Post by kirby726i own a computer that runs windows 7 ultimate x64 but im having
trouble thinking about what browser i should use for it. i always
used ie 11 but thats outdated.
Firefox 115 is the last supported version on Windows 7. It was released
a year ago in July 2023, so not that old. If you update FF on Win7,
you'll get 115 ESR.
Pale Moon is a fork of Firefox before the Quantum release, so before
March 2017 for FF v52. It then diverged with its own codebase. Because
Quantum dumped support for legacy add-ons (XUL/XPCOM programming model),
and Pale Moon stuck with legacy, you cannot use newer WE (Webkit
Extensions) add-ons. You have to get add-ons from Pale Moon's
repository: https://addons.palemoon.org/extensions/. Many legacy
add-ons were adandoned, so they never got updated, and became stagnant.
Some authors just weren't going to invest more time to build both a
legacy (XUL) and WE version of their add-on. You may lose features
available in newer WE versions of add-ons when forced to use the old XUL
add-ons in Pale Moon. Of course, if you don't use add-ons, like
adblockers, then you don't care about loss of new add-on features.
The point of moving from XUL to WE model for add-ons in Firefox was to
eliminate add-ons from interferring with each other. XUL was an
insecure uninsulated add-on model. Quite often you'd find users of one
add-on had problems with another add-on. There was no compatibility
matrix table ever published which showed which functions overlapped
between add-ons, and which add-ons interfered with other add-ons. That
would require cooperation between add-on authors that doesn't exist. It
was the users that had to determine compatibility and interference.
While Pale Moon supports Windows 7, that is its minimum Windows version.
XP and Vista are not supported. I don't use hence not intimate with the
roadmap for Pale Moon to know for how long they will continue to support
Windows 7. That might be something to ask in their forum to get an idea
of what is the future of Pale Moon. Nothing old survives forever. My
22-year old car is starting to require custom-made replacement parts
which are more expensive than stock parts. Windows 7 isn't quite that
old (14 years now). Don't know how long you've been with Windows 7, or
how long you will continue using it, but you might want to see if Pale
Moon has a roadmap or plans on how long to continue Windows 7 support.
Unless you have a desparate and narrow restriction to only Firefox
variant web browsers, you can use a Chromium variant, like Vivaldi.
That a variant uses the Blink rendering engine and V8 script engine from
Chromium does not mandate it is as insecure or just as spying. Vivaldi
runs on Windows 7, and up, but you need to use an old version. 5.6 was
their last version that supported Windows 7. According to their page at
https://vivaldi.com/download/archive/?platform=win, the last 5.6 version
was released in January 2023. Alas, when using an old OS, especially
one that has been discontinued (extended support for Win7 ended back in
January 2020), you often end up having to use old software, too.
Because web sites often require a minimum version of a web browser to
ensure it has the features needed to support the functions of the web
site, you might hit some that either require a later version of the web
browser, or haven't a clue about the one you use to visit their site.
You may find you have to play with the User Agent to get an old or
unknown web browser to work at a web site. However, the UA header got
deprecated a while ago, and sites should be testing functionality to
determine if a web client is acceptable, but the UA header still gets
used to determine if a web client is compatible with a site.