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It seems that Brendan Eich, one of the founders of Mozilla and the brain behind the development of JavaScript, acquired the former Link Browser (available for Android and iOS) to use as a lauching pad for the new OSS Brave browser (currently available only as source code for Windows; see http://github.com/brave/browser-laptop/releases).

http://www.brave.com/ wrote:The new Brave browser blocks all the greed and ugliness on the Web that slows you down and invades your privacy. Then we put clean ads back, to fund website owners and Brave users alike.

Brave is set to be available for Windows, Linux and MacOS, on top of the mobile platforms formerly supported by Bubble -- some interesting clues given at http://www.brave.com/index.html#faster...

Interesting stuff but and a good thing to have around if Mozilla falls off the wagon, but I don't see a clear line between this and Mozilla with some plugins, specifically HTTPS Everywhere and Privacy Badger. In fact, I'd prefer an organization like EFF to handle those functions for the same reason that the CEO lists in his "Principal-Agent conflict of interest," which suggests companies often don't do what's in the users' best interest.

License: MPL 2.0

Engine: It's using webkit/blink/whatever (source).

ArsTechnica outlines some of the problems of their approach: http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/01 ... y-default/

Well, I agree there could be many unforeseen snags with Brave -- as always, my stance is wait and see.

I hadn't thought of Firefox plus privacy enforcing plugins in the light you shone here and I have to agree that this coupling is the best scenario, ATM.

Found an article at Wikipedia replacement Infogalactic.com/

Infogalactic.com wrote:As of October 2016, it was in version 0.12.1, and in beta testing for iOS, Android, Windows, OS X, and Linux.

Infogalactic.com/ is a hopefully non biased, non political platform as decribed on the main page.

[2019-09-02 -- Mod note: page edited to hide link to dubious content. For further info, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vox_Day#Publishing]

The program remains in development status, but is seeing some active changes. I was pleased to see the automatic inclusion of HTTPS Anywhere, a plugin that I just recently touted.

http://www.softpedia.com/progChangelog/ ... 51299.html

I'm also glad to see they're embracing an MPL (rather than BSD or closed-source license) but I wonder if this won't push Google to move more Chrome components to closed source to avoid competing with other forks, similar to how they've steered Android.

webfork wrote: I'm also glad to see they're embracing an MPL (rather than BSD or closed-source license) but I wonder if this won't push Google to move more Chrome components to closed source to avoid competing with other forks, similar to how they've steered Android.

Existence of Chrome forks is helpful to Google. The important part for them is that the forks use the Blink layout engine. Thus, they increase Blink's market share and help ensure that websites remain Blink compatible.

SYSTEM wrote:Existence of Chrome forks is helpful to Google. The important part for them is that the forks use the Blink layout engine. Thus, they increase Blink's market share and help ensure that websites remain Blink compatible.

True, but if a browser comes out whose primary mission is anti-tracking, that's really counter to the whole business model behind Chrome. They put the time, money, and advertising effort into the program so that the user data they draw is more complete and detailed. Small projects are unlikely to disrupt their cash flow, but it's easy to discourage them by putting in a few closed-source components that REAL Chrome users would miss.

after the latest developments from the brave camp (see "Brave starts opt-in Ads trial that rewards users and publishers" https://www.ghacks.net/2018/06/22/brave ... ublishers/ &
"Brave browser gets private tab with Tor option" https://www.ghacks.net/2018/06/29/brave ... or-option/)
i've been tempted to try out brave and i found out that there is a portable version [unofficial] for brave available at https://github.com/portapps/brave-portable
there are also other apps by the same guy at https://portapps.github.io/apps/
(like Discord, Docker Toolbox, HandBrake, HLSW, HostsMan, IntelliJ IDEA Community, IntelliJ IDEA Ultimate, Postman, Rocket.Chat, Skype, Slack, TeamSpeak Client, Twitch, Visual Studio Code)

i didn't test for portability though

Brave v0.66.99 released 2019-07-01(?) (changelog at github.com /brave/brave-browser/blob/master/CHANGELOG.md).

No info on portability, but until further notice I'd assume it's still prone to Chrome/ium shortcomings (cf. https://portableapps.com/node/54119).

An interesting discussion over about PA about their Brave rewards program:

https://portableapps.com/node/60580

Supposedly there is a portable version here:
https://portapps.io/apps/

Many of the programs here aren`t really portable. When I ran brave it created a load of directories in the appData folder, but when I deleted them they didn`t come back. So, could be portable, not sure. The programs here use Yaml, which doesn`t seem very reliable in creating portable apps. So, far, of the 10 or so I tested, 8 all created files/folders in the appData folders.

hamasaki wrote: ↑Supposedly there is a portable version here: https://portapps.io/apps/

Interesting site, apparently geared towards the programming crowd -- currently only 46 programs, but does include the three release channels of Firefox (standard, ESR and Dev).

The possibility of downloading apps in ZIP archives by selecting it in the download form at the bottom of program pages is an useful feature, IMHO.

hamasaki wrote: ↑Many of the programs here aren`t really portable. [...] The programs here use Yaml, which doesn`t seem very reliable in creating portable apps. So, far, of the 10 or so I tested, 8 all created files/folders in the appData folders.

As long as they keep settings when moved to a different computer, they would qualify as portable. The '%APPDATA%' traces would only affect their stealthiness rating.

More info on YAML: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YAML.

YAML has been criticized for its significant whitespace, confusing features, insecure defaults, and its complex and ambiguous specification. Technically correct YAML can be completely unreadable by humans, especially if string values have leading or trailing whitespace.

hamasaki wrote: ↑Sun Sep 01, 2019 10:39 pm Supposedly there is a portable version here:
https://portapps.io/apps/

Many of the programs here aren`t really portable. When I ran brave it created a load of directories in the appData folder, but when I deleted them they didn`t come back. So, could be portable, not sure. The programs here use Yaml, which doesn`t seem very reliable in creating portable apps. So, far, of the 10 or so I tested, 8 all created files/folders in the appData folders.

Be warned that this site is modifying, repackaging and redistributing Brave without permission. As well as Firefox, Discord, Whatsapp, etc. A statement like "Portapps is not affiliated, associated, authorized, endorsed by, or in any way officially connected with Discord™, or any of its subsidiaries or its affiliates." doesn't somehow make it legal to modify and repackage apps in violation of their license.

Thanks for the heads up John.

Quick note on Brave's engine...

Muon is a framework that leverages the full power of Chromium including extensions support, and allows you to build browsers and browser like applications with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Node is added into the browser process only for security reasons. It may be a better fit than Electron for your application, if your application needs to leverage the full support of Chromium, needs tighter security, or needs support for things like autofill and extensions. [...] Muon is a fork of the Electron framework which is currently used in the Brave web browser.

EDIT (2020-09-25):

This repository has been archived by the owner. It is now read-only.

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