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Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

polypane.app

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Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#51

Post by kilian »

cantSpellSober wrote: post #48

* What are a few features you offer over Browserstack? (re: x-browser testing). * Do you offer GenAI integrations? (Copilot, Claude, etc) (Help me sell this to my manager)

Polypane is a chromium-based browser that you install on your own device and use while building applications that lets you develop at different (emulated) devices and screensizes/variation in one overview, with a bunch of development, accessibility and quality tools built right in.

Browserstack is an online device testing tool where you check if your site works on different real devices one-by-one. That is to say, they don't really compete: if you don't have real devices to test with then Browserstack is an excellent option.

What users mostly find is that by using Polypane (fast, local) they have far less use of Browserstack (slow, online) and the entire process speeds up. There will always be a need for real device testing.

There's no gen AI integrations, and I don't have any planned. You can happily use Claude or CoPilot in the browse panel though (which is a little browser that lives inside Polypane, so you can browse without losing the context of your project)

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#53

Post by Xelynega »

didgetmaster wrote: post #38
rckt wrote: post #13

A browser with a subscription. I have no words. People try to make money out of anything. And they succeed in this. The world is an insane place, really.

> People try to make money out of anything. So...software developers who mimic the real world. If I walk by a fruit stand, a grocery store, or a booth at a fair selling homemade crafts; I don't expect anything to be free. It is the exception when they are handing out free samples. In the software world, too many expect everything in the store to be free (as in beer). Each software product represents real effort on so…

If I walk by a stand, it cost them something to give me their homemade crafts for free(they have less to give away)

With software development the only thing lost with giving it away for free is the opportunity cost that someone might have paid for it.

So I don't think physical products and software can be compared like that

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#54

Post by avel »

no_wizard wrote: post #21
kilian wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a huge list of things Polypane emulates beyond the screen size. For devices: - user agent - reported platform - device pixel ratio - rendering mode (mobile rendering and desktop rendering respond differently depending on your viewport meta tag) - default input device - orientation APIs Beyond that it can also emulate reading direction, page language, browser locale, user-configured default font-size, differen…

Can it emulate email rendering?

You need a farm of machines that run the actual mail clients, to do that reliably. https://www.emailonacid.com/ is such a service.

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#55

Post by parentheses »

kilian wrote: post #6

Hey, I'm Kilian, the creator and solo developer of Polypane. Exciting to see this on the homepage again. Happy to answer any questions folks have!

I recall using your product years ago and it was fantastic. It helped me work solo on a web app with ease. Not having CSS and JS skills like a lot of front end devs, it was nice knowing all viewports were handled.

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#56

Post by elashri »

short_sells_poo wrote: post #49

I don't understand the many comments here complaining that the browser has a subscription. Finally! I want more paid browsers, not less. I want to get back to a world where we paid for products with money, instead of being datamined and have ads pushed down my throat. People here, out of all places, should be aware of what it means when a product is free.

I guess that when people usually talk about paid browsers, they talk about separate web engines not chromium forks. If this will help with the battle against Google's dominance.

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#58

Post by perdomon »

machine_ghost wrote: post #52

I read the website, but I still don't get what value it's offering over Chrome? Better viewport sizing?

Here's a comment from the creator with a host of things that are mostly not available in Chrome:

There's a huge list of things Polypane emulates beyond the screen size.

For devices:

  - user agent
  - reported platform
  - device pixel ratio
  - rendering mode (mobile rendering and desktop rendering respond differently depending on your viewport meta tag)
  - default input device
  - orientation APIs
Beyond that it can also emulate reading direction, page language, browser locale, user-configured default font-size, different network settings and a whole range of different media queries like color-scheme, reduced-motion reduced-data, reduced-transparency, prefers-contrast, forced-colors (windows high contrast mode) and color gamut. I'll be adding even more device browser-specific emulations later this year.

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#59

Post by GrumpyNl »

dventimi wrote: post #44
tdhz77 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like your pricing model.

I don't. Nine dollars per month for an individual? No thanks. Charge what you like. It's your right to do that, but as a hobbyist there's no chance I'm buying.

Its a great tool and for a front end developer its reasonable.

Re: Polypane, The browser for ambitious web developers

#60

Post by tigroferoce »

rckt wrote: post #13

A browser with a subscription. I have no words. People try to make money out of anything. And they succeed in this. The world is an insane place, really.

Absolutely incredible indeed! People asking money in change of their work, how dare they? /s

All these years where megacorps gave people stuff for free have tainted the minds of many.

If you questioned the subscription model over the perpetual license, that would be somehow acceptable, but assuming everything must be free is just non sense.

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