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Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

blog.servo.org

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Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#61

Post by Manishearth »

leeoniya wrote: post #59
Manishearth wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the amount of users you can win back from Chrome with a Servo browser is much larger than any VR audience you can hope to gain in the near future. A Servo browser product is not possible in the near future. That is very much a far future thing. Web compatibility is hard . Servo has a lot more potential in platforms where you don't need to support the _entire_ set of browser features -- like as an electron r…

> A Servo browser product is not possible in the near future. That is very much a far future thing. and an impossibly far future if the Servo team is now refocused on VR, no? how likely is it that these hard problems will be solved by fewer engineer-hours? perhaps there's some external backer willing to bankroll VR and Servo is just an easy expense to curtail.

You still need webcompat for VR stuff.

Focusing on VR means that we may not be working on some kinds of webcompat things (the standard example is "IE6 table layout quirks") but there's plenty of webcompat work that needs to be done otherwise.

Yes, not everyone will be working on webcompat, but this has never been the case anyway.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#62

Post by sitkack »

Manishearth wrote: post #57
leeoniya wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Filling that list out is not a higher priority for the Mozilla staff over getting the stuff done we need to experiment with delivering the web on VR & AR devices. This is extremely disappointing. I think the amount of users you can win back from Chrome with a Servo browser is much larger than any VR audience you can hope to gain in the near future. I simply don't understand how these things cannot be done in parall…

> I think the amount of users you can win back from Chrome with a Servo browser is much larger than any VR audience you can hope to gain in the near future. A Servo browser product is not possible in the near future. That is very much a far future thing. Web compatibility is hard . Servo has a lot more potential in platforms where you don't need to support the _entire_ set of browser features -- like as an electron r…

So it is about team velocity vs standards compliance? I know the Servo team isn't large enough to make a whole new browser from scratch.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#63

Post by Manishearth »

sitkack wrote: post #62
Manishearth wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the amount of users you can win back from Chrome with a Servo browser is much larger than any VR audience you can hope to gain in the near future. A Servo browser product is not possible in the near future. That is very much a far future thing. Web compatibility is hard . Servo has a lot more potential in platforms where you don't need to support the _entire_ set of browser features -- like as an electron r…

So it is about team velocity vs standards compliance? I know the Servo team isn't large enough to make a whole new browser from scratch.

I'm not sure what you mean by team velocity.

We're still working on standards compliance, but we may focus more on the bits that are actually useful within VR.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#64

Post by dblohm7 »

Eridrus wrote: post #43
larsberg wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Servo will continue to be a next-generation browser engine and a place where we'll be doing a lot of experimentation on new standards and implementation techniques. I'm sure the community will also continue to use it for all sorts of cool things! Joining up with the mixed reality team is more about how the Mozilla staff working on Servo will be focusing their time and some of the desire we have for things we want to…

I wish everyone on the Servo project the best of luck, and hope this new project will be a success, but I can't help but agree with other commenters who see this as a move away from something that could have provided a huge fundamental advantage to Firefox/Mozilla to something less impactful. This feels like the end of the Servo project in all but name.

It already has provided a huge advantage via components that are already shipping (Stylo) and soon to be shipped (WebRender) in Firefox.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#65

Post by leeoniya »

Manishearth wrote: post #61
leeoniya wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A Servo browser product is not possible in the near future. That is very much a far future thing. and an impossibly far future if the Servo team is now refocused on VR, no? how likely is it that these hard problems will be solved by fewer engineer-hours? perhaps there's some external backer willing to bankroll VR and Servo is just an easy expense to curtail.

You still need webcompat for VR stuff. Focusing on VR means that we may not be working on some kinds of webcompat things (the standard example is "IE6 table layout quirks") but there's plenty of webcompat work that needs to be done otherwise. Yes, not everyone will be working on webcompat, but this has never been the case anyway.

> (the standard example is "IE6 table layout quirks")

if a new browser in 2019 could not properly render an archived 1996 Geocities webpage at time of launch, i don't think many users would care or even notice. there are almost certainly legacy bugs in Firefox that have been open for over a decade with little activity and yet it's in production.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#66

Post by Manishearth »

leeoniya wrote: post #65
Manishearth wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You still need webcompat for VR stuff. Focusing on VR means that we may not be working on some kinds of webcompat things (the standard example is "IE6 table layout quirks") but there's plenty of webcompat work that needs to be done otherwise. Yes, not everyone will be working on webcompat, but this has never been the case anyway.

> (the standard example is "IE6 table layout quirks") if a new browser in 2019 could not properly render an archived 1996 Geocities webpage at time of launch, i don't think many users would care or even notice. there are almost certainly legacy bugs in Firefox that have been open for over a decade with little activity and yet it's in production.

It's not just old sites that depend on these quirks.

Seriously, web compat is very tricky.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#67

Post by samastur »

andybak wrote: post #28
vvanders wrote: post #5

> Coming in to 2018, we see virtual and augmented reality devices transitioning from something just for hardcore gamers and enterprises into broad consumer adoption. Every time I see phrases like this I just cringe. As someone who spent a ton of time in the gamedev/3D UI space I've yet to see anything about VR that points to be being successful in anything other than small markets. I think there are some amazing appl…

Forget "useful" for a moment. How does good VR make you feel? Have you not had any "wow" moments? I'm constantly surprised how blown away people are when they try (real) VR for the first time. That's what makes me optimistic about it as a medium.

I was blown away by 3D movies too at first and now don't ever try to see one.

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#68

Post by ericflo »

Sylos wrote: post #51
ericflo wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty cool - so you can just render DRMed video to a texture and record that texture to get around the new DRM stuff?

You can also set up a camera in front of your monitor and just record the whole thing. DRM has never been functional. Best it can do, is deflect the average user from just quickly sending it to his friend. But anyone with any motivation can easily get around it.

I'm honestly really glad to hear this

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#69

Post by ericflo »

falcor84 wrote: post #38
ericflo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone lost 70lbs playing my VR game. I think fitness is a huge use case for this stuff.

What game? {{citation needed}}

Soundboxing (https://twitter.com/jobjstauffer/status/904229973430591489?s...)

Re: Mozilla’s Servo Team Joining Mixed Reality

#70

Post by RaleyField »

Sylos wrote: post #55
RaleyField wrote: post #8

Am I the only one thinking VR for consumers won't happen for the same reason 3D television didn't happen 5(?) years ago? It's too clumsy. If you aren't gonna walk with it then it's 360 display that makes you vomit, and if you are gonna walk with it not every consumer has huge empty room where that's feasible. Most of us have couch or desk at home where we consume media, not empty warehouse. I predict whatever Mozilla…

Servo is actually not typically viewed as realistically completable. Even Firefox, which is being developed full-pelt, is behind on web standards (like any other browser is). So, for Servo to catch up to the current state of Firefox and to then also keep pace with new web standards, it would have to be developed much quicker than Firefox is being developed. So, that would require more than double the development capa…

It's helluva more completable then any VR project Mozilla is going to try. It will be another Firefox phone project.

And you don't have to repeat 20 years of Firefox to complete Firefox, a lot of it were dead-ends like XUL (themed GTK would do), a lot of it were non-essential features like Pocket and a lot of it were rewrites and mistakes that they won't have to repeat and like you said being written in Rust should speed things along. Lastly, I don't care if Servo is released standalone or if Firefox gets replaced by Servo like the ship of Theseus, all I care about is browser that is less explodable, otherwise I'll continue on Chrome.

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