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Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

complang.tuwien.ac.at

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Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#181

Post by myfonj »

forgotmypw17 wrote: post #116
imiric wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Security isn't everything, there's also accessibility to think about. TLS is not just about security. It also protects the authenticity of your content, ensures privacy and even accessibility for your visitors. Without it, any node between your visitor and your server could inject content and JavaScript to do all sorts of nefarious tracking and profiling. These days there's really no excuse for using plain HTTP on…

Actually, there is a very good excuse: I want to access the content I need with the browser and configuration I currently have, and without the ability to alter it. While the threat of MITM is technically true, thanks to being on a relatively safe networks segment, I have yet to encounter it happening in the real world, except in cases of captive portals, when I actually want it to happen. I think it is largely an ov…

There was similar discussion about "provide un-encrypted access to your pages for accessibility" few months ago here at HN under "Consider disabling HTTPS auto redirects" post [1].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31895148

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#182

Post by tjoff »

zinekeller wrote: post #39
tannhaeuser wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox on Ubuntu (which I'm not using anymore for these and other reasons) and presumably on other OSs does exactly that: refuse to open new tabs/sites once every two weeks or so, telling me "one more thing we need to do" ie self-update. So you're loosing all your browsing context, though FF does a better job restoring it after restart than it used to, but still that's user-hostile and self-important as fuck. And th…

> and presumably on other OSs Nope, it only happens when something outside changed Firefox's files (in this case when Ubuntu swapped files because dpkg updated Firefox). This never happens* in Windows and macOS (it might nag, but you can definitely dismiss it). It seems that johnchristopher has a suggestion to disable auto-updates on a specific application in Debian and Ubuntu (haven't tested it though): https://news…

No, you have control over dpkg.

It was snap that updated firefox regardless of whether you wanted it or not.

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#183

Post by jdofaz »

zinekeller wrote: post #39
tannhaeuser wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox on Ubuntu (which I'm not using anymore for these and other reasons) and presumably on other OSs does exactly that: refuse to open new tabs/sites once every two weeks or so, telling me "one more thing we need to do" ie self-update. So you're loosing all your browsing context, though FF does a better job restoring it after restart than it used to, but still that's user-hostile and self-important as fuck. And th…

> and presumably on other OSs Nope, it only happens when something outside changed Firefox's files (in this case when Ubuntu swapped files because dpkg updated Firefox). This never happens* in Windows and macOS (it might nag, but you can definitely dismiss it). It seems that johnchristopher has a suggestion to disable auto-updates on a specific application in Debian and Ubuntu (haven't tested it though): https://news…

If you download the linux version of Firefox from mozilla.org you get a tarball that you can extract and run Firefox from without needing to do anything to install it. When I've run it this way it self updates the same way as it does on macos or windows.

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#184

Post by seba_dos1 »

jimpudar wrote: post #53
weberer wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is infuriating to me as well. And the stupid Firefox restart dinosaur always comes up at the worst possible time. I would have switched to a new browser years ago, but Firefox seems to be the only one that supports vertical tabs.

Edge has vertical tabs built in. Many other browsers can be made to have vertical tabs with plugins.

Edge is not free. I wouldn't seriously consider using a non-free application for something as essential as everyday web browsing.

You can't really have usable vertical tabs in Chromium via plugins either, unless you're content with wasting a lot of horizontal space for an ugly sidebar and vertical space for uselessly duplicated tab bar.

Firefox is the only actual choice I'm aware about.

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#185

Post by asddubs »

danjoredd wrote: post #175
lupire wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not start by disabling JS and CSS in an existing browser?

Im just saying I think making a new Mosaic would be a fun project. Been watching Andreas Kling do his browser hacking lately and it looks like a lot of fun

you mean andreas kling

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#186

Post by seba_dos1 »

lupire wrote: post #165
efficax wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i don’t want most of my software to auto update but i certainly want the browser, which ingests untrusted data from unknown sources constantly, to get bug fix updates automatically.

That's your choice. Some other people only visit trusted sites.

Those people can choose to disable automatic updates.

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#187

Post by danjoredd »

asddubs wrote: post #185
danjoredd wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im just saying I think making a new Mosaic would be a fun project. Been watching Andreas Kling do his browser hacking lately and it looks like a lot of fun

you mean andreas kling

Right. I love his livestreams but I struggle with his name a lot. Apologies

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#188

Post by tolciho »

mrtksn wrote: post #118
badsectoracula wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is also possible that stuff are getting worse though. After all i remember friends of mine who were in university raging on how bloated the web was around 2000 and i'm 99% certain they weren't middle-aged men disguised as teenagers :-P. If anything i don't remember knowing anyone above 25y back then who even cared about web stuff. After all having some people see and complain about things getting worse doesn't mea…

When you look back, you can notice patterns: Something new and amazing comes out and it promises to take the humanity to a new age. At first it is fuelled by enthusiasm where believers work for free on it just to make it great and pay their bills by working for money on the old-school stuff. Their prime motivation is not profit. Then this thing starts becoming profitable in the sense of bringing street cred and money…

The feature where the cpu fans run after a webpage displays a table with about 30 items in it is pretty swell. Others might cry w.t.f. and avoid using such bad software as much as possible.

The feature where Firefox repeatedly changed your preferences and helpfully showed PDF with the JavaScript jank was pretty terrible. Changing that preference a third time won't make it any more charming. Yes, yes, the cattle are supposed to be OK with the "movement" of their cheese, move along now, nothing to see here.

> ... clothing, shaving, coffee - everything

Uh, no. Coffee in America started out cheap and for the masses (following some sort of Tea Party, I think it was) and then even more for the masses (now with pre-ground beans, instead of using the mill in the stock of your Sharps Carbine) and only very recently has there been a movement towards not-mainstream "hipster elitist circle" coffee made by purists.

> Things don't become worse

This is not what I've read; for example, British church organ making went through a rough patch around the decade of 1900 or so. With a little study of history more such examples could doubtless be found. One might even be optimistic that the modern web might pull itself out of the "big miasma"[1] that it has sunk into. But if the powers that be are blind to criticism, and go on about "tooling issues" or whatever, eh, it might be a while before changes can be made for the better.

By the way, Arnold Toynbee said some pretty funny things about blind elites.

[1] gemini://diesenbacher.net/

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#189

Post by rrwo »

lucideer wrote: post #149
rrwo wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because Twitter does that doesn't mean it is the case everywhere else. It moves some of the rendering work from the backend (having to query the data and generate markup) to the browser (query the API and generate the content based on the responses). At my current job, it's made a significant improvement. The server returns compact JSON data instead of HTML, so it's easier to generate the data and uses less band…

I'm not saying it's impossible - glad to hear you've successfully implemented it in your workplace. I'm just saying that by-and-large it has the opposite effect to the stated intent. If most examples of a strategy make things worse, and only one person uses that strategy to improve things, then going around saying "everyone is doing it wrong" rather than questioning the strategy isn't particularly sound. I've build p…

I was disagreeing with this statement:

> My modern version of this is browsing with JavaScript disabled. Most of the sites that don’t work weren’t worth my time anyway.

I think a lot of sites that require JavaScript are worthwhile.

(Whether they are all well implemented is another matter.)

Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)

#190

Post by _greim_ »

It's interesting that the author would associate "frames, tables, and other fancy features" with a lack of interesting content. I assume tables are included because they were widely misused at the time, not because tabular data wasn't interesting.

I have a button in my toolbar called "dammit" which strips away every iframe, embed, object, audio, and video from the page, multiple times per second. These are considered foundational elements in the web platform and yet, when they disappear, pages seem to magically collapse into something readable.

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