Sync: Status update

Linu74

Another way works on my Side.
I rename 2 Folders in /home/user/.config/vivaldi-snapshot/Default "Sync Data" and "Sync Extensions Settings"

Linu74

NEO701

Thanks for your efforts.
Will we have the ability to save a complete profile backup "offline" that can be restored locally in addition to the online Sync function ?

zakius

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

I'm not sure what you mean, the whole point of the extensions API is that it opens up the browser context?

background scripts have very limited capabilities and contentscripts are run in website context
it makes a difference for mouse gestures and keyboard shortcuts for example, but I believe there are many other usecases

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

Fair point, I've never come across this issue but that seems annoying.

makes a difference for a RSS reader for example, but I expect people to create other extensions that would benefit from parallelization

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

Enable this flag to do so: vivaldi://flags/#extensions-on-chrome-urls

checked it many times, in chrome, chromium and chropera all it does is expecting extension to request additional permission in it's manifest, it doesn't automatically enable them, though it may be different for Vivaldi

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

Extensions can add buttons, popups & badges, they can add context menu entries. In Vivaldi pages they offer can be added as web panels. In addition to extensions, Vivaldi can load in mods that customise the interface.

surely Vivaldi can be modified in some ways, though currently there is no user friendly way of managing them and many of them requite fiddling with files that get replaced with updates (just like manual edits to XUL in Firefox based browsers, it was possible but not feasible)

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

That's a contradiction.

broken from usability point of view, perfectly fine from it's designers point of view, these two unfortunately can be true at the same time

what is impossible in chromium extension ecosystem?
Fire gestures with ability to execute event while scrolling over tab bar (since contentscripts are run inside websites you can execute gestures only in website area and have to wait a while before code can get injected, and of course this won't work on internal pages etc. unless extension author requires the extra permission and user not only enables it but also pretends to ignore that obnoxious warning)
Pretty much the same goes about all vim-like control extensions

Pages and pop-ups generated by chromium extensions can't be consistent with browser itself nor with OS since webtech doesn't provide proper UI elements nor styles to apply (there is appearance property that doesn't work anyway)

@luetage said in Sync: Status update:

Look at the opera add-ons sidebar category. After all these years only a few extension which use the API have been written. Don't think it makes much sense. And the modding of the interface you can do in Vivaldi directly, no need for extensions.

that's why I think it would be nice to be able to create proper extensions but if basic features are not provided by Vivaldi's team (either as built-ins or extensions) these won't be provided at all

LonM

@zakius I understand the problem better now.

I think there are definitely workarounds - I am perfectly happy with my current RSS reader extension that builds its UI in HTML instead of natively. I can add it as a web panel, no need for a sidebar API.

And there are ways to communicate and pass messages between multiple components in an extension - I've been able to use a background script in an extension I'm building currently without any major issues. There are some odd quirks, but nothing that completely breaks what I'm trying to do.

For the most part, I would take the security advantages of keeping things separated the way that google devs have chosen to build things - they understand the underlying setup of the browser better than me. And for less experienced users, warnings and hiding some features is a good security feature. (I would quite like it if vivaldi grew to have a userbase that also included less experienced users, so blanket getting rid of these wouldn't be a good start on that front).

Though I do have one big gripe: Chromium bases its extensions API entirely on async callbacks, whereas firefox (implementing the same API) prefers Promises - These are far neater.

And yes, It would also be nice if there were a proper entry point for what are currently referred to as browser mods.

zakius

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

And there are ways to communicate and pass messages between multiple components in an extension - I've been able to use a background script in an extension I'm building currently without any major issues. There are some odd quirks, but nothing that completely breaks what I'm trying to do.

I'm not sure what are you referring to but I assume it is the part about Event and Background pages/scripts
If it's so then as far as docs tell you can't have BG script per se if you are using Event Scripts (that basically perform the same tasks as webworkers, are created on demand, execute their code and quit)

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

no need for a sidebar API.

it was just another example that extending chromium extension API was done before

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

For the most part, I would take the security advantages of keeping things separated the way that google devs have chosen to build things

IMO they should provide much more APIs but limit their availability in store distributed extensions to trusted authors only, if you sideload anything it's your own business, right? But even that feels like an overkill, we have permissions system for a reason, let's just use it (with a twist, in Android some permissions can't be given during installation due to their power and user has to add them manually later, and some can be only given via adb cause are not available in UI at all, doesn't it sound like a nice solution?)

MS did stuff like that with their UWP and pre-UWP APIs: Apps signed by Nokia and MS could do much more than others, including messing with registry directly, while everyone else was limited to safe features (at least as long as App was published via Store)

LonM

@zakius For message passing, it's done in an event driven manner, but you can also use sockets to talk between background pages, content scripts, and other parts.

I do agree with you that it's strange you can only have background or event pages, but I can't imagine if the top of my head a scenario where you would want both.

And yes, permissions really should be as granular as possible. But if more powerful apis were made I don't think they should ever be limited to trusted authors - that puts too much onus on Google to manage.

As far as new APIs go, I guess you need some imagination on that front. Not something I'm brilliant at.

ROTFL

@gwen-dragon said in Sync: Status update:

Worked for me.

zakius

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

I can't imagine if the top of my head a scenario where you would want both

from my understanding of chromium extensions you do need bg script to open new tab on toolbar button click, if you can use event script for that too then it may indeed be harder to imagine, but definitely not impossible

@lonm said in Sync: Status update:

But if more powerful apis were made I don't think they should ever be limited to trusted authors - that puts too much onus on Google to manage.

well, if one creating these APIs would be using them to provide extensions it would be easy, but since Google won't do that...

ROTFL

@gwen-dragon It's just the meme I have in my mind when somebody says "helped in my case" / "works for me"

Don't take it personally Lilo You explained it wery well.
Just replication of fixes sometimes is as hard as the errors.

So everyone in IT is joking with "works on my machine".
I use to say this on my daily basis too

iAN CooG

@gwen-dragon I don't know if something is lost in translation but I don't see anything unfriendly, it simply means I can't replicate your issue on my machine, nothing less nothing more.

hebasto

Crash on Linux Mint.

$ vivaldi
ATTENTION: default value of option force_s3tc_enable overridden by environment.
[20145:20145:0310/133753.292881:ERROR:bookmark_model_associator.cc(1005)] Bookmarks persistence error was encountered: Native version (117) does not match sync version (1)
[20145:20317:0310/133754.393597:ERROR:get_updates_processor.cc(244)] PostClientToServerMessage() failed during GetUpdates

petersaints

Now that Sync is coming along nicely there are only two things missing to make Vivaldi perfect.

Of those things, only one of them is keeping me from using Vivaldi full time, which is the lack of mobile support. If I have sync, I really really want to have it sync with my Android smartphone and tablet. Please release a Vivaldi app for Android, even if it means just "skinning" the default WebView engine, which also happens to be Blink-based, like Microsoft did with their Edge browser.

The other thing is the new built-in e-mail client. It would be nice to have, but given that I web-based e-mail has gotten pretty god over the last few years, it's something that I really don't need that much. And when I need a real e-mail client I'm okay with using Evolution on Linux and the "Mail and Calendar" app on Windows 10.

Ayespy

@petersaints Developers are already working on a mobile Vivaldi. I don't think it's planned to be "quick and dirty," however, with just a skin on an existing app. I think they are looking for something more than that.

Malp

Worked for me too

mossman

I was perfectly happy with sync up till now, but yesterday and today two very big issues popped up so I thought I'd ask here if anyone else has any experience before I submit a bug report...

I just discovered that at least two of my installations are no longer actually synced - when I open the settings they are stuck on "Login to Vivaldi sync in progress. Please wait.". I see no way to stop and log in again, so I will go offline after writing this to see if forcing an error gives me those options.
Yesterday I spent about two hours fixing my wife's synced profile on two installations after I discovered that a bug has been infinitely cloning one of her notes! I discovered this and worked hard to kill it when it had already reached 62,000 copies... I think it's related to the bug that popped up when they introduced markup in notes - in that case notes wouldn't render at all when the first line started with a space IIRC. In this case the note being cloned started with a blank line and then a space before the text. I also deleted another note (not being cloned) which rendered as HTML tags pointing to an image - that might have originally been a real note which screwed up or some code the bug had thrown in.

mossman

@mossman Well it took several attempts (as mentioned in the blog about the update) but I'm happy to report that going offline did indeed give me the option to "switch user" and start the log in from scratch.

Ayespy

@mossman Will you file a bug report on each of these, please?

AnrDaemon

@quhno: you can do it in IE just as well. That's not a "feature set" that makes (was made) Opera distinctive from all other browsers. And Vivaldi still do not compare.
The only feature that made it into Vivaldi that I use constantly is web panels.
Selective cookies manager is flaky at best, I can't even post on Vivaldi team blog - it do not recognize my authorization.
URL blocker is missing.
Custom CSS missing.
UI is not customizable (actually, it is customizable, but to be able to do so, you need to download Chromium source code and dig through it to find reference points to place into CSS/JS or pester people with access to that code for help; and still, changes are not persistent).
Even the browser controls are made by ad hoc principle and barely satisfy the minimal requirements for comfortable browsing. It really should be Control -> Action, not Action -> Control. "Action -> Control" does not let you create state-dependent controls, like "stop page load or scroll to top, if it's not loading already".

Pesala

@anrdaemon said in Sync: Status update:

UI is not customizable

Much can already be done by editing common.css. I use it for a few simple changes: Transparent Thumbnails and Removing the Navigation Bar from the Start Page

See the Modding Forum if you want more.

The ability to Concatenate Commands would be useful for both shortcuts and mouse gestures.

I think Page Actions are the same as user CSS, though I am not too familiar with writing CSS, I guess anyone who needs special page actions could write their own code and share it on the modding forums.

Ayespy

@anrdaemon said in Sync: Status update:

That's not a "feature set" that makes (was made) Opera distinctive from all other browsers. And Vivaldi still do not compare.

You're correct. In 3 years, Vivaldi has not caught up with 20 years of Opera development.