Yandex.Browser - Beta

[deya]

Oh, ok, well that must be the latest version if you downloaded it from their site. Mine says up to date at 6712 so I'll leave it and see what happens.

There is no option to start with homepage. You can't enter a URL and have it open at a specific page like you can with other browsers.

The bottom option on your image is their homepage, yandex[dot]ru, but that's the Russian language version of their search page - which, if your using Yandex, will auto translate anyway. I have it set to open with the tableau, which I think they may class as the browser homepage.

Further down in settings - appearance - there's the option to show Yandex button, and clicking that will load the English version of their search page.

I'm on the case with the changelog thing. It's bugging me now.

[danielson]

For the record, have version 16.3.0.6796 as of now.

Seems to be much better than previous editions (app loading and page rendering).

[Melita-s]

How does Yandex compare with Firefox regarding Privacy and security? Does it have add ons that we can chose for protection?

Thank you

[danielson]

By default, (correct me if i'm wrong) it has Adguard which does quite a bit.
Then you can install a whole slew of security related extensions from the Google repos.
Guess it all depends on how "secure" is "secure".
Security wise, Firefox and Chrome based browsers are pretty much similar (extensions taken into consideration of course). Apparently 64bit Chrome version is more secure than 32bit version.

Btw, Yandex is fast to load since it has a "preloader" set to work by default (just noticed that).

[Melita-s]

"Using Google Repos"- is this by any official agreement or collaboration Yandex has with Google?

[danielson]

I don't think there's any special "entente" between Yandex and Google.
If the basic codes remain unchanged, i don't see why any Chrome based browser should have incompatibility issues with Google Chrome's extensions.
I see something this as akin to Cyberfox, Waterfox (and once upon a time, Palemoon too) who use Mozilla Firefox extensions.

[Melita-s]

I have always used only Firefox and avoided anything to do with Google because of their privacy violations. Never even considered using Google Chrome. After following this thread, I got interested in Yandex, hence the above questions. I'll be away for the next 5 to 6 months. Hope to come back here after that and perhaps try out Yandex. Thank you for clarifying things.

[danielson]

Safe trip Melita!
Who knows, by the time you come back, we might have a revamped Firefox and perhaps even a new Opera browser for you to try out!

[Melita-s]

Thank you for the good wishes danielson This is my annual trip to Asia and the Far East. Opera also has made me curious recently. I am sure there will be something exciting here when I come back.

Kind regards

[deya]

Updated to 16.3.0.6919 beta. I think you must be using the Final, danielson.

I've emailed them about the changelogs and they referred me to the Yandex Club blog, which is in Russian language so not much help for here.

But, if you type this - browser://version - into Yandex you'll see all the info for the browser.

More info can be found here - browser://chrome-urls -

Regarding privacy etc, this is the help section for the new style browser; https://yandex.com/support/newbrowser/

Click on the various sections, privacy, security and so on. That should explain what you need to know about the browser and all its various features and functions.

If you want to explore more and make alterations then use flags, here;
browser://flags

You can install any Chrome extension from the Chrome Store if you want to use more than the pre-installed extensions. Also, by using this URL; - browser://extensions - you can enable developer mode, which allows you to drag and drop extension files from the Opera extensions page, if you want to.

I've emailed them several times with queries - they always reply, and in English. If you do decide to use Yandex then I would suggest you enable the auto translation, it's very good, and then you can read their blog posts regarding the browser on the Club site. It translates user comments so you can learn quite a lot from there - same as you can learn a lot from user comments on the Opera Team blog, or Vivaldi etc.

To anyone thinking of trying it, you have to remember that in the western world you could probably class it as a niche browser, with not that many users. And that Yandex communicate mainly in their own language - Russian. All that being said, the browser is international and installs in various languages so you'll have no problems using it.

Yandex are a large company, the Russian equivalent to Google. This browser is their version of Chrome/Blink, with the modified UI and various other differences to Chrome.

It's different, it may or may not suit your needs. But it is a good browser.