07/12/24 | Sync Doesn't Work

[Osiris75]

@DoctorG There is nothing wrong with that, but there is also nothing wrong with people who just need everything to work and no longer desire to deal with this. Both are very valid points.

@c64lover Saying "Changing browser because of sync given how much good stuff is provided with Vivaldi is just SILLY, you certainly aren't power user ", is not cool and not true. I love the browser, which is why I am still here, but acting like it is the only "power user" browser is flat out untrue and leveling personal attacks like that has no business here.

Vivaldi is a company, period. If they want to grow, it is up to them to make their product not only good, which I think it is, but also resilient. No matter how you feel, "this could happen to any company", "it is not a big deal", etc. It has been happening to Vivaldi now for half a month now and for many it is a very big deal. We all have different needs and also perspectives on what is important to us. Your perspectives are absolutely no more or less important than others. Just because it is not a big deal to you, it is to others.

[Ayespy]

@Himmelssheriff1999
As to browser quality, Vivaldi is well in advance of Brave.

As to resources, Brave started with $50 million in outside capital, and has hundreds of employees. It's meant to be a significant profit engine for a limited number of owners.

Vivaldi, partly because they refuse to monetize your data, has never earned the kind of capital Brave started with, and has a development staff in the 20's.

My guess is that perhaps four of these are qualified to participate in the Sync fix, and I know they are working day and night to get it done. This requires some hardware upgrades, some rewriting of sync code, and the migration of data from millions of accounts. These are just the realities. Those of us who simply can't find a browser that satisfies their daily operational needs as well as Vivaldi are content to wait for the fixes to be completed, tested, and deployed. Substantial progress has been made (my sync under the new improved conditions is working perfectly, but it's not yet ready for public deployment).

Consider an Israeli Kibbutz vs an American industrial farm. The first grows a few hundred bushels of clean, healthy and high-quality produce to support themselves and sell at local farmers markets over the year, in the process doing zero harm to the environment. The second produces hundreds of tons of medium-quality produce, grain, whatever, which contains poisonous chemicals and is highly profitable, while in the process helping to destroy the ecosystem of the planet. I think of Vivaldi as being an economy more similar to the Kibbutz model, except that millions of users benefit from the work a a few, without contributing anything other than their clicks on some partner links (which are transparently identified to users), and their criticisms of Vivaldi and its business model.

Finding fault with with the company, which is employee-owned, or the devs in topics such as this actually has zero positive effect, other than the emotional satisfaction, feelings of superiority in spite of zero knowledge concerning the task at hand, and the warm feelings one experiences from denigrating something with which they are not satisfied.

Still, we don't limit such commenting. Users are entitled to their feelings and opinions, irrespective of the fact that the basis for these may have no bearing on the issue at hand. Sync will be fine soon, I'll wait, and in the meantime will not waste my energy on negativity.

[Catweazle]

I understand completly that for some users it is a big issue to no have sync, especially at this time, when many want to use a new device.

Yes, Vivaldi is a small cooperative that by far cannot be in terms of resources at the level of other large companies with external investors, which Vivaldi does not have in order not to lose independence, as we are seeing now with Mozilla, and even less so with companies like Google, Apple or M$ that have more income than many countries. Neither with Brave, with support from Cryptocompanies and Facebook.

Even so, Vivaldi offers more services than any of them, Google aside, with ethics, transparency and user-centeredness like no one else.

Is it annoying that sync has now crashed and recovery is taking longer than expected? Of course, but these are things that can happen after so many years and this is why it is always advisable to make a backup of important data, as in any software, precisely to have the data at hand in cases like this.

Changing to another browser for this reason, at least for me, is exaggerated, it is like changing a good car after years because of a problem that may take some time to fix, because the workshop has to order a part, to another worse brand.
With the difference that Vivaldi is a free product, despite it's features and services which no other browser has, not even some paid ones.

[Osiris75]

@Catweazle I agree mostly with the ethics, but not too much with transparency. With it not being fully open source and with a pretty lame reason for it being so. Until then, they are not transparent.

Not sure what you mean by services. Functionality wise, there are other browsers that match it for most use cases. The reason I choose Vivaldi is that those other choices are either unethical, too new, or don't have cross-platform.

[DoctorG]

@Osiris75 Your accusation is really weak. Nobody wants to give results of hard work to internet thieves, who sell all what they can.

[Cretec]

In the end, it has been 2 weeks down. We can all spin how Vivaldi is this or is that, it is good, or it is bad. The fact, right now, a major part for many people is down. Anyone trying it out, for the first time, and goes to see how it syncs, it is broken. Features don't mean much if you cannot even sync them.

No matter how you want to spin it, it is a black eye for Vivaldi. People who want to use it don't care if they are small. Many people don't even care about the ethical side or even know about it. I do, but many don't. All they care about it something that functions. We are almost at 2025, people expect a modern browser to work and sync across devices.

Ever since I retired from working for others, I have been running a small business. We have had our issues. If that affects our clients, do you think they care that we are small? No, they want what we give them to work. If it doesn't they go somewhere else. I appreciate some people's loyalty to a brand as a small business owner. However, what is more important is if the tool, which a browser is, works.

[Osiris75]

@DoctorG Just because you don't understand open source and proper licensing, doesn't make something weak. Nothing that Vivaldi has is something that cannot be done, and most have already been done.

[Catweazle]

@Osiris75, only part of the UI is proprietary and even full auditable and also moddeable by the user, the only thing is you can't fork it for another browser (what Google and MS have on their wishlist for Chrome and EDGE).

Mozilla has it way easier to make FF OpenSource, because there isn't any big company which use Gecko in the market, all big companies use Chromium or maybe WebKit in the Apple world.

Nothing to do with transparency respect the user, but with the survival of Vivaldi and other small Chromium browser manufacturers.
The simple existence of Vivaldi Auto, something that Google itself has not managed to get into this area so far, shows that 100% OpenSource is not always the best option in a market saturated with ~100 browsers, mostly Chromium.

[DoctorG]

@Osiris75 said in 07/12/24 | Sync Doesn't Work:

you don't understand open source and proper licensing

Open Source license does not protect owner rights.
But i think that is a useless discussion about FOSS and weak licenses.

Well, you are not happy.

[j4j4]

Time to do a rename.

Vivaldi syncs sinks

[Osiris75]

@DoctorG Thank you for explaining you don't understand Open Source licenses. There are many and yes many protect the owner's rights. Anyway you are right, it is off discussion. That said, Vivaldi is not fully transparent.

You guys have talked about Brave, and I agree on the crypto crap which is why I do not use it. However, it is fully open source. Has the absolute best ad blocker, something I wish Vivaldi would use, and has had no problem growing to over 10x Vivaldi's size with everything out there to see.

[DoctorG]

@j4j4 said in 07/12/24 | Sync Doesn't Work:

Time to do a rename.

Vivaldi syncs sinks

Such comment stinks.

[Osiris75]

@j4j4 Not cool and you have seen I have my issues with Vivlaid, but I do think they are a good company. Just don't agree with all their decisions.

[Ayespy]

@Osiris75 With 100X the marketing budget, yes it has grown to 10X the size of Vivaldi. It also plays on user paranoia, which is a powerful marketing ploy. Also it's "FOSS," which is the be-all and end-all for some users.

[Cretec]

@Catweazle Just saying, Brave is fully open source and has a much larger user base despite being younger primarily due to their own Ad blocker, which is also fully open source. It is actually what draws many Linux users to them from Firefox, versus other browsers, including Vivaldi. I, personally, hate their sync, ironic to say right now, and the crypto and suspect decisions. So I do not use them. However, they are proof that Open Source can work. They are up to almost 80 million monthly active users.

[Osiris75]

@Ayespy And none of that matters to the regular user or those that want to see transparency when it comes to privacy and security. For many people, you either are or you are not. Your stuff works or it does not. It is a minority of people that go beyond those very basic principles and become loyal to a brand over functionality.

[Ayespy]

@Cretec How does a "cloud" save you in the event that your (because of the software they are running) servers and software (because of substantial refactoring) cannot properly deal with load balancing? What? You just shift to different servers running the same broken software? you roll back to earlier (slower, less capable software which is no longer compatible with your refactored software?) A cloud is not magical. It can replicate a working version and pick up where an outage left off. It cannot fix a broken version running on the wrong hardware for it.

[Catweazle]

@Cretec, yes, but OpenSource in what? There is nothing in the Brave Source which may interest Google or Microsoft (its adblocker? LOL), not so with Vivaldi's proprietary source. All other is the FOSS Chromium, little more in Brave as the Chromium as is (gutted Google APIs same as in Vivaldi and even EDGE (but with own MS tracking crap)).

[Osiris75]

@Catweazle There is nothing in Vivaldi that either M$ or Google would want either. Many features, Edge already has and Google focuses on more clean interface.

[Ayespy]

@Osiris75 Vivaldi is not trying to capture users who know no better than to use Brave. It it "a browser for our friends" - ie, one that does or improves on Opera 10/12 functions, honors user privacy, and provides a vibrant community. It does not seek to compete in the same marketplace as the "big guys." It seeks to serve a particular, and discerning base. To retain users that can't cope with its conformability and features, it offers limited versions. But it exists for its conformability and features, not to be a browser "dumb enough for anyone to use." The Team do their best to keep everything up and running per normal, while fixing 30 to 60 bugs a day, while developing the features that were always a part of Vivaldi's natal vision.