Has FR been Pigeon Holed by Google Chrome?

None ^ | 12/26/2013 | PeteePie

[PeteePie]

I came into work today and fired up Google Chrome, like on any other day. My Google home page usually displays the eight most frequently visited websites in icon/link form. The icon and link for Free Republic has always occupied the number one or two spot, depending on my frequency of visits. But today Chrome looked different. It wasn't just the new seasonal header image but that some of my frequently visited icon images have been replaced by some infrequently visited icon/links. I clicked on 'Do Not Show on This Page' option for these newbies and it replaced them with other less frequently visited sites until it ran out of replacements and left me with a blank icon with no link. WTH? It never offered FR as a replacement icon despite the fact that I click on it half a dozen times every day at least.

Note; ignore the source url, if I used google's url, I would be forced to excerpt, which doesn't make sense in this case.

[NewHampshireDuo]

According to prism-break.org Ubuntu also has some security leaks. They can, however, be fixed. I like Mint which is Ubuntu based and also Mint Debian. Fedora is very good also but I don’t like the desktop as much as Mint’s Cinnamon desk top.

That aside, Firefox is far better than IE, Chrome or any other proprietary browser. I only use Firefox.

[re_nortex]

Fedora is very good also but I don’t like the desktop as much as Mint’s Cinnamon desk top.

MATE on Mint is fine but I've grown very accustomed to KDE4...and that took some doing for me since it was horrible before about the 4.9.X series. I've become very used to Activities, allowing me to partition my workload far better than anything I've seen before.

[kevao]

I’ll be getting a new System76 lappie in the next few days. Comes with Ubuntu installed. First thing I’ll do, is install PCLinuxOS KDE on it :) I love Linux, but Ubuntu is fugly.

[mojitojoe]

First of all, if you’re using chrome, expect to be spied on and don’t be surprised by anything. You couldn’t pay me to use G 0 0 gle anything!

[mojitojoe]

I was wondering the same thing.

[mojitojoe]

DITTO! Only naive fools use G 0 0 g le.

[AlexW]

“I understand Google mail is doing the same thing, uses your e-mail to find you targeted ads.”
____________________________________________________
I use Yahoo Email for personal mail, and G-Mail for more commercial bulk mails such as InternationalLiving.com, EscapeArtist, WND, etc.
I have had very few problems from bulk ads or spam with either.
It could be that having a foreign IP may prevent a lot of commercial spam. I do not know.

[NewHampshireDuo]

I’ll probably end up giving Fedora another shot as I probably haven’t given it enough time to really familiarize myself with it. Thanks.

[GeronL]

You don’t like Firefox?

[GeronL]

I do nor recall anyone boasting about using the Opera web browser

[GeronL]

I tried several different versions of Linux this past week off of my USB card and I have to say that Ubuntu is still the best. I tried Linux Mint 16, Puppy, Simplicity Linux (Pupplet that didn’t even bother to remove the barking when loaded), Linux Console 2.0, and more. I also looked at a bunch of websites about others during this time.

None of the ones I tried were anywhere near as smoothly operating, nicely designed and works as well as Ubuntu 12.04 LTS

Linux Console 2.0 did nothing when I tapped the touchpad, I had to use the actual buttons to get anything done. It also looked a bit like Windows 3.1, lol

[re_nortex]

GeronL -- I wonder if anyone, self excluded, here in the universe of FReepers still uses lynx? Free Republic displays perfectly on it (graphics aside, of course). There are times when I do maintenance without X running and the combo of lynx/Free Republic works just fine.

[GeronL]

I was tempted to try Lynx last week when I reading about it (among other old browsers)

[GeronL]

I have to build it myself?

lol

It took me weeks to figure out to unzip things in Linux, I don’t see myself being able to build anything. :p

[re_nortex]

It took me weeks to figure out to unzip things in Linux.

Ahem, unzip, eh? Try untar! :)

part of the thrill comes from extracting the tarball and then building from source, allowing for total customization. But if that's not your cup 'o tea, the following works in Ubuntu 13.10:

    sudo apt-get install lynx

Not as much fun...but it works. And once installed, fire things up with:

    lynx freerepublic.com

Voila! No annoying graphics! Just pearls of wisdom!

[GeronL]

“Untar!!” is the call of battle for the caveman

[NewHampshireDuo]

The old IBM T42 that I’m typing on now is Ubuntu. I only use it for browsing and email but it has served me well for a few years now.

[GeronL]

If Ubuntu is too resource heavy for it, there are Linux variants that use even less.

[Hugin]

I don’t use g(.)(.)gle anything - not their search engine, not their browser, not their android tablets or phones. Every keystroke you make is radioed back to the mothership.

I agree. I also like Bing better as a search engine.

[Varmint Al]

FreeRepublic is the first slot on my ToolBar links. I have unchecked all the times the software wants to install Chrome. FireFox is the way to go.

Good Hunting... from Varmint Al