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

adayinthelifeof.nl

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

#481

Post by khimaros »

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…

also, a related HN thread about minimal subset of HTTP and HTML: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23731606

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

#482

Post by binary132 »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #305
binary132 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 s…

The GPL is not required for such a commons to flourish. Most Rust projects are published under a permissive license, and that scene is flourishing just fine. I think that open source software as a whole, not the GPL specifically, is what has enabled the flourishing you mention. It seems to me that in the counterfactual world where Linus chose to use the BSD license for his kernel, Linux would thrive just as much as i…

The point of copyleft is to protect the continued existence and welfare of such a commons. I'm not even necessarily saying it is the only way to achieve a healthy free commons, I'm simply explaining what GPL is for.

That said, do you think it is in fact protecting the user from exploitation, or promoting the health of a free commons, to use "free" software in nonfree products which do not provide their source code to the user nor guarantee the user's ability to study, extend, and modify the software that they are using?

I think the argument for Free Software is at the very least strong and good. There can be other approaches to solving the problems FSF wants to solve, too, but it is a totally valid and non-debatably historically useful position at the very least.

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

#484

Post by dredmorbius »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #457
dredmorbius wrote: post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to share specific details? Curl? wget? netcat? Terminal-mode browser? (I use all of the above myself. Many websites ... behave poorly with them, though they can still be useful.)

Original netcat yes, all the time. A variety of other TCP clients. Customised Links browser. Several proxies. Customised tnftp. curl in HN examples. Consider that each web user might visit different websites and seek different information and data. Each user might have different preferences. What is good for one user might not be good for another. Me, I prefer textmode. I am not interested in X11-style terminal emula…

Thanks, that's useful. Might be an interesting write-up or tell / show HN type submission.

I do similarly for some cases. I've written scripts to parse down NOAAA weather reports to something that renders well on a terminal, and have scripts and shell functions similar to surfraw (by now badly dated itself) for doing quick lookups from a shell.

I share your view that most website payloads are rubbish (in one case I'd stripped > 90% of the Washington Post's payload to deliver just article text), and that selective acceptance and presentation makes a huge difference.

Though as much as I use shells and terminals, I still find GUIs useful, including Web browsers, though the situation is increasingly frustrating.

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

#485

Post by jackthetab »

slashdev wrote: post #439
jackthetab wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does he have to finish anything? TFA even says "I don't expect to finish." The Mona Lisa is unfinished and Leo spent 16 years on it.

He doesn’t, if he’s honestly ok with that. But you only have so much time, why not pick a goal that is achievable? Seems like a waste.

Why have a goal?

Oftentimes it is the journey that is the most important, not the destination.

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

#486

Post by TheHappyOddish »

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…

Screw everyone else, it looks interesting and fun. I'll be following your RSS updates. Good luck!

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

#487

Post by TheHappyOddish »

xelia wrote: post #476
abareplace wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can afford not reading news only if you live in a democratic country with a stable economy, far from any conflict zones. In other parts of the world, you would miss information that you need for your survival.

Even in that country - if you’re a woman you need to know if you still have rights regarding bodily autonomy (e.g. abortion). If you’re queer you need to know if you’re allowed to dress a certain way (anti-drag laws) or express public affection, without being arrested.

I mean everyone needs to knows the law broadly, and the specific laws that may impact them.

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

#488

Post by clankyclanker »

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.

That’s the thing: the GPL isn’t there for you, the developer. The GPL exists to ensure freedoms for the user and it does this by requiring responsibilities of the developer.

This creates an interesting and important second-order effect that allows it to accomplish its goals without needing to boil the ocean by ensuring every user has the same ability to develop the same software, blurring and reducing the line between user and developer, creator and consumer. Practical considerations often prevent the expression of this effect but the opportunity doesn’t even exist in most other situations, particularly when you get to web services.

I didn’t reply to the important issue of money, the fundamental developer problem, because I’ve never been in a situation to sell my own code: my own projects have zero to do with my rent work.

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

#489

Post by firewolf34 »

PH95VuimJjqBqy wrote: post #234
nonrandomstring wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I get angry about not being able to do anything about anything. And this is my way of trying to do something about it. It's the best I can do. This attitude is gold, and it's what changes the whole world. What you said about the misery of "news" resonates with me. In psyops we call it "sapping". Propaganda designed to demoralise, dispirit and corrode resistance used to come from our enemies . The classic example wa…

For me it's a bit like the whole "woke-ism" thing. The vast majority of people enjoy each other and don't subscribe to the vitriol that comes from both sides. In that manner, the internet is a bit of an echo chamber where if you get all of your impressions of the world from it, you'd think people were constantly at each others throats. The news is the same way, they report negativity, so it has a real tendency to mak…

from the "assume ignorance before maliciousness" standpoint, a lot of the impression you speak of is just a fact of us humans reporting on the (perceived) more critical news, (perhaps also maybe the more profitable news) - but is more (in my opinion) a natural result of the news having limited time/bandwidth to report on a near-infinite content production source (the world)

A side effect (and the end result) is that we all end up having poor [Bayesian priors](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability) in our heads - this disproportionate reporting practice at large impacts our understanding of the world, as you describe. And I bet there's a feedback loop: the more skewed our model of the world, the more we will produce/consume skewed content.

I think this is not something you can ever truly do completely away with because of the many factors that it arises from, not limited to our psychological biases that tend us towards liking or interacting with certain form of content more than others... but certainly there should be more controls.

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

#490

Post by ynniv »

kelnos wrote: post #417
Scubabear68 wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fundamental problem I have with the GPL, and I think is echoed elsewhere here, is that the GPL is not about my code. It is trying to force my will on other people’s code. It is inherently less free because it is trying to exert dominance over things I do not own and have never been involved in. In theory, a 10 liner GPL Python script could infect an org with 20 millions lines of closed source code and try to dict…

Unfortunately you've fallen victim to years of anti-GPL propaganda and FUD. A 10-liner GPL Python script is not going to "infect" an org with 20 million lines of closed source code. Suggesting that it's possible, even "in theory", is absurd. Yes, you need to be careful when you integrate GPL and LGPL code into your proprietary code base, and in some cases you just cannot do it. But so what? You are not entitled to us…

  Unfortunately you've fallen victim to years of anti-GPL propaganda and FUD. A 10-liner GPL Python script is not going to "infect" an org with 20 million lines of closed source code. Suggesting that it's possible, even "in theory", is absurd.
Unfortunately, intention is not how law works. The GPL is a legal contract, and how much of a company's IP will come under it will be determined by a judge after lots of expensive litigation. If a suit is filed they will pick apart every line in the license, subpoena every change that was made in every version that someone could claim "was distributed" (available at a public URL?), every email that was tangentially sent, every bug that was filed, every document written, etc, just to determine the extent of what is covered. If that sounds excessive and you haven't heard of it happening, that's because no one wants to go through this and would rather settle than spending the money and effort on defending themselves. To understand the potential, look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_LLC_v._Oracle_America,_....

The GPL purposely weaponizes source code in a way that other open source licenses do not, and personally I would rather hope that people decide on their own to release their changes than invite the lawyers into my code. Using code licensed this way is okay for projects that are already 100% GPL or aren't worth owning.

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