Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

blog.perrysun.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

321–330 of 623 posts

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#321

Post by easton »

bobmaxup wrote: post #257
mrtksn wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't mean that the website wont ask. Because they have single chance, the API is called after they receive your consent through an HTML dialog that looks similar to the native one.

If you disable them, they are not visible. If a website shows you a modal that looks like a notification consent prompt, I hardly see what that has to do with a browser vendor, which is the subject of this thread.

Because right now, they don't render that modal on Mobile Safari since there's no notification support. If they add notification support, we'll start getting those popups.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#322

Post by xwolfi »

JimDabell wrote: post #219
rimliu wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People complaining about Safari also seem not to know how much it brought when first iPhone was released. Canvas, CSS animations, etc.

No single organisation has done more to advance the mobile web than Apple. Can you think of any? The first iPhone and “desktop class” Mobile Safari was a watershed moment and everybody started using WebKit for their mobile browsers after that point, including non-Apple devices. Look at what the mobile web was like before the release of the iPhone. Then take a look at what it was like the year after, when people had s…

Maybe Blackberry ? It wasnt on html they innovated but I loved mine before the Samsung revolution.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#323

Post by tinus_hn »

tarsinge wrote: post #319
LAC-Tech wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes zero business sense for small-medium companies to make separate android and IOS apps. That's man hours that will be spent on a specific platform and its app store, instead of on improving the core product. PWAs are here to stay.

It absolutely make sense to make a state of the art app on a platform if it's key to the business. Also resources is not the problem, even big companies (like banks) make low cost web apps instead of native ones if they can. I don't see why Apple should facilitate compromised user experiences instead of setting the bar higher.

Also a PWA can’t compete in quality with a proper native app, should a competitor ever build one you’re toast.

The question just revolves around how integral an app is to the business. Online banking probably requires an app. A restaurant that offers online ordering probably does not. A video game requires an app. An online encyclopedia does not.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#324

Post by zenexer »

lucideer wrote: post #255
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…

But that isn't the case. At all. IE wasn't difficult because it was behind the times; it was difficult because it was deliberately different. The 2nd pillar of Microsoft's infamous Embrace, Extend, Extinguish strategy ensured incompatibility, which doubled developer efforts. The idea of IE being purely an "outdated" browser seems to be one perpetuated by young devs reading & misunderstanding old blogposts. The narrat…

> The idea of IE being purely an "outdated" browser seems to be one perpetuated by young devs reading & misunderstanding old blogposts.

That’s certainly not true: it was indeed outdated for much of its life. Yes, through IE6, it did things differently; beyond that point, though, it simply fell behind. It stopped evolving in any meaningful way—with the possible exception of tabs being introduced in IE7–while other browsers continued innovating.

From IE6 through IE11, Internet Explorer wasn’t just doing things differently; it was truly behind. Tasks that could be achieved without JavaScript in other browsers requires JavaScript (or worse) in IE. Eye candy like gradients? Maybe you could get away with some of IE’s custom CSS extensions, but you had to get lucky or change your design.

I may be young by your standards, but I vividly remember developing for IE5 and IE6. I even remember changing my plans for a project when Chrome was announced. IE really isn’t that old.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#325

Post by BoxOfRain »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #153
mrtksn wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that developers are simply angry with Apple for not letting them to fiddle with the latest stuff that Google is experimenting with. Chrome is the new IE but with better manners if you consider the non standard Chrome specific stuff that makes websites to work only in Chrome. Developers hated IE for not being standart, you had to write two versions of your CSS, you had to make your code accommodate the Box m…

> I suspect that developers are simply angry with Apple for not letting them to fiddle with the latest stuff that Google is experimenting with. That is absolute bullshit. Browser push notifications have been out for years on other browsers (INCLUDING desktop Safari), and they are the one thing that Apple is dragging their feet on the most because they know it's the most important thing that prevents a dev from just d…

This is a personal opinion, but I'm actually really glad Apple are dragging their feet on this.

I absolutely despise presumptious software that feels entitled to my attention as and when it chooses. I have my browser set up to wholesale reject all push notifications, I don't let the vast majority of my apps send me push notifications, and any application that feels entitled to pollute my inbox (email already has an awful signal/noise ratio as a communications medium) with useless email alerts gets uninstalled or unsubcribed from immediately. Frankly browser notifications should never have been a thing, it's just another varient of the spamdemic that plagues the modern software landscape. I'll look at your software when I choose, and if the software starts dictating that it gets removed or silenced without exception. I honestly don't understand how most people stay sane with their phones and laptops pinging and flashing away like a pinball machine all day.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#326

Post by leppr »

mrtksn wrote: post #256
whostolemyhat wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you like to be notified about meetings in your calendar? Yes Would you like notifications when someone mentions or DMs you in your work chat? Yes Would you like to know when you get emails? Yes Also only one of the things you mentioned has anything to do with notifications.

We could have had passwordless internet if people behaved nicely. Instead of signing in into Gmail with a password and 2FA code, typing your e-mail address would have been enough to see your e-mails if everyone was honest and never misuse this power.

The nice thing about open standards like web push notifications vs. proprietary apps' arbitrary logic is that the open standard version puts users in control.

The browser is free to refuse every notification request AND make websites believe the notifications have been enabled. Unless smartphone OS vendors are kind enough, you can't do that with app notifications.

It seems you're arguing against the concept of push notifications itself, not whether the native or web app implementation is better.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#328

Post by jeroenhd »

mrtksn wrote: post #214
jeroenhd wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What website requires installation? The ones I use all work perfectly fine just from the web UI with the option to install them?

All websites(with the exception of HN maybe?). Installation doesn't strictly mean putting the website on your home-screen. Whenever you encounter a new website you are required to go through installation process, you can't simply click a link and consume the content anymore. For most websites you need to read and accept the tracking terms and if you are not happy with the default options you need to do custom install…

I wouldn't call that "installation", just "setup". Installation implies some form of (local) persistence.

I avoid setup screens as much as possible. I close many of the websites linked to on HN but I'm not accepting these newsletter popups and neither should anyone else.

Websites will keep doing this for as long as people accept this behaviour. Depriving our browsers from useful features is not a solution, it's merely digging our head into the sand and pretending the real problem, problematic and aggressive marketing and data trade, doesn't exist.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#329

Post by leppr »

easton wrote: post #321
bobmaxup wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you disable them, they are not visible. If a website shows you a modal that looks like a notification consent prompt, I hardly see what that has to do with a browser vendor, which is the subject of this thread.

Because right now, they don't render that modal on Mobile Safari since there's no notification support. If they add notification support, we'll start getting those popups.

You could then use Brave which blocks in-website ads and annoyances even on iOS.

Re: For developers, Safari is crap and outdated

#330

Post by pertymcpert »

collaborative wrote: post #287
peterkelly wrote: post #285

> Progressive web apps are really cool, because they can give you the following capabilities that you would normally expect with a native app: > - Run full-screen (no visible browser UI) > - OS-level notifications and alerts > - Ability to use the app when the device is offline > - Local data storage and retrieval > - Install an app icon on your smartphone’s home screen > - Access to hardware functions such as the ca…

Says who? You are free to not use PWAs. Just let people choose for themselves

Use an Android then.
Post reply on HN