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For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

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Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#231

Post by chrizel »

dwaite wrote: post #98
chrizel wrote: post #57

Speaking about Safari bugs I got concerned with lately: you cannot use Content-Security-Policy if you use web sockets with Safari: https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=201591 I don’t understand why this doesn’t get more attention. It is just infuriating if you can’t use a security feature, just because some browser doesn’t follow the specs correctly. Oh well, time repeats itself just like with IE. And just for a m…

you cannot use connect-src self. You can use CSP just fine if you are more explicit.

Checked it again. You are right about this - if I define it as 'connect-src 'self' wss://' it works - not without the 'wss://', which I tried last week. Thanks for the nudge. At least we have a workaround.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#232

Post by jsnell »

simondotau wrote: post #215
afavour wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re talking as if it’s an either/or situation. For a company the size of Apple it definitely isn’t. They could fix long-standing bugs, implement web standards others have had for years and improve security, privacy and battery life. They just don’t.

I don't agree. Microsoft seriously tried with Edge, but the pace of change set by Chrome was too much for them. The only group even close to keeping pace with Google is Mozilla—and their market share numbers are starting to look concerning. Given the current trajectory, we can't place long term hopes in Mozilla. If neither Microsoft nor Apple can keep up, and the Hacker News crowd thinks that's okay, we might as well…

Apple chooses not to keep up. They obviously would have the resources and technical competence to do it if they wanted to.

But cui bono? Apple benefits directly from crippling the web since it protects their App Store monopoly, they happen to have the perfect means of crippling the web by ensuring there will be no browser competition on iOS, and it is the area where theyre shipping their worst software. It is hard to believe that it is a coincidence rather than a cynical corporate optimization game.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#234

Post by sgt »

I think PWA is a good concept and interesting, but I don't really use them myself. I also noticed that very few people use PWA's - especially in cases where you have to pay for the apps, which makes me think that developers like them because they are cool, but because they make business sense.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#235

Post by wickedsickeune »

andrewmcwatters wrote: post #106
roca wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of sites use WebRTC for video and audio calls. Google Meet, Discord, Slack for example. On desktop it's far more secure to use those in-browser than via desktop apps.

Yeah, and those all suck up my RAM. Color me nonplussed that WebKit doesn't follow in Chromium's footsteps.

Discord in particular, is an example of Electron done right. It's super performant and low impact on resources. MS Teams, made by a vastly richer company, is an example of the opposite.

It's not Electron that's eating your RAM.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#236

Post by kristiandupont »

tarsinge wrote: post #202
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The analogy is simple: back in the day devs got sick of IE because it was the one thing holding them back. You can make a site, easily, that looked beautiful on all the other major browsers, but because IE was outdated when it came to standards support, you had to basically spent all your time fighting with it. Safari serves that role today. There are tons of things I'd love to do but can't because they're not suppor…

Safari is not holding back, Safari is just not implementing Google’s PWA (because it doesn’t really make sense on Apple devices where it would be far inferior to native). You can make a beautiful site in Safari and it will work everywhere (I do professionally). Chrome is the new IE (2001 era, when it was cutting edge and pushing proprietary technology) except ActiveX is PWA.

>it doesn’t really make sense on Apple devices where it would be far inferior to native

Yeah, I get that it doesn't make sense for Apple, business wise -- which is why they are not doing it. But it sure would make sense to developers.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#237

Post by phist_mcgee »

rubyn00bie wrote: post #18

> Because IE was seriously outdated, lacking support for cutting-edge web APIs and technologies enabling the modern websites and web apps we use today. This is just false, or at best only half of the story to make a false equivalence. IE was cutting edge until Firefox. The biggest problem with IE was all the insanely weird shit it did, not missing features. It would “fix” missing tags, that would then be broken on ev…

Anyone remember mobile safari's CSS 100vh 'feature'?

https://medium.com/rbi-tech/safaris-100vh-problem-3412e6f137...

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#238

Post by bobmaxup »

mrtksn wrote: post #195
leppr wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way?

I see you are new here, would you like to receive notifications from us? You need to decide on it before even looking at out offerings. NO Okay, what about signing up to our newsletter? NO Okay, we will track you now all over the internet but if you like you can manage that. JUST GO AWAY Okay, btw to see the rest of the article or any of the pictures you need to create an account first. --- Web technologist are cluel…

You could just disable the notifications? You can do this in pretty much any browser.

https://support.apple.com/guide/safari/customize-website-not...

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#239

Post by tannhaeuser »

afavour wrote: post #34
jolux wrote: post #22

Apple has its own opinions about what web standards it should implement. It’s as simple as that. Google has been extremely successful in convincing developers that browsers that don’t behave like Chrome are behaving wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I wish Safari had more features, fewer bugs, and an evergreen release cycle. It’s clear Apple do not see themselves as competing with Chrome, largely because of iOS, and I do wa…

You’re talking as if the W3C or even Mozilla don’t exist. This isn’t an Apple vs Google thing. This is an Apple vs web standards thing. That’s why Safari is outdated for developers.

W3C hasn't been involved in HTML "standards" for over ten years now (they're hosting the CSS WG, though).

Don't get me wrong. I think WHATWG (Domenic et al, and Hixie before) worked very hard to bring HTML forward. And the idea to have a loose workshop of "browser vendors" agree on how to evolve browsers might've looked like a good one at the time. But is nevertheless not what standards are about, especially when it drives "browser vendors" out of business or out of producing browsers alltogether (such as Opera, Hixie's original employer, and even Microsoft).

Also, Mozilla lending credibility to such an effort hasn't helped Mozilla either when Firefox has fallen from its position as dominant and innovative browser to low 1-figure usage.

At a certain point years ago, work done on "web standards" has become a Google stealth ops to own the Web even more than they already do. As it stands, WHATWG will be remembered as the ones to have killed the Web, and oddly enough, Apple as the last ones standing in opposition to a web owned by Google. Certainly not webdevs caring about fscking PWAs and push notifications that absolutely nobody wants.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#240

Post by coldtea »

onion2k wrote: post #191
coldtea wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Clearly millions of people do use it, so you aren't refuting the point in any way. Are forced to use it. And millions more would be forced to use it if Safari handed it on a plate as well...

The overwhelming majority don't know, or really care, that they're using it. People don't care about tech. They care about what they see. User complaints will never be "WebRTC is bad!". They'll be things like "Google Meet kills my phone battery!", or "Teams doesn't work on my iPhone!". The solution to those complaints is usually to make the underlying tech better rather than chuck it out entirely and use something el…

>The overwhelming majority don't know, or really care, that they're using it.

Which is why as devs we have a responsibility to save them from bad tech.

That said: "PWA: because people don't care about tech" would be an apt marketing slogan.

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