Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive • Hacker News Board

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#171

Post by jasonkostempski » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 1:47 PM UTC

greggman wrote: post #156

Santosh83 wrote: post #2

A reminder that, as article points out, a healthy web needs multiple independent client implementations and we're already down to less than a handful major ones. Ideally they should hold equivalent usage share which implies that as currently usage is heavily tilted towards Google Chrome, the best way in which you can help Mozilla is to use their browser and get your friends and family to use it too, unless there's a…

I'm curious, why does the web need multiple independent client implementations? Note I'm not trolling, I'm seriously asking the question. I think it's assumed to be true but not necessarily true. I'm probably wrong. As a counter example AFAIK there is no python standard that lots of teams make competing implementations. There is basically one python and a few incomplete copies but those copies have little to no say i…

As soon as the binaries start betraying their user, there needs to be an alternative. Open source goes a long way to prevent the people in defacto control from adding things like requiring unnecessary accounts, naggers, ads, telemetry, backdoors, excessive bloat, etc. But sometimes the maintainers can't be reasoned with beyond a tolerable point and a lot of software and people already rely on it heavily. If the thing is a standard then someone needs to fork (if open source with a proper license) or reimplement. If it's a closed, proprietary foundational piece of software (OS, driver, word processor, compiler, browser) then someone needs to create an alternative from scratch. Those alternatives may very well start betraying the user at some point in which case, goto 10. e.g. We don't need a competing Linux because Linus is currently on our side.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#172

Post by dev_tty01 » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 1:49 PM UTC

robin_reala wrote: post #105

gsnedders wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, arguably started at DigitalStyle.

Can you expand? I thought I had a good grasp of Mozilla’s history but this is the first time I’ve heard of them.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DigitalStyle

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#173

Post by madeofpalk » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 1:51 PM UTC

amelius wrote: post #163

madeofpalk wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused what the move should be then? People want more features and capabilities from the products they use, websites included. What im reading here is a preference for web technologies to be frozen as they were since 2000.

That's a difficult question for which there are probably many answers, so here's my attempt at it. One first insight: we don't need the "semantic web" because Machine Learning can recover semantics. (This is also how Google's webcrawler views the web, so why not apply it to browsers too? People mix up semantics and formatting too often for the "semantic web" to be a useful concept). Another thing to realize is that o…

> Personally, I long for a world where formatting a document or showing a video on a computer screen is not considered "high tech". And this might be the way towards it.

Okay so here's the thing. Web pages do a lot more than just 'formatting a document' or showing a video. Any serious talk about the web platform has to acknowledge the that that it's an 'application platform' that is more than just an .rtf file.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#174

Post by verroq » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:01 PM UTC

greggman wrote: post #156

Santosh83 wrote: post #2

A reminder that, as article points out, a healthy web needs multiple independent client implementations and we're already down to less than a handful major ones. Ideally they should hold equivalent usage share which implies that as currently usage is heavily tilted towards Google Chrome, the best way in which you can help Mozilla is to use their browser and get your friends and family to use it too, unless there's a…

I'm curious, why does the web need multiple independent client implementations? Note I'm not trolling, I'm seriously asking the question. I think it's assumed to be true but not necessarily true. I'm probably wrong. As a counter example AFAIK there is no python standard that lots of teams make competing implementations. There is basically one python and a few incomplete copies but those copies have little to no say i…

I don’t think there is a need, however market forces will ensure that competition exists. If the incumbent starts to betray the user alternatives will automatically arise.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#175

Post by NetOpWibby » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:16 PM UTC

I wrote my own browser a few years back and it was quite challenging/fun trying to figure out how to do basic browser things. You can check it out here: https://paulwebb.software/SciLab/Aries

Since then, I’ve been using Opera, then Vivaldi, and now Firefox, taking notes of how certain things are done. Lately, I’ve been thinking about using Servo as my base insead of Electron and doing a whole rewrite.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#176

Post by scrollaway » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:21 PM UTC

jstewartmobile wrote: post #133

scrollaway wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> From the tone of the replies, kicked off by a guy in the analytics industry who went so far as to google me for a comment, Upton Sinclair is screaming from the grave Good lord, get a hold of yourself. I work in the gaming industry (easy mistake to make, right?) and you seem to have read "hints" as "hits" and made up a whole scenario from that... I didn't Google you (nor would I care to), I just called out a complet…

You butchered my original comment to a point where I could only assume malice. As for "hints", my bad. In 2017 they're going back to the 800lb gorilla of search and browsers for the bulk of their operating revenue, and I'm supposed to just accept that as "independence" and back off? There is a disconnect here that I'm obviously not going to bridge, so fine, they're independent! Go write their non-profit-for-profit ch…

The bulk of Mozilla's revenue through 2019 is most likely going to come from Verizon.

https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/14/mozilla-terminates-its-dea...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-21/verizon-i...

I'm not aware of a renewal of the Google financial partnership. Feel free to correct me if you find information that goes beyond 2011. There certainly could be a new deal with Google there but Mozilla is not in the negociating position it once was, so there just as well could not; and seeing as I'm finding zero info about it, I'm leaning towards "there isn't".

But hey, I guess if they don't make a billion dollars a year through donations and take in zero outside revenue, they're not independent.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#177

Post by TheAceOfHearts » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:27 PM UTC

rlv-dan wrote: post #40

This begs the question: Is it healthy that one of the most important technologies today (web) is also very complicated (=expensive) and thus effectively limiting number of players.

I'd agree that the browser spec is incredibly complex, but a large part of it is due to not wanting to break compatibility with the web. Many of the problems tackled by the browser are just complicated, and there's no shortcuts.

If we look at other technologies, the same thing happens there. How expensive would it be to write a new OS from scratch? A new C++ compiler? A new UI toolkit? These technologies are all incredibly complex.

Heck, consider how many projects are just frontends for LLVM. The LLVM IR claims to be well documented [0], but AFAIK it lacks a formal spec as well as multiple independent implementations.

[0] http://llvm.org/docs/LangRef.html

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#178

Post by extra88 » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:28 PM UTC

yipbun wrote: post #142

sjellis wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The situation with Microsoft Edge is strange. Not only is Microsoft Edge not available for older versions of Windows, it is not supported on Windows 10 IoT Enterprise, Windows 10 LTSB, or, most importantly, Windows Server editions. Virtual desktop hosting (VDI/terminal servers) has to be based on Windows Server (licensing requirement). This means that Edge can't actually be the only supported Microsoft browser for Wi…

This is pure speculation. Maybe they're doing something shady with edge that would get them in more trouble(or found out) if they put in enterprise systems, but they see the regular consumer market as easy targets who can't defend themselves. That might explain why they're pushing edge so hard.

IoT Enterprise and LTSB are for embedded systems, they lack many of desktop applications and features (like Cortana) found in "regular" Windows. Windows 10 Enterprise is the desktop version, it has everything in Pro, and then some. There's nothing "shady" about Edge.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsforbusiness/compare

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#179

Post by nayuki » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:28 PM UTC

xfer wrote: post #167

greggman wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious, why does the web need multiple independent client implementations? Note I'm not trolling, I'm seriously asking the question. I think it's assumed to be true but not necessarily true. I'm probably wrong. As a counter example AFAIK there is no python standard that lots of teams make competing implementations. There is basically one python and a few incomplete copies but those copies have little to no say i…

Python has multiple implementations like numpy and others that i am not familiar with. Python not having a clear spec is a disadvantage, although it is pretty stable language. C++ has standards and all compilers implement them and people stick to standards, no idea what you are talking about when you say "embraces and extends with optional non-standard features". Linux implements the user interface standard called Po…

Python has multiple implementations such as CPython, Cython, PyPy, IronPython, Jython. However, because the de facto CPython has no spec, every other Python implementation has behavioral differences from CPython and there is no real way to resolve all the differences without heavy burdens.

Re: Maintaining an Independent Browser Is Expensive

#180

Post by quickben » Sun, Dec 03, 2017, 2:28 PM UTC

greggman wrote: post #156

Santosh83 wrote: post #2

A reminder that, as article points out, a healthy web needs multiple independent client implementations and we're already down to less than a handful major ones. Ideally they should hold equivalent usage share which implies that as currently usage is heavily tilted towards Google Chrome, the best way in which you can help Mozilla is to use their browser and get your friends and family to use it too, unless there's a…

I'm curious, why does the web need multiple independent client implementations? Note I'm not trolling, I'm seriously asking the question. I think it's assumed to be true but not necessarily true. I'm probably wrong. As a counter example AFAIK there is no python standard that lots of teams make competing implementations. There is basically one python and a few incomplete copies but those copies have little to no say i…

Let me answer your first question with few examples:

When Chrome started taking off in 2010, they introduced unique ID per browser user that's sent to their servers. This has nothing to do with the web standards, but it's non optional added feature.

When gmail took off in Canada, Gmail started requesting an actual phone number, to open an email account.

The above are examples when company starts having advantage.

When a company starts having monopolies, expect stuff like mandatory signons just to browse and such.

In China for example, you must register with RL creds if you want to post for the masses online.

TLDR: monocultures are bad, monopolies are bad.