and are, in my option, client side oriented rather than server side oriented. Slackware's stability is focused and steady. Current branch is stated as development, may not be stable, may require the user to correct or fix bugs. To ask for something to be added to stable branch seems counter to the Slackware way. I know that many people who've posted on this thread are using current branch, but Pat's focus and Slackware's reputation rest on stable branch. Thus the reason the latest Gecko or Blink isn't included for "all" users (meaning both stable and current branches) is proper and I as a stable branch user truly appreciate all of Pat's decisions on that side.

I specifically don't use current, because I see many updates in the current branch every week, including new kernels, which would mean having to update the system way to often for me to effectively use both laptop and desktop as working systems to accomplish my work, rather than just my play. I imagine there are many using stable but run WM's of current to play, but I'm sure there are many who don't.

Thanks to Pat for being more concerned about Slackware stability, while also being willing to allow others to extend package research and building under stable and current the packages which might be of interest to the adventurous Cheers.

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