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WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

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Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#51

Post by pjmlp »

guelo wrote: post #40
csomar wrote: post #37

It seems most people here are concerned about the readability of web content. Text is already gone with SPAs and React. The only reason we still have an index-able web is because of Google and websites still want to get indexed and ranked. In fact, I'd say Wasm is probably better for text since now you have to provide text in a raw format (ie: JSON) for it to be linked/indexed which is much better than trying to craw…

What do you mean that Text is already gone? SPAs and React render plain HTML.

They do, but anyone trying to see how a Website works will find the developer tools as usable as with any browser plugin, unless they have the right plugins installed, and running the developer build.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#52

Post by netdevphoenix »

ghusto wrote: post #14
jillesvangurp wrote: post #9

> So there are only 2 web browser engines, and it seems likely there will soon only be 1, and making a whole new web browser from the ground up is effectively impossible because the browsers vendors have weaponized web standards complexity against any newcomers. Maybe eventually someone will succeed and there will be 2 again. Best case. What a situation. The premise of this article seems completely wrong. Chromium, S…

> Chromium, Safari, Firefox. And a longtail of half implemented alternatives. But the point is that there are 3 independent browser engines that are fairly widely used. Come on, you can't say that with a straight face. Safari exists because Apple has a monopoly on iOS traffic, and therefore an financially significant portion of mobile traffic. As soon as their rigid fingers are pried loose of that (which we're seeing…

Firefox only exists because Google needs an alternative to pretend its not a part of a duopoly. That alternative doesn't have to be Firefox tbh. They could stop sponsoring and choose any of the thousands of alternatives. Similarly Safari exists because Apple has exclusive control of what goes in iPhones. If it is ever forced by legislation to open it up to other browsers, it will lose some of that control. I don't think it will ever be forced to fully open though. I expect apple to make it so only a select number of entities can afford to release a true Safari competitor.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#53

Post by simion314 »

JimDabell wrote: post #36

The web had this before briefly. Back in the 90s and 00s, some people just wanted to use Flash. They treated the web browser like it was just a way to run executables in a window. Nothing worked right. Bookmarks, search engines, command-line tools, user preferences for font size, user scripts, view source, right-click menus, ad blockers, auto-translations, user stylesheets, assistive tools, bookmarklets, deep links……

www should be split in documents and apps it is horrible that we mutilate html, css and js to make a document language work for application.

And I bet competent developers can create a GUI framework that is more accessible then the div soup that the SPAs use today.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#54

Post by lukan »

aredox wrote: post #12
skerit wrote: post #8

Funny to read this: > So there are only 2 web browser engines, and it seems likely there will soon only be 1, and making a whole new web browser from the ground up is effectively impossible because the browsers vendors have weaponized web standards complexity against any newcomers Ladybird seems to be thriving. Sure, they themselves only plan on releasing a beta version next year, but still. And it's even on the Hack…

What is ladybug's marketshare? Does it work flawlessly with "This webpage works better with Chrome" webpages? It is not even mentioned on https://caniuse.com/?search=web%20components

"Does it work flawlessly"

"they themselves only plan on releasing a beta version next year"

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#56

Post by lukan »

fresh_geezer wrote: post #25
spankalee wrote: post #5

This post is so wrong and right at the same time. On the set up: First, there are 3 major engines, and even if Gecko dies there will be two. Second, both users and developers want a more capable web. Don't blame browser vendors for giving it to them. The web is wildly successful because of its continued evolution, and if it stopped evolving, native mobile apps would have beaten the web back even more. WASM could inde…

> WASM could indeed make for a simple, yet powerful, web-like platform, and I hope to see this! Careful what you wish for. WASM-rendered pages could spell the end of ad-blockers and other extensions that modify or read page content. You'll have only binary blobs being downloaded rendering something on a canvas surface.

That is in theory already possible today, also just with obfuscated js blobs.

But the way the ad networks work, is that they do dynamic content loading. So knowing where the ads are coming from and just blocking those lists will continue to work also in WASM.

But indeed, modifying the content specifically, when all you have is a canvas, will be close to impossible.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#57

Post by yoz-y »

Sometimes I wonder whether having the document-based-web and application-web in one place a good thing or bad.

Ideally the document based web would require only a subset of standards (html, css, and javascript) and should be much simpler to implement a browser. Then anything more complex could just "Open in an app runner environment".

But then of course since the application-web subsumes the document based one, there is no necessity for vast majority of people to ever care about the pure documents. Maybe gemini people were right and we need a completely different protocol.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#58

Post by palata »

For a very long time, I was pissed at "the web" being abused by heavier and heavier "apps" instead of staying "websites" and keeping "desktop apps".

Now I am starting to think that this is maybe just a super inefficient way to improve the technology for desktop apps: after years and a shit load of money put into running apps in the browser, maybe the end technology will just end up being used for desktop apps. And going through the browser will just have been a detour.

ElectronJS, Tauri... as if there was a realisation that actually, we want desktop apps, but unfortunately we invested in web tech, so we recycle it however we can.

Not sure if that makes sense, but that's how I feel. I liked desktop app, I'd be happy if it all cycled back to proper desktop apps.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#59

Post by TingPing »

aredox wrote: post #10
jillesvangurp wrote: post #9

> So there are only 2 web browser engines, and it seems likely there will soon only be 1, and making a whole new web browser from the ground up is effectively impossible because the browsers vendors have weaponized web standards complexity against any newcomers. Maybe eventually someone will succeed and there will be 2 again. Best case. What a situation. The premise of this article seems completely wrong. Chromium, S…

Look at the market share. And look at how much breakage report there is with Firefox vs. Chrome or Safari (not to say the return of "this website works better with Chrome" disclaimers, as if we were back to IE6).

Do you have a source for real world sites broken? It’s extremely rare for me and I exclusively use Safari and Firefox.

Re: WASM Wayland Web (WWW)

#60

Post by pepsi-not-coke »

I proposed a similar idea (before WASM was a thing) in 2015 on the W3 TAG mailing list, where I simply said why can't the site owners tell the user's browser what browser engine, including specialized ones, should be loaded to render and interact with their site/app. It was dismissed with idiots from the browser vendors saying it's impossible because of ABI compatibility etc. I kid you not, 10 years ago, and then someone from Meta tweeted the same idea 2 years later (the guy behind Slick Carousel) when WASM was a thing, but he did not specify WASM, and I told him that I had brought it up, too. This is not a new idea, but I'm glad to see renewed interest and WASM as the way to do it.
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