Include epiphany browser in fedora

[jyotir (Jyotiraditya Tiwary)]

To acheive the same affect on flatpak version of firefox, you can run

$ flatpak override --user --env=MOZ_USE_XINPUT2=1  org.mozilla.firefox

[gemmakaru]

Thanks so much for this, it sure opens up opportunities.

[mpphill2 (Matthew Phillips)]

Okay, I have to admit I was wrong. I installed Fedora SB 38 and decided to go with Epiphany (Flathub) as my default… it is working great! None of my previous issues with YouTube, or any site so far really. It even opened up as captive portal for my Spotify login, and impressively when I clicked “Go back to the app” it did!

I’m going to stick with it a while longer and report back. Really liking the new Epiphany so far, and obviously really liking Fedora SB 38!

[mpphill2 (Matthew Phillips)]

After using it for a couple days it is a little bit slower than Firefox, no doubt, but at least all the pages load for me. Another thing that kind of annoys me is the Do Not Track flag isn’t being set for me. I think maybe because I turned off Ad Blocking and it is tied to that? There was an article about them being enabled by default.

But it’s so much better than it used to be, I’m going to stick with it for a while. I like the idea of a tightly integrated desktop, and really the browser is the most important desktop app for most people.

[catanzaro (Michael Catanzaro)]

For avoidance of doubt, Epiphany is already available in Fedora, either via RPM or via Fedora Flatpak (though I doubt anybody actually tests whether the Flatpak works well). The version offered by Flathub is also a good bet. The Fedora versions are not showing up in GNOME Software due to a bug.

It’s actually installed by default because it provides the web app runtime for GNOME Software. Only the desktop launcher and search provider are missing, because we don’t want it to look like there are multiple browsers installed (Firefox is the default browser in Fedora Workstation), even though there are. Most of the browser is provided by the epiphany-runtime package (installed by default) and the desktop launcher and search provider is provided by the epiphany package, which you can install with dnf if desired.

@mpphill2

After using it for a couple days it is a little bit slower than Firefox, no doubt, but at least all the pages load for me. Another thing that kind of annoys me is the Do Not Track flag isn’t being set for me. I think maybe because I turned off Ad Blocking and it is tied to that? There was an article about them being enabled by default.

The DNT header is not sent anymore because it is useless. Browsers that allow toggling the DNT header just add an extra bit of entropy for websites to use to fingerprint you. Firefox ought to follow Safari and Epiphany in removing this preference.

But it’s so much better than it used to be, I’m going to stick with it for a while. I like the idea of a tightly integrated desktop, and really the browser is the most important desktop app for most people.

Glad to see it’s working well for you.

[mpphill2 (Matthew Phillips)]

Thank you for the insight! It’s interesting learning about and keeping up with the project. I like to go to the about:gpu (webkit://gpu) page and look at the different versions of the various technologies used (WebkitGTK, WPE, GStreamer, etc), and every now and again go to their web pages to see the new release notes.

Glad to say it is still working well and I am still with it