WikiTree Sourcer: Upcoming changes on Firefox and Safari

Question

I'm working on a change to how the WikiTree Sourcer browser extension is coded for Firefox and Safari and would like to get some feedback from WikiTreers who use it on those browsers.

Currently Sourcer uses the latest APIs (knows as MV3) on Chrome but uses the older APIs (known as MV2) on Firefox and Safari. I am working on moving to using MV3 on all browsers.

This will have some improvements in the way permissions are handled in Firefox for example. At the moment you have to grant all the permissions that the extension requests in order to use it anywhere. With MV3 Firefox lets you pick and choose.

The possible downside is that some older versions of Firefox and Safari will no longer work with the extension. So I would like you know if there are users who would be impacted by that.

In Firefox the extension currently requires Firefox version 89. If I change to MV3 it will require Firefox version 109 (released January 2023). Both of these have the same system requirements so I don't think anyone currently using the extension will be prevented from upgrading to 109. Let me know if there would be a problem for you with this.

In Safari MV3 support was added on Safari Version 15.4 in March 2022 on both macOS and iOS. On Mac this version of Safari requires macOS 12.3, on iPad and iPhone it requires iOS 15.4. Let me know if this means that you would not be able to use it.

For users or Chrome and other Chromium based browsers (Edge, Brave, Vivaldi, Opera, Kiwi) the requirements will not change since the Sourcer extension has been using MV3 for a long time on these browsers.

Please answer this post if you think the change to MV3 on Firefox and Safari would cause you problems.

Comments

The current version of Firefox, according to my ticker, is 119.  Mozilla does seem to update pretty frequently, but compatibility back to 109 sounds like a very reasonable margin.  You'd think that those who are using the apps and browser extensions are most likely people who also stay pretty current with software updates, so I'd guess that few, if any, Firefox users would be impacted.  But thanks for asking.

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I am using iPad 3 eos 17.1.1 hope it will be fine

And iPhone 14

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Update I have just released version 2.0.0 of Sourcer on Firefox only for now. It is using Manifest Version 3 and required version 112 of Firefox. Please let me know if you see any issues.

I will wait for feedback before releasing 2.0.0 on Safari and Chrome.

Answer 1

I am using the latest Firefox and Safari on all of my current devices, so would not have an issue with the change.

Answer 2

My Firefox Browser is 119.0.1, so I'm good with whatever you need to do. Thanks for checking!

Answer 3

I am using Safari version 16.6.1 with macOS Big Sur version 11.7.10. So, I am confused by your statement that "this version of Safari requires macOS 12.3".

So, by your statement of requirements for macOS above, I am not sure if the change will work for me or not.

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I am using iPadOS 15.8 on an iPad Air 2 and iPhoneOS 16.7.1 on an iPhone SE; so it shouldn't be a problem for me.

Comments

It looks like I was wrong about Safari 15.4 requiring macOS 12.3.  I think it was introduced with that OS release but is also available on some earlier OS versions.

So if you have Safari version 16.6.1 it should work fine with MV3 extensions.