maintainer-feedback requested: [Bug 255344] www/firefox: enable HW_COMPOSITING by default

[bugzilla-noreply at freebsd.org]

Bugzilla Automation <bugzilla at FreeBSD.org> has asked freebsd-gecko (Nobody)
<gecko at FreeBSD.org> for maintainer-feedback:
Bug 255344: www/firefox: enable HW_COMPOSITING by default
https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=255344



--- Description ---
Hello,

I've recently updated my PC and added a dGPU nVidia GT710. Up until now I was
using the built-in graphics in my AMD processor. I don't remember having any
issues. However, after switching to nVidia and downloaded nvidia-drivers
package I started noticing tearing/skipping artifacts when scrolling in
Firefox. Since I'm new to nvidia tools and configurations, I've spent several
days trying to find what is causing the tearing problem while mainly suspecting
the driver or KDE. At some point I've noticed that this tearing problem is
happening only in Firefox, and resizing/moving windows around the screen was
smooth. So, apparently the problem was neither in the driver nor KDE, but in
Firefox. I've checked what is written in about:support and noticed the
following:

HW_COMPOSITING: available by default, blocked by env: Acceleration blocked by
platform

After forcing the hw compositing with `layers.acceleration.force-enabled=True`
in about:config scrolling became silky smooth. 

So, is there a reason for disabling hardware compositing by default? In my
opinion, with the state of nvidia and amd drivers currently, most of the users
would expect these relatively basic accelerations to be enabled by default. If
they have problems with something, just then should they try to disable the
problematic feature. If there are serious problems, then at least a
post-installation message pointing the user to enable acceleration will be very
beneficial in both performance and tearing-free experience.