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iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

developer.apple.com

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Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#361

Post by ivell »

donkyrf wrote: post #331
concinds wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wait until regulators do their job and take away Apple's dictatorial control, in all areas , and all these doom-and-gloom predictions on all these tangential issues end up proving ludicrous. What kind of control would Chrome have over the web? Adding APIs doesn't force the billions of websites to adopt them. So what if a website adds WebBluetooth? You don't want the web to have that anyway, and if you keep us…

So according to you, a company that has about 25% of the global smartphone market, should be _legally forbidden_ from creating a tightly integrated software/hardware bundle. Whereas, a company that has 70% of the global browser market somehow would have no way to take advantage if they had an even larger share. I wonder how our species would survive without the unique market analysis from one-of-a-kind minds like you…

Web and Apple ecosystem is not comparable. IE had quite large market share and was brought down by Chrome in quite short time. Firefox challenged IE quite effectively before that. But Windows (desktop) still enjoys quite large market share even though Google, Linux and Apple (macOS) are trying hard.

The OS lock-in is much more difficult to break than Web where the standards are openly built and made available. One aspect in favor of Google is the complexity of implementing all those standards. But that is not lock-in, rather an issue of having enough resources to implement a compliant browser.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#362

Post by troupo »

kelthuzad wrote: post #231
troupo wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple's conflict of interest is motivating them to reject entire feature sets for competing technology instead of helping to implement a safe standard It literally is "everyone must immediately implement anything Chrome shits out". You don't even accept the fact that both Safari and Firefox team reject the entire premise on the same grounds . Nope. "They must work on better standards for these features that Chrome…

>It literally is "everyone must immediately implement anything Chrome shits out". You don't even accept the fact that both Safari and Firefox team reject the entire premise on the same grounds. It isn't factually and certainly not "literally" that. I've explicitly stated that the problem isn't the rejection of the specific implementation in its current form, but the wholesale refusal of features to deny rival technol…

> You're literally making stuff up and ignoring the fact that I have actually even started my response with an acknowledgement of that point: "You're right that Firefox also opposes some of these specific implementations in its current form, and that Google often rushes features. However, that doesn't diminish Apple's conflict of interest at all

Rule of the thumb is "nothing you say before 'but' matters". Apple's opposition to Chrome features is not just echoed by Mozilla. It is repeated almost verbatim.

And yet, you completely ignore all that, and go to say "well, Apple is bad, and conflict interest, so Apple must work on a better safe standard for these features". You don't even for a second assume that two of the three browser vendors oppose these features for the same reason. No. Chrome shipped them, so they absolutely must work to implement these features (in some form) because Apple bad or something.

> There is no such assumption,

"the wholesale refusal of features to deny rival technology equal rights, instead of helping to implement a safe standard." Yup. "Whatever Chrome ships must be implemented no matter the cost and despite any opposition for any reason".

> only the fact that Apple has a conflict of interest, which manifests itself in anti-competitive behavior

Which literally has nothing to do with Chrome-only non-standards. Chrome wants them. It's on Chrome to design and implement them safely. Neither Apple nor Mozilla owe them anything regardless of the amount of demagoguery around their decisions. Both Apple and Safari pointed out the issues they have across many discussions. Chrome didn't care.

Safari has multiple issues, that's true. None of them stem from refusing to support every shitty thing that Chrome vomits into the world and calls a standard.

Speaking of "denying rival technology equal rights". Do you know that WebSQL was implemented by Chrome and had approval from Safari, but got killed due to opposition from Mozilla? Did Mozilla "deny rival technology equal rights"? Or perhaps, just perhaps, they had valid concerns that lead to rethinking of the approach?

You can't even come up with proper rebuttal of Mozilla's and Apple's concerns (you don't even know about their concerns to begin with) beyond "but native apps" and diatribes about Apple.

BTW here's Mozilla relenting on just one of the hardware APIs: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33995022 (sadly, the twitter account has been locked)/ Original quote: "Just a day after shipping an impl to Firefox Nightly, this is the first discovered case of WebMIDI-fingerprinting... Chrome still allows web developers to enumerate attached MIDI devices without user consent or even a notification, btw."

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#363

Post by troupo »

leptons wrote: post #355
troupo wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If it’s bad for users (e.g. some new ad tracking) Yes > but if it’s not that, then refusing to ever adopt those standards (or to provide their own alternatives) is either foolish NIH syndrome on Apple’s part or it’s greed. Note that Firefox's position is literally exactly the same as Apple's on these Chrome-only features: https://mozilla.github.io/standards-positions/

Firefox gets paid by Google. A lot. Maybe part of their agreement is to not implement some features because it would compete with Chrome. I don't really know, and I don't really care what Firefox does or doesn't do. I only care that Apple does not allow other browsers to use their own browser engines. Opera mobile also implements the APIs I need (on Android). Even MS Edge supports the APIs. Firefox can join Apple in…

"Every browser that doesn't jump when Google says 'jump' is driven by malicious actors and intent that I can't articulate beyond some tin-foil conspiracy theories" is not as good an argument as you think it is

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#364

Post by troupo »

ivell wrote: post #361
donkyrf wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So according to you, a company that has about 25% of the global smartphone market, should be _legally forbidden_ from creating a tightly integrated software/hardware bundle. Whereas, a company that has 70% of the global browser market somehow would have no way to take advantage if they had an even larger share. I wonder how our species would survive without the unique market analysis from one-of-a-kind minds like you…

Web and Apple ecosystem is not comparable. IE had quite large market share and was brought down by Chrome in quite short time. Firefox challenged IE quite effectively before that. But Windows (desktop) still enjoys quite large market share even though Google, Linux and Apple (macOS) are trying hard. The OS lock-in is much more difficult to break than Web where the standards are openly built and made available. One as…

> The OS lock-in is much more difficult to break than Web where the standards are openly built and made available.

Where have you been in the past 10 years or so? Chrome views the web as their own fiefdom, and web devs happily oblige. There are now dozens of Chrome-only non-standards that are presented as "openly built standards" and devs deride other browsers for not implementing them.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#365

Post by troupo »

mdhb wrote: post #348
simianparrot wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Been working with web related tech since the early 00’s. Safari has just never been a problem except for invasive ads, like back in the Flash days.

This is such nonsense and everyone who’s a web developer knows you’re not being honest here but just to make it ever clearer for anyone else here’s a chart showing the number of bugs that only occur in a single browser . https://wpt.fyi/results/?label=master&label=experimental&ali... It’s undeniable that Apple makes a dogshit browser.

> This is such nonsense and everyone who’s a web developer knows you’re not being honest

And in your opinion "being honest" is speaking for every web dev out there?

I've been a web dev for 25 years (god I'm old) and Safari has not been a major pain for me.

You keep bandying wpt.fyi results around not even understanding what they mean. E.g. Safari only passes 8 out of 150 accelerometer tests. So? Does it affect every web dev? Lol no. But it does pass 57 out 57 accessibility tests which is significantly more important.

Edit: don't forget that there's also Interop 2025 which paints a very different picture: https://wpt.fyi/interop-2025?stable

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#366

Post by well_ackshually »

donkyrf wrote: post #331
concinds wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wait until regulators do their job and take away Apple's dictatorial control, in all areas , and all these doom-and-gloom predictions on all these tangential issues end up proving ludicrous. What kind of control would Chrome have over the web? Adding APIs doesn't force the billions of websites to adopt them. So what if a website adds WebBluetooth? You don't want the web to have that anyway, and if you keep us…

So according to you, a company that has about 25% of the global smartphone market, should be _legally forbidden_ from creating a tightly integrated software/hardware bundle. Whereas, a company that has 70% of the global browser market somehow would have no way to take advantage if they had an even larger share. I wonder how our species would survive without the unique market analysis from one-of-a-kind minds like you…

> a company that has about 25% of the global smartphone market, should be _legally forbidden_ from creating a tightly integrated software/hardware bundle.

Absolutely not. Most of us are perfectly happy with Apple tightly integrating Safari with their hardware.

However, we're going to legally forbid them to prevent users from breaking that tight integration, because it's their device. Apple doesnt "own" the smartphone market: it provides hardware and services, and it shuts the fuck up.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#367

Post by taveras »

concinds wrote: post #291
icehawk wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even a day ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46454115 : > I want my browser to protect me from ALL those things. Ublock origin did precisely that, then Google went in to kill ublock origin. Ublock lite is nowhere near as good. > > I consider this betrayal - naturally by Google, but also by random web designers such as on the python homepage who consider it morally just to pester visitors when they do not w…

Why did you link me to a random comment? edit: I see now. Firefox still has uBlock Origin. You missed the point. If Chrome wants to make itself less attractive, you should celebrate.

> If Chrome wants to make itself less attractive, you should celebrate.

I appreciate that Chrome reducing user autonomy in order to further Google's own business goals _should_ be a reduction in their competitiveness in a perfect market.

But the web browser market does not have perfect competition today, and I cannot recall a time when it had.

Regulators preventing Apple from controlling iOS browser engines but allowing Google to have de facto ownership of the web would be an example of governments picking winners and losers.

Public policy needs to move the market towards real competition.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#368

Post by objclxt »

concinds wrote: post #241
MBCook wrote: post #172

I’m not going to say I think Apple should be able to lock out competing browsers, I know this is going to happen. But God I don’t want this. The iPhone is basically the only thing stopping a total Chrome/Chromium hegemony from ruling the web the way IE did. I don’t think Google will practically abandon things the way Microsoft did. But they will absolutely have the kind of power Microsoft did to force any feature. I…

I can't wait until regulators do their job and take away Apple's dictatorial control, in all areas , and all these doom-and-gloom predictions on all these tangential issues end up proving ludicrous. What kind of control would Chrome have over the web? Adding APIs doesn't force the billions of websites to adopt them. So what if a website adds WebBluetooth? You don't want the web to have that anyway, and if you keep us…

> What kind of control would Chrome have over the web? Adding APIs doesn't force the billions of websites to adopt them.

You are assuming adding APIs is a net positive, and the debacle that was Chrome’s privacy sandbox initiative suggests that’s not the case

> why are we all dependent on Apple, alone, to save us from ~60% Chrome?

How’s Firefox doing now? They’re literally dependent upon Chrome to exist. Without Google they have no money to fund development.

The only viable non-Chromium browser engine today that is not funded by Google is WebKit.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#369

Post by crazygringo »

leptons wrote: post #308
crazygringo wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So I have to have a real iPhone to debug problems with Apple's implementations. Safari fucking sucks You'll still have to debug it. Even when other browsers are allowed, Safari isn't going away. "Safari fucking sucks" isn't an argument that Apple is being anticompetitive. There are a bunch of things that suck about Chrome too. And Firefox as well. No product is perfect.

Of course I have to debug it, but I develop for standards, not Apple's wonky implementations of touch events and lots of other things. So I should not need Apple hardware to debug a web browser. I can't install Safari on Android or any other platform, so if there's a bug that only shows up in Safari , then I have to buy Apple hardware . I'd rather not give Apple one goddamned cent of my money, they have already mistr…

You have a very idiosyncratic take. I've never heard anyone else complain, as a dev, that Safari was harder to develop for because it was buggier. When I run into JavaScript API differences between Safari, Chrome, and Firefox (as I have many times), they just mostly do different things where the spec is underspecified. I don't assume Chrome is doing it the right way and Safari is the buggy one. It sounds like you just develop Chrome-first.

Yeah, if you want to test against Safari you need Apple hardware. If you can't be bothered to get some cheap secondhand Apple hardware for testing for your business, then that says more about the business decisions you're making. The idea that Apple ought to be obligated to make its browser available on other platforms seems pretty silly to me.

You sound like someone complaining they want to develop a Microsoft Word plugin on Linux, and they're upset Microsoft doesn't sell a Linux version of Office and that they have to get a copy of Windows. What do you expect? You develop and test on the platforms where your desired users are. If you can't accept that basic reality, then maybe you shouldn't be making software.

Re: iOS allows alternative browser engines in Japan

#370

Post by dagmx »

bangaladore wrote: post #351
dagmx wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s literally from their requirements page https://developer.apple.com/support/alternative-browser-engi... You have to request explicit permission to be able to be a browser on iOS. You can’t just ship an app. I assume part of that process is that you specifically demonstrate that you try your best to use best safety practices. Again, it’s also not absolute safety. It’s just due diligence review.

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I meant the WebKit guidelines were from the commenter, not from the apple page. > or features that improve memory safety within other languages, within the alternative web browser engine at a minimum for all code that processes web content; This can't be analyzed in any real way, so its just another way that Apple will restrict web engines and claim it was due to "not enough use of memory saf…

Why does it matter if Apple themselves don’t link the WebKit docs? It’s literally their project and seems to meet their requirements.

There’s a lot of things in the requirements like funding that Apple cannot verify. I think you’re being too binary in this.

Some of it is very clearly intended to be a “show us you are at least considering these security measures and have practices in place to minimize known issues”. Again, for the third time, it’s clearly NOT a list for ongoing perfect security, given that there are other items on the list that deal with further mitigation strategies.

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