Is there a substitute for Firefox and Multi-Account Containers?

May 16, 2021 2:35 PM

I'm running into an ongoing, random technical issue with my computer. I need to do some troubleshooting. I want to figure out if Firefox and the Multi-Account Container add-on is causing or contributing to the problem. That means trying a new browser to see if the problem persists, but I need to have the same type of functionality.

I need to be able to isolate my work log-ins and websites (including facebook and multiple G-mail-based ones) from my personal ones. I've been a long-time Firefox user, and it's my first choice in browsers. I have Edge on my system. I've been an Opera user in the past. I really, really, really want to avoid putting Chrome on my system.

What can allow me to have multiple G-mail accounts open, will wall off facebook as much as possible (it's evil, and I'd never touch with with a ten-foot pole, except it's part of my work duties) and still be a decent privacy-respecting browser?

posted by sardonyx to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

You can kinda-sorta replicate some of the functionality of multi-account containers with user profiles in Edge and then only using a specific profile for sites that you want to keep isolated to one profile, but you won't really be able to replicate stuff like always opening a specific site in a specific profile. Still, it might be enough for testing.
posted by Aleyn at 3:49 PM on May 16, 2021

Also, I haven't tested this, but I imagine most Chromium-based browsers (e.g. Edge, Vivaldi, Brave, etc) will have this similar sort of user profile feature, if you'd rather use something other than Edge.

Also, also, if you install Firefox Developer Edition, it will use a completely separate profile from your main Firefox installation, so you can try that to see if it's just the add-on causing the issue.
posted by Aleyn at 3:58 PM on May 16, 2021 [1 favorite]

With the caveat that work has upped its game, and I don't need anything other than Firefox any more...I have used Pale Moon in the past for work-related Firefox issues. Not sure if it will do what you need in this case, though. Totally with you on Chrome and Facebook, and if Pale Moon does work for you, you won't need one, and it'll do a good job of stopping the other from being too invasive.
posted by Calvin and the Duplicators at 4:16 PM on May 16, 2021

I’ve recently started using Brave as a browser for this purpose. All the benefits of chrome, but with privacy.
posted by bluloo at 5:45 PM on May 16, 2021

In firefox, if you create a new profile, it should be almost completely independent of the one you use as far as user-installed add-ons, cookies, passwords, etc go. They're all kept in separate directories and don't talk to each other. The exception would be any system-wide modifications to the browser, which you'd probably have had to do explicitly. If you go to about:profiles in the address bar, there's an option to create a new profile and launch it in a new browser.

I'm sure you can convince firefox to start with the profile manager rather than launching the default profile in windows. In linux, command "firefox -p" (optionally with a --no-remote to avoid having other software try to open a page in the open profile) works. I'm not sure what the equivalent is in windows, but it must exist.
posted by eotvos at 5:04 AM on May 17, 2021

I think your best best is to create multiple profiles for Edge. Create one for each container you'd have in Firefox. The downside is you have to swap between them manually, the Firefox container system will choose a container for you automatically based on the URL. Actually Edge does have some automatic profile switching but I've never used it myself and can't comment on how complete a solution it is.

It is also possible to juggle multiple profiles in Chrome.

Brave does not have this feature.
posted by Nelson at 7:44 AM on May 17, 2021

Sorry to waste your time - it's clear my answer above was based on misreading the question.
posted by eotvos at 8:59 AM on May 17, 2021

I was about to suggest Firefox Developer Edition myself.

I know you don't like Chrome, but for the record you can do the same thing with it -- regular Chrome, Chrome Canary, and Chromium all use separate profiles.

(Chromium is also an option for this, it's got all the Google stuff removed so it's just a regular browser)
posted by neckro23 at 10:00 AM on May 17, 2021

Response by poster: Thanks for all the replies. To be honest, I'm not sure if the problem is a problem with Firefox (I really hope not) or the Container add-on, so what I intend to do is to resort to Edge, as it's already on my system, and if I still encounter the same problem, at least I can say to the laptop company "I'm running Microsoft installed software and I'm still having this issue, therefore it's not the software I installed."

The advice for creating multiple profiles in Edge is probably what I need to do, so thanks to Aleyn and Nelson for suggesting that approach.
posted by sardonyx at 9:16 AM on May 18, 2021