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

Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

541–550 of 593 posts

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#541

Post by mtomweb »

dmitriid wrote: post #539
mtomweb wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our group was initially formed by a group of people who develop for iOS Safari on daily basis. We have an exceptionally detailed understanding of the bugs and functionality issues of the browser. The only reason google is in the conversation at all is their browser along with Firefox and Edge has vastly better functionality and stability. We’re trying to fix real world problems caused by anti-competitive behavior. An…

> Our group was initially formed by a group of people who develop for iOS Safari on daily basis. Yes, you keep copy-pasting that. As if that absolves you of factually incorrect statements. > We have an exceptionally detailed understanding of the bugs and functionality issues of the browser. And yet you fail to understand that hardware APIs are opposed by BOTH Safari AND Firefox. And yet you include them in your lists…

The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument which would require us to argue each and every API on its individual merits something neither of us has time for.

Instead let’s focus on the core issues: 1. Severe underfunding of Safari 2. Bugs 3. Install Prompts/Banners 4. Push API

1. Apple has no incentive to fund their browser while they are not at any risk of losing market share to the competition on their primary OS.

2. Because of the underfunding and the fact users/developers can’t shift to other browsers, bugs that are either impossible to work around (or require a very high level of skills) have not been fixed. Some which were reported 7 years ago.

3. Users do not know web apps exist. They have no way to install them.

4. Notifications arrived for native apps in 2009, in 2022 they still are not available for web apps even though they are essential for many different types of apps. Apple has promised them in 2023 likely as a result of our advocacy work.

Without a viable web ecosystem on iOS mobile web apps are dead and the entire ecosystem gets shifted to native apps and webkit applies no competitive pressure on chrome/edge or Firefox. The status quo is the worse case scenario.

The fix for this scenario is competition. With a 60% market share on MacOS (the on my comparable market where Safari is the default), as long as apple meets developer needs then I can’t see them losing a majority market share on iOS.

A highly funded Webkit be able to contribute to the web ecosystem instead of holding it back.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#542

Post by account42 »

MBCook wrote: post #14

I’m going to ignore the security angle and post my big fear. Chrome has dominance similar to IE at the height of its popularity. Whatever you think of their decisions, Apple is the only thing stopping a 90%+ Chrome web. (Note: not why they’re doing it, just a side effect) People keep arguing Apple is being anti-competitive. But no one seems to recon with the possible consequences of what they’re asking for. And I fea…

> No, I don’t know a good solution.

I know one: Anti-trust enforcement.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#543

Post by dmitriid »

mtomweb wrote: post #541
dmitriid wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Our group was initially formed by a group of people who develop for iOS Safari on daily basis. Yes, you keep copy-pasting that. As if that absolves you of factually incorrect statements. > We have an exceptionally detailed understanding of the bugs and functionality issues of the browser. And yet you fail to understand that hardware APIs are opposed by BOTH Safari AND Firefox. And yet you include them in your lists…

The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument which would require us to argue each and every API on its individual merits something neither of us has time for. Instead let’s focus on the core issues: 1. Severe underfunding of Safari 2. Bugs 3. Install Prompts/Banners 4. Push API 1. Apple has no incentive to fund their browser while they are not at any risk of losing market share to the com…

> The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument

I focused on some APIs I know about. There's nothing strawman about facts that you misrepresented in your diatribe. How can I be sure that you represented everything else correctly?

Oh. I can't. Because I also saw your section on "Edge differentiation".

Should I go through everyting else and discover same misrepresentation and falseness? I think I won't, these two are quite enough, thank you.

> Instead let’s focus on the core issues

You keep skipping from goal post to goal post, and each next argument you make isn't made in good faith.

> 1. 2.

I'm not even going to dignify this speculation with an answer

> 3. 4.

And again and again all comes down to literally one or two standards. That's it. That's all you really have.

Well, sometimes you have more, but then it's just a random dump of random standards that you are absolutely sure are actual standards (and not "Draft comunity reports" by Google) and that everyone must implement them now.

> Without a viable web ecosystem on iOS mobile

Please define a "viable web ecosystem". So far it looks like to you "a viable ecosystem" is "anything that Google implements, others be damned".

> web apps are dead

Yes, they are dead. For many reasons that have nothing to do with notifications.

> The fix for this scenario is competition. With a 60% market share on MacOS

Yes. Let's talk about competition. There is none, it's fully dominated by Google: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31905404

Oh wait. You don't really care about that.

> A highly funded Webkit be able to contribute to the web ecosystem instead of holding it back.

Webkit is contributing to the web ecosystem, and isn't holding it back. For the obvious reason that your definition of a viable web is taken straight out of Google propaganda, and has nothing to do with making the web viable.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#544

Post by iggldiggl »

antifa wrote: post #506
afiori wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also since Firefox for android removed one of its distinctive features a few years ago; once you could set it to ask how to open a link (send to another device, share, copy to clipboard, open normally) when an app tried to start a browser; now you can no longer do that. I use different browsers for different things so I want to chose how to open external app links. I would install a shim browser that does just that i…

I'm not sure if it will do everything you need, but I've had great experiences with "Open Link With" on f-droid. https://f-droid.org/packages/com.tasomaniac.openwith.floss/

"Open Link With" is indeed great for routing between different apps, but the problem remains that within Firefox you currently no longer have any choice of what to do with the link – it'll always open the full browser and open a new tab first.

Previously,

1. you had the choice of activating the "tab queue" system for links opened with Firefox, i.e. the URLs would then only be saved in a list in the background instead of launching the full browser.

2. when sharing an URL with Firefox, you had the aforementioned choice of "actually open the link", "bookmark it", or "use Firefox Sync to send the URL to some other Firefox instance in your Sync account". The latter two choices happened in the background, so you didn't have to wait for the full browser UI+engine to start first, the page to load, etc. etc.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#545

Post by mtomweb »

dmitriid wrote: post #543
mtomweb wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument which would require us to argue each and every API on its individual merits something neither of us has time for. Instead let’s focus on the core issues: 1. Severe underfunding of Safari 2. Bugs 3. Install Prompts/Banners 4. Push API 1. Apple has no incentive to fund their browser while they are not at any risk of losing market share to the com…

> The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument I focused on some APIs I know about. There's nothing strawman about facts that you misrepresented in your diatribe. How can I be sure that you represented everything else correctly? Oh. I can't. Because I also saw your section on "Edge differentiation". Should I go through everyting else and discover same misrepresentation and falseness? I th…

Pointless discussing if you can’t agree on any of the basic factual points.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#546

Post by alickz »

veilrap wrote: post #419
adamius wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does Apple get to choose how its competitor gets to compete? We give microsoft plenty of flak for anti-competitive behavior. It deserves it too. Its not hard to see why. But so does Apple. Now why can't I install my silly joke app? Oh that's right Apple won't let me install my joke app on my devices or friends for more than a week or so for reasons. Even though it can be easily tracked to me, its signed etc. Why…

No one is forced to use Apple products at all. Choosing an Apple product over non-apple products is a choice. There is extensive competition with Apple products. Choosing to buy an iPad, and being upset that they can't install linux on it, failed to do any product research before buying the product. Many people, myself included, choose to use Apple products in part BECAUSE of how those products work and function, tod…

>I don't want to install additional browsers, app stores, or other crap on my phone, I just want it to work well, out of the box with reasonably high security.

I don't see these as mutually exclusive.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#547

Post by alickz »

Retr0id wrote: post #378
bogwog wrote: post #29

IIRC, every video game console that ships with webkit has been jailbroken due to vulnerabilities in webkit. Off the top of my head at least, I know the following have been exploited that way: * PS4 * PS Vita * 3DS/New 3DS * Wii U * Wii Also maybe PS3/PSP and likely also PS5 will get the webkit exploit treatment at some point.

A couple of things to note here. Firstly, this is not a webkit-specific problem - It's just that webkit is the most commonly embedded browser engine. I have personally jailbroken my LG smart TV using a V8 n-day exploit (details not public, yet). For any modern browser engine that is left unpatched, it is only a matter of time before it can be exploited using publicly-available techniques - and console manufacturers k…

>I have personally jailbroken my LG smart TV using a V8 n-day exploit (details not public, yet).

What have you done with your jailbroken TV?

I was considering jailbreaking my LG Smart TV too as I _hate_ the Home screen with a passion and was hoping to replace it. But I use the Game Mode all the time, so I was hesitant to jailbreak in case that interfered.

I'm just curious why you've jailbroken yours and whether or not I should.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#548

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

elashri wrote: post #319
mtomweb wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes users should be free to choose whatever browser they want and the gatekeeper shouldn't be allowed to interfere with that.

That is not my point. I mean the point is that many people who chose to own IOS did that because of privacy and security it provides as the current apple ecosystem. It is like choosing a private school with a restrict rules and code of conduct over another private school with more open rules (options) since you pay for your phone anyway.

or they could just be choosing the prettiest glass and metal rectangle

without data, we can't assume either of our justifications are what go through buyers minds

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#549

Post by dmitriid »

jpgvm wrote: post #528
artdigital wrote: post #527

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Chrome is something users install because it's their preferred choice. We can argue as to why it's their preferred choice but the point remains that users actively download and install Chrome - usually as one of the first things they do when they purchase a new computer. Chrome is getting bundled with a buttload of software. So many software that comes with an ‘installer’ has a hidden checkbox somewhere that if you…

I think there is a big difference between engine monopoly vs browser monopoly, however that does depend on how well governance works for the Chromium project (I really don't know enough to assert anything concrete). Namely an engine isn't a product and most value-add is in the porcelain of the browser, implementation of web standards -shouldn't- be a competitive advantage because doing leads the the sort of fragmenta…

Current theoretical way of web standards is: a standard can only become a standard if there are two independent implementations of it.

This somewhat prevents browsers from implementing fully proprietary tech that canät be replicated by anyone else. It does lead to problems like WebSQL being scrapped (the idea was to basically run sqlite in the browser, Mozilla said they donät want to reverse-engineer sqlite behaviour for an independent implementation, the idea was scrapped).

However, with Google dominance we see more and more things appearing in Chrome only and based on Chrome's own goals, and then advertised as standards.

There's an ideal state somewhere, but I don't know how we could reach it.

Re: Apple's claim is that it bans other browsers for security

#550

Post by ImPostingOnHN »

dmitriid wrote: post #543
mtomweb wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument which would require us to argue each and every API on its individual merits something neither of us has time for. Instead let’s focus on the core issues: 1. Severe underfunding of Safari 2. Bugs 3. Install Prompts/Banners 4. Push API 1. Apple has no incentive to fund their browser while they are not at any risk of losing market share to the com…

> The issue is you are focusing on the specific APIs as a strawman argument I focused on some APIs I know about. There's nothing strawman about facts that you misrepresented in your diatribe. How can I be sure that you represented everything else correctly? Oh. I can't. Because I also saw your section on "Edge differentiation". Should I go through everyting else and discover same misrepresentation and falseness? I th…

as an observer, most of your responses to valid, good faith points (e.g. "I'm not even going to dignify that with a response") seem to indicate that you are arguing to argue, rather than to come to clarity with the other person. Also, they are pretty rude (for reasons beyond the above one), and seem to me to be against the spirit of HN commenting.

tl;dr if you think your dignity is above responding to someone, don't.

Post reply on HN