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Ladybird browser spreads its wings

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Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#101

Post by 1GZ0 »

samiv wrote: post #94

I'm already speculating that sooner or later in the future this project will end up pivoting to chromium as the underlying engine. I can think of two reasons for this - money is involved and someone buys them out / influences the direction of the project - the reality of the task ahead sets in the and the dev team gives up on custom engine development For those of you coming back to this comment from the future, yep…

You really think Google has people running around with suitcases full of money, tempting devs to abandon their own browser engines in favour of chromium?

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#102

Post by red_trumpet »

znpy wrote: post #85
jraph wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll take an alternative browser engine, even if it's written in C++. > I'm curious Is it really curiosity though? Because the answer is straightforward, the project started as a hobby, the developer picked whatever language they were proficient in. Andreas is open with the fact that he started Serenity OS and LadyBird as a rehab project. Put too much barrier in this setting (like learning a new language and all the…

>> I'm curious > Is it really curiosity though? I'm kind of annoyed at this whole train of comments ("I'm curious..."). In so many occasion I see something cool and the main comment track is "why hasn't this been writte in rust?" (or some other allegedly safe/better programming language). It's like seeing a beautiful painting being painted and arguing about the kind of paintbrush the painter has used. It's so sad.

> It's like seeing a beautiful painting being painted and arguing about the kind of paintbrush the painter has used.

It's like seeing a beautiful painting and realizing the painter didn't use lightfast colors. In ten years the painting will not be beautiful anymore.

Yes, the painter / author put in a lot of work, and this deserves acknowledgement. But ones decision to use it or not is not only based on the amount of work put in.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#103

Post by mrob »

skywal_l wrote: post #86
KronisLV wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Using the web today is a hostile experience, and the only safe haven from all this nonsense is using community-supported alternative browsers, that are really stripped down versions of mainstream ones, and relying heavily on ad, cookie, JavaScript and other blockers, which may stop working at any point. I think the actual root of the problem is that the people and organizations developing and running the sites do w…

I found NoScript to be a good alternative. It disables JS by default but then you can reenable per page but also per domain. You only enable just what you need for the page to work and sometimes only temporarily. I still need to enable things here and there but it's a fairly easy straightforward process. Couple this with uBlock and firefox Container (where I am logged to google only for gmail in a specific container)…

uBlock Origin already supports Javascript blocking (both globally and per domain) if you enable advanced mode. Redundant extensions are just extra attack surface.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#104

Post by account42 »

red_trumpet wrote: post #102
znpy wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I'm curious > Is it really curiosity though? I'm kind of annoyed at this whole train of comments ("I'm curious..."). In so many occasion I see something cool and the main comment track is "why hasn't this been writte in rust?" (or some other allegedly safe/better programming language). It's like seeing a beautiful painting being painted and arguing about the kind of paintbrush the painter has used. It's so sad.

> It's like seeing a beautiful painting being painted and arguing about the kind of paintbrush the painter has used. It's like seeing a beautiful painting and realizing the painter didn't use lightfast colors. In ten years the painting will not be beautiful anymore. Yes, the painter / author put in a lot of work, and this deserves acknowledgement. But ones decision to use it or not is not only based on the amount of…

It's more like seeing a beautiful painting and complaining that the painter didn't use your favorite brand of paint which promises to be much better looking than the other paints in ten years but hasn't even been around that long.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#105

Post by oriolid »

torstenvl wrote: post #84
oriolid wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you explain your thinking a bit more? To me the "language of diplomacy" equivalent for computers sounds more like C calling convention, HTTP and XML or JSON.

Nobody is saying there is a programming equivalent of the language of diplomacy. He said that using Rust to achieve memory safety is analogous to using French for diplomacy, in that, whatever value the language itself might bring to that goal, you are not likely to achieve it if you are not proficient. If you are not proficient in French, you likely ought not to conduct diplomacy in French. If you are not proficient…

Ok, I'll try to explain.

- French itself does not add much value to diplomacy. The reason to use is that everyone else who does diplomacy is expected to know French (and probably isn't a native speaker which makes things a bit more equal). English is probably taking over there, like it has done in other domains.

- The recent C++ versions are not actively promoting shooting yourself in the foot like older variants, but they aren't exactly trying to prevent it.

- Rust is going out of its way to prevent writing memory unsafe code. It is still possible if you know what you are doing, but just trying out stuff at random is more likely to give you a compile-time error than undefined behaviour.

- Most programmers aren't very competent, not matter what they believe about themselves. With Rust they are less likely to commit serious errors. Or get anything done, but that's a separate discussion. The French will probably point out your pronunciation mistakes too before continuing discussion, but that's also not the point here.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#106

Post by Ginden »

maccard wrote: post #58
miki123211 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox is open source, it would be far easier for the community to make a stripped down Firefox port with no telemetry, no ads and no upsells for Mozilla services. With that said, almost all of Mozilla's revenue comes from Google, which might possibly influence what features they implement, their stance on various web standards etc.

> which might possibly influence what features they implement, their stance on various web standards etc. Unless you’ve got some examples to back this up, it’s FUD. Posting hypotheticals is how rumours start, and this is just stirring the pot.

Conflict of interests is a real thing to worry about. I wouldn't trust scientist working in tobacco company on cigarette harm, even if I have no evidence of wrongdoing.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#107

Post by frou_dh »

samiv wrote: post #94

I'm already speculating that sooner or later in the future this project will end up pivoting to chromium as the underlying engine. I can think of two reasons for this - money is involved and someone buys them out / influences the direction of the project - the reality of the task ahead sets in the and the dev team gives up on custom engine development For those of you coming back to this comment from the future, yep…

Do you think you have a better handle on the "reality of the task" than Kling, who already worked at Apple on WebKit and subsequently got Ladybird to where it is now?

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#108

Post by samiv »

asddubs wrote: post #100
samiv wrote: post #94

I'm already speculating that sooner or later in the future this project will end up pivoting to chromium as the underlying engine. I can think of two reasons for this - money is involved and someone buys them out / influences the direction of the project - the reality of the task ahead sets in the and the dev team gives up on custom engine development For those of you coming back to this comment from the future, yep…

I doubt it. Your prediction might be more appropriate for a project that's in its first week of development, not having been developed for several years and already overcome many difficult hurdles. And if they switch to chromium, there is literally nothing interesting about this project. The fact that it's a novel engine is their only differentiating feature.

The age of the project or the development status of the project does not matter, what matters is the user base.

If you build anything that accumulates users, business interests will be aroused at some point. Business people don't give a shit about the technology itself unless of course the technology itself really is a USP and can be converted into €$. But most people (end users) don't care much about the underlying technology in the browser and whether it's open source or not, chromium or not. Only technologists care.

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#109

Post by [deleted] »

oriolid wrote: post #105
torstenvl wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is saying there is a programming equivalent of the language of diplomacy. He said that using Rust to achieve memory safety is analogous to using French for diplomacy, in that, whatever value the language itself might bring to that goal, you are not likely to achieve it if you are not proficient. If you are not proficient in French, you likely ought not to conduct diplomacy in French. If you are not proficient…

Ok, I'll try to explain. - French itself does not add much value to diplomacy. The reason to use is that everyone else who does diplomacy is expected to know French (and probably isn't a native speaker which makes things a bit more equal). English is probably taking over there, like it has done in other domains. - The recent C++ versions are not actively promoting shooting yourself in the foot like older variants, bu…

[deleted]

Re: Ladybird browser spreads its wings

#110

Post by peoplefromibiza »

oriolid wrote: post #105
torstenvl wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is saying there is a programming equivalent of the language of diplomacy. He said that using Rust to achieve memory safety is analogous to using French for diplomacy, in that, whatever value the language itself might bring to that goal, you are not likely to achieve it if you are not proficient. If you are not proficient in French, you likely ought not to conduct diplomacy in French. If you are not proficient…

Ok, I'll try to explain. - French itself does not add much value to diplomacy. The reason to use is that everyone else who does diplomacy is expected to know French (and probably isn't a native speaker which makes things a bit more equal). English is probably taking over there, like it has done in other domains. - The recent C++ versions are not actively promoting shooting yourself in the foot like older variants, bu…

> - French itself does not add much value to diplomacy.

Funny, given that the word diplomacy is a French word, together with embassy, treaty, alliance, passport and protocol :)

> Rust is going out of its way to prevent writing memory unsafe code

But if someone is not proficient in Rust it will only slow them down and they'll end up fighting the language and the compiler instead of using the language.

It's a common complain among non Rust programmers.

> Most programmers aren't very competent

I strongly believe Andreas Kling is very competent.

For the rest of us who are not him, incompetence does not go well in hand with Rust, which is a very complex language.

EDIT: pretending that a very proficient C++ programmer will chose Rust because "it's 2024" it's the same thing as pretending that they will chose Haskell, which is equally memory safe and also equally complex.

Why nobody ever recommend Haskell or Smalltalk?

It doesn't seem much like a discussion about memory safety to me, but rather promoting Rust.

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