Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not convinced that JavaScript is the difficult part. HTML/CSS rendering seems far more challenging.
Servo seemed to have pretty much got rendering working. I'm no expert but I feel like the hundreds of JS apis contribute a lot to the complexity. Just looking at the list here looks like it would take decades for a single person to complete https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API
What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
151–160 of 356 posts
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
So, how should I feel as a blind user who uses Firefox? :)
Happy that I use my time to try to help your disability and make your life easier rather than make sure that a web browser that hardly anyone uses work 100% correctly. Surely, most of the time Firefox will work just fine or at least good enough and by that standard I am sure that a site that has put some focus for it being easier to read with a screen reader is more important?
Maybe so, but another option is that the main functionality of the website tells me to use Chrome in a vary accessible way. :)
Don't take it like I'm trying to be snarky, it was just funny to be in two minorities with contradicting significance for the developer.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
Comparing it with MS-IE is unfair. It was not Mozilla or Firefox, but Chrome and Android broke the hegemony of IE in many countries. Where I lived, bank or government sites were IE-Windows only until Chrome appeared. In countries like Korea it was a total shit show. I understand it is a shame that only 3 engines left and but please it is not even close to what MS did.
I think you're conflating two different things. One thing is Google's decisions when it comes to standards, another one is websites' decision on which browsers to support. Your conclusion that "websites support more than one browser therefore Google's behavior is not that bad" doesn't follow, even if those things are somewhat correlated in the long run. It's perfectly possible for Google to be engaging in similar beh…
Yet you are only hypothesizing. MS-IE broke standards and stagnate deliberately, I have yet to see such a deliberate behavior from Google. There are hiccups and f*-ups but it is nothing compares to MS.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Open source without the option for an alternate development organisation to drive or steer development direction means vey little. Open source is that option. The economics of starting from scratch vs starting from Chromium's latest commit are fundamentally different. I'm not saying that it's easy, only that it is not remotely comparable to the IE situation.
> The economics of starting from scratch vs starting from Chromium's latest commit are fundamentally different. I don’t think they are. That fork then immediately finds itself in the same position as other engines, where now the fork is going to need to keep up with whatever Google is adding to Chromium. You might then think, “Then the fork can just pull from upstream.” Okay, so then: a) Your fork probably isn’t diff…
The fact that both Brave and Vivaldi were able to disable Google's FlOC within a very short period of time is evidence against both (a) and (b) in my view.
Even more so the fact that Brave was able to build an alternative ad network on top of Chromium.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The only reason they disallow Chromium and Mozilla is they want their users locked into their environment and they want to leverage that substantial locked-in user base to dictate terms That's one reason, but not the only reason. Security is another big one in that the WebKit process is running with privileges that Apple does not want to award to any other app process on the platform, much less a third-party one. T…
"Security is another big one in that the WebKit process is running with privileges that Apple does not want to award to any other app process on the platform, much less a third-party one." If they really cared about security then they could subject their browser to an independent security audit, and require the same audit be passed for any other browser that's allowed on their platform. Why don't they do this?
> Why don't they do this?
Because the idea that all you need to do to ensure software is secure is hire an expensive consultant is ridiculous.
Especially with a web browser which are highly complex pieces of software.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#156We don't have to speculate, we've been through this already during the IE4 to IE6 era. Microsoft just did whatever they wanted with the web "platform", and so will Google. In Microsoft's case what they wanted was nothing . They weren't a web business, saw it as a threat to their platform leverage, and so just left it abandoned and stagnant for years. Google is simultaneously better and worse: they won't leave it stag…
You fail to mention that IE was closed source while Chromium is open source. That's a completely different situation. We already have a number of Chromium based browsers that go against some of Google's most fundamental interests (e.g Brave).
That's exactly where F/OSS has failed us big time. Just because it's "open source" doesn't mean browsers have to aggregate to whole operating systems. There was once this idea, you know, of exchanging documents and links via TCP/IP, and it was good. Then came platforms and browser wars, and the piece of crap that is JS and CSS along with them. In the end our only way out of this is to start over with a decentralized/p2p medium for document exchange. But F/OSS don't seem to get it that we need open standards not necessarily open implementations.
The same thing has happened to Linux which was ok as long as it was chasing commercial Unix, spawning POSIX even; but look what happened with systemd, wayland, snaps/flatpacks, Docker, k8s, and all the other erratic developments - all the while not a single end-user app was created in the last decade.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chromium is open source. You're confusing Chromium with Chrome.
It's like confusing "open-source" Android, AOSP and Play Services: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/07/googles-iron-grip-on... >While Android is open, it's more of a "look but don't touch" kind of open. You're allowed to contribute to Android and allowed to use it for little hobbies, but in nearly every area, the deck is stacked against anyone trying to use Android without Google's blessing. The second you try to…
The difference is, AOSP on its own is unusable, but Chromium Is.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#158It will look the same, to me. Chrome might be the last Google app I use, if I ever try to quit them all.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The economics of starting from scratch vs starting from Chromium's latest commit are fundamentally different. I don’t think they are. That fork then immediately finds itself in the same position as other engines, where now the fork is going to need to keep up with whatever Google is adding to Chromium. You might then think, “Then the fork can just pull from upstream.” Okay, so then: a) Your fork probably isn’t diff…
The fact that both Brave and Vivaldi were able to disable Google's FlOC within a very short period of time is evidence against both (a) and (b) in my view. Even more so the fact that Brave was able to build an alternative ad network on top of Chromium.
Brave and Vivaldi fall into the “don’t matter” category.
Call me when a Chromium fork displaces Chromium.
Re: What will a Chromium-only Web look like?
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
Luckily they don't :) In my opinion Chromium/Chrome is the new IE and not Safari
I'm sorry - but this is just not a realistic take. Call me when I can install Safari on linux (or any platform other than macOS/iOS). Until then - the ugly truth is that Apple intentionally underfunds and underdevelops the browser because they see it as a fundamental risk to their control and revenue from the App store. It's there because "they have to have a browser" not because they're doing anything novel or cleve…
KDE's Konqueror is a webkit browser, and there are others. Safari is not available on Linux, but it doesn't need to be.
I disagree that Apple is underinvesting: their slower, more deliberate pace can be an advantage: you can see the pitfalls of implementations in other browsers. I am not disagreeing that Apple has had their own share of bugs, though.