Subject: bug#60668: IceCatMobile: Dark mode?

From: Mart Rootamm <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 14 Feb 2023 17:07:45 +0200

Hi, Mr. T.

I couldn't find the perfect theme extension for IceCat Mobile from
Mozilla Addons, but there is only one that does work for me, though it
only paints the address bar gray, but not the menus or settings pages:

Dark Theme for Android & PC
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/dark-theme-android-pc/

Version 68.4.2 of IceCatMobile is old, and its rendering engine is
much slower than that of the latest version of Firefox, and some sites
no longer support it: For example, the "more extensions by user"
section at Mozilla Addons won't load information, and the placeholder
spans continue to animate; GitHub always supports the very latest
version of Firefox, and relies on the latest functionality; the
desktop version of YouTube has a somewhat mangled design, which loads
slowly anyway.

The saving grace of IceCat Mobile 68.x is the support of a greater
number of WebExtensions, the presence of about:config, and maybe a few
other things.

With regard to the possibility of enabling dark mode on sites by
default and in the browser UI, I've added the following settings in
about:config —

Integers:

ui.systemUsesDarkTheme;1
widget.non-native-theme.scrollbar.style;4

Booleans:

userChrome.theme.fully_dark;true
userContent.page.dark_mode;true
widget.content.allow-gtk-dark-theme;true
widget.disable-dark-scrollbar;false
widget.gtk.alt-theme.dark;true
widget.non-native-theme.scrollbar.active-always-themed;true
widget.non-native-theme.scrollbar.dark-themed;true

The above settings for UI in about:config don't seem to work, as they
are far too new for IceCat Mobile 68.4.

Neither is there any guarantee, that IceCat 68 will be able to make
these site-oriented settings work, or that sites that use conditional
dark mode in CSS, would be able to detect browser-based dark mode
settings in this version of IceCat. I've kept the settings anyway.

Other dark extensions do not work in this browser version: the "Native
Dark" extension, and some themes, such as Dark Theme for Firefox, Arc
Dark Theme, and a number of others.

Interestingly enough, "Dark Mysterious Forest" works in Fennec F-Droid
68.12.0esr.

Most other "dark theme" extensions paint individual websites.

Global Dark Style paints all sites dark, and one can disable certain
domains. There is also Dark Reader. I haven't tried those out.

Some individual extensions, such as NoScript and uBlock Origin, have
dark theme support for themselves.

Here's a list of extensions that I use:

NoScript
Stylus
uBlock Origin

I've added links for all the other WebExtensions, because Mozilla's
own search facility does not display them.

Custom UserAgent String (clunky UI, but works)
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/custom-user-agent-revived/

MobiDevTools (vaguely similar to FireBug, and to Firefox developer tools)
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/mobidevtools/

Privacy Settings
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/android/addon/privacy-settings/

Work with URLs (urls paths opener obfuscate decode) [sic]
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/workwithurls/

Video Background Play Fix — this is important when playing YouTube and
switching to other apps, or when the lock screen appears.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-background-play-fix/

View Page Source Mobile
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/view-page-source-mobile/

I can also suggest CleanLinks, which cleans up URLs of tracking codes
when copying them, but I haven't tried it out.

Return YouTube Dislike — While this extension will install in mobile
IceCat 68.x, and while it may have worked there at one time or
another, then it no longer seems to work in that version of IceCat,
either with mobile YouTube, or with the desktop version of YouTube.
This extension works only in desktop Firefox or derivatives.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/return-youtube-dislikes/

A note about Fennec F-Droid 68.12.0esr and IceCatMobile 68.4: Besides
version differences, Fennec F-Droid, while newer, uses an animated
progress bar, which slows down rendering in really old smartphones,
while I haven't noticed progress bar animations in IceCat Mobile.

-M.

2023-01-08 23:31 GMT +02:00, Mr. T <[email-masked]>:
> Hi,
>
> thanks a lot, finally a mobile browser that allows all addons like the
> old firefox versions and not just a hand full of selected add-ons that
> are not quite enough.
>
>
> I hate mozilla for always trashing good stuff like rss support, ftp
> support and now mobile addon support, thankfully there are people who
> care about real free software ;)
>
>
> but there is one thing i miss on the installed icecat mobile version
> 68.4.2 (is this really the latest version, fdroid dosnt provide a later
> one but release date 2020 seams a bit old)
>
> and that is dark mode, there is no way to set it and its also not
> enabled when enabled system wide, i like to browse in the evening before
> sleeping in while lying in bed so its a must have for me to have a dark
> as possible UI, dark reader could be installed successfully but the url
> bar is much to bright. Also its nice to save battery with my amoled device.
>
> So please add a dark mode.
>
>
> thanks and keep up the good work.
>
> Mr. T
>
>
>
>
>