~20 days ago, google announced that they are limiting api availability on March 15th 2021. https://blog.chromium.org/2021/01/limiting-private-api-availability-in.html This means that sync and some other features will stop working from that day on and users that use them will complain and file bug reports. Other distros are already discussing the subject and some even suggest the removal of chromium from their repos, so I think it is time for debian users and maintainers to do it too. So, what will debian do? Let me hear your thoughts. p.s. I am the least affected user by that change. I do not use sync or any other of the services that are will stop functioning. In fact, I do not use sync on any of my browsers. On top of that, I no longer use chromium after last year's huge delays in major updates. But here I am, opening the discussion for its future in debian.
control: severity -1 minor None of this is relevant to running chromium as a web browser, which is its intended purpose. Best wishes, Mike
control: severity -1 minor None of this is relevant to running chromium as a web browser, which is its intended purpose. Best wishes, Mike
So, in your opinion, a browser is useful only for rendering pages? Nowadays, web technologies have evolved and web pages are not static html. Sites are complex and the ability for someone to sync passwords/bookmarks/history in his browser helps him have some continuity for his work, even on different devices. For some, sync is not just another browser feature but a critical feature the browser MUST have. Leaving sync aside, these are the features that are expected to break Geolocation Click to Call Chrome spelling API Contacts API Chrome translate element Speaking for myself and only for myself, I am not affected by any of these. But I am not the average user. Other major distros have already announced or are discussing what they will do. Fedora has even removed their api keys already! Slackware is asking users if they are willing to use a muzzled browser. Why? Because building chromium takes a lot of time and that cut in usability may not worth it. Finally, if you consider this a minor issue, make an announcement beforehand so the users know what to expect by then and remove /etc/chromium.d/apikeys from the package on a future update, because it will be useless.
Hi, As for https://bugs.debian.org/982062 which causes lack of bookmark synchronization etc., I agree it is a minor bug. Considering this will not be fixed by the upstream by reading this post. https://blog.chromium.org/2021/01/limiting-private-api-availability-in.html Since this bug will certainly cause confusion to many users, it will be nice to mention short not on this bug with resulting issues in README.Debian. Osamu
Hi, As for https://bugs.debian.org/982062 which causes lack of bookmark synchronization etc., I agree it is a minor bug. Considering this will not be fixed by the upstream by reading this post. https://blog.chromium.org/2021/01/limiting-private-api-availability-in.html Since this bug will certainly cause confusion to many users, it will be nice to mention short not on this bug with resulting issues in README.Debian. Osamu
Hi!
Recently I was hit by this bug, a nice workaround is in this Stackoverflow
answer: https://stackoverflow.com/a/67459416
The procedure in Debian could be to create a file /etc/chromium.d/enable-sync
with the following content:
# Set OAUTH2 flags to enable sync with google services:
# https://stackoverflow.com/questions/67459316/enabling-chromium-to-sync-with-google-account
export CHROMIUM_FLAGS="$CHROMIUM_FLAGS
--oauth2-client-id=77185425430.apps.googleusercontent.com"
export CHROMIUM_FLAGS="$CHROMIUM_FLAGS
--oauth2-client-secret=OTJgUOQcT7lO7GsGZq2G4IlT"
This could be added to the README.Debian file.
Have Fun!
Daniel.