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Show HN: We launched a new web browser

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Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#171

Post by ahtihn »

_Algernon_ wrote: post #53
quickthrower2 wrote: post #34

I have a question about blockchain DNS's. This might be the time to ask! There is a centralization aspect in any DNS, blockchain or otherwise in that, literally to be useful, there needs to be consensus about which chain operators own which .{name} extensions for a given name. Which makes financial incentive for say an investor to 'bribe' browsers into using their DNS, which then charges money to end users, which er.…

If you are going to use an immemorable hash instead of a memorable name, why not use IP directly?

Because you don't necessarily own your IP, usually it's owned by your hosting provider.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#172

Post by ahtihn »

mdoms wrote: post #67
webmaven wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is probably a decent case to be made for having an indirection layer above IP addresses, even if they are as meaningless and unmemorizable as a hash: for portability (IP addresses are tied to the host infra provider), load balancing, etc.

We already have that.

Do we? Where can I buy an IP address? Do all hosting providers support assigning an arbitrary IP address to a website?

Let's say I have a hosted wordpress blog with a custom domain. How do I get a static IP for it?

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#173

Post by everfree »

jagger27 wrote: post #139
everfree wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do blockchain-based name systems (or ENS specifically) make you "gag and recoil?"

Proof of stake for one, and the cult it’s built on. Shouldn’t need to be said.

I think it does need to be said.

Nobody can engage with your opinions if you don't express them.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#174

Post by gwbas1c »

mike_hearn wrote: post #162
gwbas1c wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the ship has sailed and we won't have a new browser from scratch any time soon. I think the big mistake is that we let the HTML spec get so complicated that it's essentially become Google's platform. Although it's technically open, it certainly looks and smells like a monopoly. How do we fix it? Maybe someone could make alternate rendering engines that use Canvas and WASM?

This is a topic dear to my heart. Actually, I'm working on a first-step project to help address this very issue. It's worth reflecting on a few important points. 1. "We" didn't "let" HTML5 become anything. HTML5 reflects whatever browser makers choose to ship, which is why it's un-versioned. The attempt at an industry wide consensus building effort around what HTML should be failed (W3C), largely because it spent mos…

> To do (2) it really helps to have a good, easy to use deployment technology.

That's why I suggested "Canvas and WASM." It's very trivial to get a "Canvas and WASM" program running in the browser. All you need to do is plan the API inside of WASM very carefully, because...

> That means to make a competitor to HTML5 you need to go outside the browser and build new kinds of browser and document/app technology.

... the next step is to remove the HTML & Javascript adaptors, and "build new kinds of browser"s that are compatible with the WASM API in the "Canvas and WASM" hack!

In this case, the newer browser would probably perform much better than the "Canvas and WASM" hack. :)

Edit: If you read this and want to talk further, my profile has a link to my web page. You can email me or track me down on LinkedIn.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#176

Post by daenz »

mkmk3 wrote: post #111
daenz wrote: post #93

Congrats on your accomplishment! However, I will never use it because a browser is one of those really important information gateways that I want to be very sure is not compromised.

Your strong wording is interesting here, and I'm curious about what this is implying about how you approach security. The implication here is "not compromised by independent actors that wouldn't already be capable", right? You're delegating trust to closed source megacorp products or open-but-insanely-complex megacorp dependents (firefox/chromium babies?), all of which will naturally create a strong incentive to find…

For me to consider using it, the company would need to have millions of users, a large team of highly credentialed security engineers working on ensuring it is not vulnerable, and 6-figure bug bounties. If your unproven company can't be on the hook for $250,000 bug, why should anyone trust it with their banking info?

Basically there are not enough signals here for me to believe they are life-or-death serious about it. I know it sounds dramatic, but people's finances, careers, lives, etc can be destroyed by mishandling the information that flows through the browser. They need to take it that seriously, and signal that to everyone.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#177

Post by Fnoord »

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #135
mariusor wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hahaha, I don't think a project as monumental as a browser deserves such dismissiveness. Let's not forget that Mozilla's full rust browser has not achieved (and never will) feature parity with safari or chrome either, and they invested far more man power and time into it. The lone effort of a handful of developers that got equally far is worthy of a mention as a "new browser" even if it's not fit for human consumptio…

Yeah I remember the first Mozilla builds in the early 2000s. They were awful. Everything crashed constantly. It was such a memory hog. fast forward twenty years and I use it on a daily basis, and I'm so happy I'm not forced to use Chrome (not to mention some abominations from the past like IE with ActiveX - and at some point such setups were mandatory in order to access some services).

Ah yes, the Mozilla Milestones of what came to be known as SeaMonkey. If the competition was flawless I'd agree. However, Netscape and MSIE also crashed constantly. Opera might've been the most stable, also in the sense it was the first to have proper session management and recovery (plus it had unique features like MDI long before tabs were a thing). It took ages till Firefox once again had certain features Netscape used to have (like sharing profile over network which Netscape could with LDAP). But such was abstracted on filesystem level in the Microsoft world. An OS or browser needs a reasonable unique selling point, standards compatibility, and stability and security. Feature-wise one can slack, as long as these aspects are strong enough.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#178

Post by Fnoord »

jefftk wrote: post #153
iforgotpassword wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> closed-source Aaaand I'm out. Still not over Opera abandoning presto. With open source there's at least a chance it can be continued by someone else.

I would also prefer to see it be open source, but I think in this context that's not the point? My parent was saying that they do not expect to see new browsers from scratch, and this is one. Aside: you could make the argument that both Chrome and Safari are only open source because they were not built from scratch.

If they weren't based on FOSS we would all be running Firefox and Opera now, not MSIE (Firefox was popular on desktop before Chrome existed, as was Opera on mobile). Or perhaps they'd have forked Firefox/Gecko instead, or collaborated the effort with these projects. Safari and Chrome are merely a wheel in the larger ecosystem of Apple and Google, a means to an end.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#179

Post by Gigachad »

vladvasiliu wrote: post #116
Gigachad wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Web browsers are the most complex codebases in existence. Firefox contains more lines of code than Linux. It would require probably 100 developers just to keep up with new features being added. Then going back and catching up on the already existing components is virtually impossible. Mozilla had a project called Servo which aimed at replacing just a small slither of Firefox and the project ran for years with a huge…

> Mozilla had a project called Servo which aimed at replacing just a small slither of Firefox and the project ran for years with a huge monetary investment and eventually was canceled. Haven't some parts of it been integrated in Firefox? The project does still seem to go on, although outside of Mozilla: https://github.com/servo/servo

I think some CSS stuff did get merged. But if you look at the insights tab you can see the project is moving at 3% of its previous rate. Mozilla got rid of the servo team so I assume it’s only hobbiests still working on it.

Re: Show HN: We launched a new web browser

#180

Post by bogomipz »

mike_hearn wrote: post #162
gwbas1c wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the ship has sailed and we won't have a new browser from scratch any time soon. I think the big mistake is that we let the HTML spec get so complicated that it's essentially become Google's platform. Although it's technically open, it certainly looks and smells like a monopoly. How do we fix it? Maybe someone could make alternate rendering engines that use Canvas and WASM?

This is a topic dear to my heart. Actually, I'm working on a first-step project to help address this very issue. It's worth reflecting on a few important points. 1. "We" didn't "let" HTML5 become anything. HTML5 reflects whatever browser makers choose to ship, which is why it's un-versioned. The attempt at an industry wide consensus building effort around what HTML should be failed (W3C), largely because it spent mos…

>"The attempt at an industry wide consensus building effort around what HTML should be failed (W3C), largely because it spent most of its political capital on implementation-independent academic dreams rather than incremental improvements."

Interesting. Can you elaborate on what some of those academic dreams are/were that derailed things? Did they end up in the spec or were they just bikeshedded to death?

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