Making Firebug part of Firefox core

[Ben Williams]

Can anyone tell me why Firebug isn't part of Firefox's core
installation?

It does seem like an area that Firefox is genuinely falling behind.
IE8 has their debugger as (as far as I know) a non-optional part of
the browser now. Safari 4 beta has similar tools in their default
install (thought it's not out of beta yet). I believe Chrome has
similar tools as well in their default install.

Yet Firefox relies on a third-party extension?

I consider firebug to be a completely essential part of the firefox
experience, and in my opinion, making firefox so developer-friendly
has been a decent factor in its current popularity.

Yet it ships without web debugging tools?

It just seems funny to me.

Maybe the move to version numbers that match firefox (http://
blog.getfirebug.com/?p=109) is a start in this direction.

- Ben

[johnjbarton]

IE8 and Safari are playing catch up, so I guess the have to ship the
debugger with their browser. Otherwise no one would use their
debugger.

jjb

[Ben Williams]

I think with respect to being part of the default install, they're not
playing catchup any more (although I agree that they're playing
catchup in terms of features and usability). Unfortunately your point
about shipping the debugger with the browser otherwise no-one will use
it applies to firefox/firebug as equally as it does others.

- Ben

[dm]

> > > I consider firebug to be a completely essential part of the firefox
> > > experience, and in my opinion, making firefox so developer-friendly
> > > has been a decent factor in its current popularity.
>
> > > Yet it ships without web debugging tools?

I disagree that Firebug should be part of the the FF core. Whilst I
agree that it is a completely essential part of MY firefox experience
I can't see it adding anything at all to my Mum's firefox experience!
She has no interest in the guts and workings of web pages and so
having Firebug in her FF would simply be bloat. And, of all the
firefox users I know, only a very small percentage are developers. An
extension is the perfect place for Firebug, and means it also can
improve independently of version changes in the browser.

However, it may be a better idea that Firebug be developed in direct
conjunction with Firefox, with their developers (FF) considering it at
all stages of Firefox development. But from reading this group and the
bugs and blogs it seems as if Firebug already enjoys pretty direct
support from the FF team.

Regards,

d

[Ben Williams]

On Mar 26, 5:16 pm, dm <cheekybud...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> I disagree that Firebug should be part of the the FF core. Whilst I
> agree that it is a completely essential part of MY firefox experience
> I can't see it adding anything at all to my Mum's firefox experience!

Ahh, but I can. Why do you use Firefox? Because it is, without
question, the best web development environment in the world. And that
makes you love Firefox. And that makes you recommend firefox to
others, like your Mum. And that increases Firefox's market share,
which makes the world better for everybody :) Your Mum likely wouldn't
be using Firefox were it not for its developer-friendliness.

> She has no interest in the guts and workings of web pages and so
> having Firebug in her FF would simply be bloat. And, of all the
> firefox users I know, only a very small percentage are developers.

Totally agreed that only a small percentage are developers; but IMO
they're a *very* important percentage. To quote one S. Ballmer,
"Developers developers developers developers [...] developers".

- Ben

[johnjbarton]

I guess the number of developers using Firefox but not using Firebug
solely because it's not installed is very low. And the extra effort
and potential impact on non-developers would be a distraction. But in
any case you're talking to the wrong folks here, we don't assemble and
distribute Firefox.

jjb

[Maciej Jaros]

Ben Williams wrote:
> Can anyone tell me why Firebug isn't part of Firefox's core
> installation?
>
> It does seem like an area that Firefox is genuinely falling behind.
> IE8 has their debugger as (as far as I know) a non-optional part of
> the browser now.

Are you sure? It was optional for IE8 beta as far as I remember (or at
least one could uninstall it).

> Safari 4 beta has similar tools in their default
> install (thought it's not out of beta yet). I believe Chrome has
> similar tools as well in their default install.
>

Can't confirm Chrome now, but Opera surely has one built in.

> Yet Firefox relies on a third-party extension?
>

Yes, but that goes for many other extensions. Many extension that would
be much lighter, much safer, and much more usable for everyday-people.
Just from top of my mind: session manager, sidebar, quicknotes. Note
that even DOM Inspector was (not sure if it still is) disabled and
available only as an extension.

Firefox from it's beginning was just supposed to be light at start (and
as heavy as you like it) ;-).

Regards,
Nux.