Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

adayinthelifeof.nl

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 501 posts

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#201

Post by binary132 »

ynniv wrote: post #172
phkahler wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> As you do, I find the discourse around tech to be a pit of dismissiveness, avoidance, denial, resignation, and learned-helplessness. Do you think this is why people are abandoning the GPL license in favor of MIT/BSD? Something about the fight the GPL aims to win being a hopeless fantasy? In the face of the sentiment you and OP express, I'd think GPL usage would be widespread.

As a developer my problem with the GPL is that it's less free than other licenses. It's an interesting legal hack, but it can only succeed in its goals by boiling the ocean. I just want to write things, and sometimes making money involves not publishing all of your source code. Having to choose between options and idealism limits the popularity of GPL projects.

Isn't that kind of the point?

The purpose of GPL and Free Software (which it has actually had resounding success in) is to develop a free commons which will stay free and not be exploited.

It's not for you to exploit to make a buck, and if that excludes your project, that's fine.

There are lots of things I would never consider free-licensing, but I think people badly miss the point of free software because they are stuck thinking only in terms of their own needs and personal benefit.

Again, if you don't want to use or contribute to free software, that is perfectly reasonable. But just bear in mind that the Linux kernel and GCC are incredibly valuable tools which are firmly in the commons and will remain free, and which you have benefited enormously from the use and free availability of.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#202

Post by phkahler »

ynniv wrote: post #172
phkahler wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> As you do, I find the discourse around tech to be a pit of dismissiveness, avoidance, denial, resignation, and learned-helplessness. Do you think this is why people are abandoning the GPL license in favor of MIT/BSD? Something about the fight the GPL aims to win being a hopeless fantasy? In the face of the sentiment you and OP express, I'd think GPL usage would be widespread.

As a developer my problem with the GPL is that it's less free than other licenses. It's an interesting legal hack, but it can only succeed in its goals by boiling the ocean. I just want to write things, and sometimes making money involves not publishing all of your source code. Having to choose between options and idealism limits the popularity of GPL projects.

>> As a developer my problem with the GPL is that it's less free than other licenses.

The freedom to deny other people the freedom you are enjoying is not compatible with the notion of freedom. It's hypocrisy.

That's not to say there is no place for MIT/BSD licenses, but it is not with general application software or libraries used to build such.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#203

Post by nvm0n2 »

Sakos wrote: post #106
ilaksh wrote: post #24

"Writing a browser" (from scratch) at this point basically means you are implementing a type of portable operating-system-in-a-box (the web platform) and that it will be compatible with whatever Google decides to add to theirs. The browser is so comprehensive in functionality and APIs, and such a challenge to keep up with Google's constant churn of new features and total dominance, that not even Microsoft could do it…

Am I wrong in thinking the only thing we're missing for a rich ecosystem of browsers is a modular, independent Javascript runtime/interpreter similar to Java? Java has a bunch of JVMs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Java_virtual_machines Maybe we need Mozilla (and others) to make an independent Javascript "VM" that everybody can use.

That's V8.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#204

Post by saalweachter »

School-Cotton wrote: post #150
jongjong wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Current system does have many nodes in a hierarchy but they are operated by trusted entities and there is not much fluidity. Also nobody owns their domain names; just renting from the centralized providers and you just have to trust them with everything. With a blockchain, you would provably own your domain name and nobody would be able to change your 'zone file' aside from you since they wouldn't know your private k…

The fundamental point blockchain fans miss is that most people don’t mind having centralized trusted entities. The fact that humans can intervene to change the owner of a domain name is a feature, not a bug, at least in non-authoritarian countries.

You also need some way to, you know, recover control of a domain after you lose your private key.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#205

Post by marginalia_nu »

jaytaph wrote: post #59

OP here. Thanks for the pos/neg/neutral comments everybody. Some remarks: Yes, there are a lot of browsers out there where I can contribute to which would be more efficient. But that would result in just a few browsers instead of a lot of browsers. I'm all for the last one, as this would give people options. This IS a pet project. I never told anyone otherwise. I would start writing it even when I wasn't fed up with…

Ignore the noise. So much crab mentality on HN sometimes.

If even half the time spent telling people that their project is pointless waste of time was spent doing something constructive instead, the world would have a lot more cool and interesting projects in it.

Better to fail at something bold and ambitious than not even try at all.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#206

Post by rhplus »

grishka wrote: post #181
ilaksh wrote: post #24

"Writing a browser" (from scratch) at this point basically means you are implementing a type of portable operating-system-in-a-box (the web platform) and that it will be compatible with whatever Google decides to add to theirs. The browser is so comprehensive in functionality and APIs, and such a challenge to keep up with Google's constant churn of new features and total dominance, that not even Microsoft could do it…

> The browser is so comprehensive in functionality and APIs Not really. If you limit your scope by saying that you're building a hypertext document viewer , it suddenly becomes approachable. A lot of the functionality is all that PWA stuff no one asked for and no one is using for anything good anyway. WebSQL? IndexedDB? Service workers? WebGL? WebGPU? WebBluetooth? WebRTC? Just act like it all doesn't exist. 99% of a…

No true websites use service workers, just like no true Scotsman puts sugar in his porridge.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#207

Post by lib-dev »

gen220 wrote: post #193
grishka wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The browser is so comprehensive in functionality and APIs Not really. If you limit your scope by saying that you're building a hypertext document viewer , it suddenly becomes approachable. A lot of the functionality is all that PWA stuff no one asked for and no one is using for anything good anyway. WebSQL? IndexedDB? Service workers? WebGL? WebGPU? WebBluetooth? WebRTC? Just act like it all doesn't exist. 99% of a…

In a world where UNIX-inspired systems run most software, I like to imagine that it’s possible for a UNIX-like browser to become dominant. Recall that UNIX (and C) were built (and adopted) in response to perceived over-complexities in contemporary systems. Maybe in 20 years we’ll recall + interact with Chrome like how people in the 80s recall + interacted with Multics or OS/360. To complete the analogy, I guess you’d…

People interested in building browsers should look into WebKit. You can use that for HTML/CSS/JS rendering and save a lot of time/effort.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#208

Post by b3lvedere »

mongol wrote: post #70

I can relate. I have also stopped following the news, and almost all social media as well. I don't know if it is an age thing, or just the state of the world. But the past year, opening a news site have given me stress symptoms. And news sites love to feed it. Someone burns a koran? It is only news if it is reported. If someone does it in their basement alone, it would not matter at all. But instead it becomes a glob…

I got so fed up with enforced media in general.

It may be news, the preview movies on a Disney DVD, commercials, advertisements, billboards and whatnot. I absolutely hate enforced media. I do know it pays the bills/makes other things cheaper because of its revenue, but i stopped caring about those business models a long long time ago. They are all in it for the money and nothing more.

I will pay for products, as long as they leave me the f alone. No enforced "you should try this or buy that!" stuff. So i use pihole, duckduckgo, etc. It is my infrastructure and i will use it as how i see fit.

I eagerly await this browser.

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#209

Post by lijok »

Ensorceled wrote: post #200
lijok wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US makes up a mere ~4% of the worlds population

> US makes up a mere ~4% of the worlds population So you concede all the other points? "This revision represents 11 million more people living in extreme poverty, largely driven by South Asia (5 million) and the Middle East and North Africa (4 million)." World Bank is claiming there are 11 million more people living in extreme poverty in 2023[1]. [1] https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/march-2023-global-pover...

> So you concede all the other points?

No, I simply did not consider points made from a US-centric worldview to be valid in this discussion.

> World Bank is claiming there are 11 million more people living in extreme poverty in 2023[1].

Compared to when?

Re: I'm fed up with it, so I'm writing a browser

#210

Post by sneak »

ynniv wrote: post #172
phkahler wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> As you do, I find the discourse around tech to be a pit of dismissiveness, avoidance, denial, resignation, and learned-helplessness. Do you think this is why people are abandoning the GPL license in favor of MIT/BSD? Something about the fight the GPL aims to win being a hopeless fantasy? In the face of the sentiment you and OP express, I'd think GPL usage would be widespread.

As a developer my problem with the GPL is that it's less free than other licenses. It's an interesting legal hack, but it can only succeed in its goals by boiling the ocean. I just want to write things, and sometimes making money involves not publishing all of your source code. Having to choose between options and idealism limits the popularity of GPL projects.

> I just want to write things, and sometimes making money involves not publishing all of your source code.

I've made lots of money and I publish every piece of code I've ever written to do it.

What you are describing must have been written by someone who does not believe in software freedoms.

Software freedom is an ideology, not a license. If you license part of your software as free software but not other parts of your software, you do not believe in software freedoms for the users of that software.

It's sort of like a factory that only uses slave labor for one step of production. Does that factory operator believe in human rights if their line is 90% respectful of the dignity of mankind?

Post reply on HN