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Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

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Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#81

Post by alganet »

taf2 wrote: post #53

Not even close. IE 6 didn’t get any updates or new web features for years. It was closed source. It was dead and everyone used it. float:right; zoom:1; was a common necessity… to compare them is an insult to the immense progress and effort spent over the last 24 years… (yes chrome started in 2007, but the teams from Firefox get credit too, many of them went on to build chrome ). The open source movement won, IE is de…

Then why does it feel like standards lost?

We don't have float:right;zoom1: but our "necessities" nowadays are even crazier. Babel, vdom, frameworks provided by browser-vendors. Those are several orders of magnitude more complex than previous "workaround" approaches to the web, all unstandardized.

How about Electron? Do we see any Firefox-based desktop apps around or is that market completely dominated by the Chrome runtime? Are app developers happy having only Chromium as the viable solution? (my guess: they're not, but they have no choice).

Where we're going is even nastier than clearfixes and table layouts.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#82

Post by inquirerGeneral »

HWR_14 wrote: post #30
MBCook wrote: post #11

Yes. If it works on Chrome, no one cares or even tests for other things. If there is a JS feature in Chrome they want to use, so it’s impossible to use other browsers (instead of looking wrong) people do it. Performs fine in Chrome? Ship it. Yes, Chrome is the new IE in that it’s the only browsers companies care about, just like IE was for a very long time. Everything has to be Chrome compatible to succeed. That’s th…

Unless you want to have customers on iOS.

[dead]

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#83

Post by m4rtink »

alganet wrote: post #81
taf2 wrote: post #53

Not even close. IE 6 didn’t get any updates or new web features for years. It was closed source. It was dead and everyone used it. float:right; zoom:1; was a common necessity… to compare them is an insult to the immense progress and effort spent over the last 24 years… (yes chrome started in 2007, but the teams from Firefox get credit too, many of them went on to build chrome ). The open source movement won, IE is de…

Then why does it feel like standards lost? We don't have float:right;zoom1: but our "necessities" nowadays are even crazier. Babel, vdom, frameworks provided by browser-vendors. Those are several orders of magnitude more complex than previous "workaround" approaches to the web, all unstandardized. How about Electron? Do we see any Firefox-based desktop apps around or is that market completely dominated by the Chrome…

Isn't this a Firefox/Mozilla fault as well ? Afaik there is really no API or support for embedding Gecko & anyone who tries to do that, is on their own, having to periodically rebase large patch sets for embedding.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#84

Post by purplejacket »

taf2 wrote: post #53

Not even close. IE 6 didn’t get any updates or new web features for years. It was closed source. It was dead and everyone used it. float:right; zoom:1; was a common necessity… to compare them is an insult to the immense progress and effort spent over the last 24 years… (yes chrome started in 2007, but the teams from Firefox get credit too, many of them went on to build chrome ). The open source movement won, IE is de…

Ummm ... 2024 - 2007 = 17

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#85

Post by sowut »

every time i get a new work machine i attempt to use a browser that is not chrome. last time was firefox, this time was safari. eventually i start using chrome on certain sites because of ublock origin. then, as was the case with aws, certain websites are flakey enough times that i just give in and use chrome full time.

side note: hey aws, why is your rds performance insights dashboard broken on safari? 33% of the time it will "freeze" and i have to reload the page. very un-dude like.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#86

Post by darknavi »

sowut wrote: post #85

every time i get a new work machine i attempt to use a browser that is not chrome. last time was firefox, this time was safari. eventually i start using chrome on certain sites because of ublock origin. then, as was the case with aws, certain websites are flakey enough times that i just give in and use chrome full time. side note: hey aws, why is your rds performance insights dashboard broken on safari? 33% of the ti…

> eventually i start using chrome on certain sites because of ublock origin.

uBO works fine on Firefox for what it's worth. Maybe even better because of the lack of Manifest v3 restrictions.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#87

Post by bunderbunder »

wseqyrku wrote: post #15
MBCook wrote: post #11

Yes. If it works on Chrome, no one cares or even tests for other things. If there is a JS feature in Chrome they want to use, so it’s impossible to use other browsers (instead of looking wrong) people do it. Performs fine in Chrome? Ship it. Yes, Chrome is the new IE in that it’s the only browsers companies care about, just like IE was for a very long time. Everything has to be Chrome compatible to succeed. That’s th…

> If it works on Chrome, no one cares or even tests for other things. We've been through an extensive standardization pass for this to not happen. Anything not matching the specification whether in Chrome or any other browser should be considered a bug. This is not at all the same as IE, where it just went its own way.

The unstated major premise of this assertion is that the standard is a spec that every browser must comply with exactly. It's not; there's not a single browser that has ever implemented 100% of whatever was the latest standard at the time, and major browsers typically also include many of their own additions that go beyond the standard.

This latter bit isn't in conflict with the standard; it's an essential part of the standardization process. The typical route for something making it into the standard is for a browser to release their own browser-specific extension and use that as a basis for advocating that it be added to the standard. XMLHttpRequest, for example, started as an IE-only feature and didn't make it into all the other major browsers for several years. It got a published W3C spec a little bit after that, which meant that browsers needed another couple years to also get synced up on their behavior.

In this respect, Chrome has definitely now taken IE's old position: new Web standards have a tendency to start as Chrome-specific extensions, and then the other browsers have to implement their own versions and get them ratified into the W3C specs in an effort to try and keep up. Which in turn suggests that a compatibility-minded Web developer might want to choose a similar strategy from what was done in the past: test on the most popular browser last.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#88

Post by _fat_santa »

One issue I keep see cropping up with various corporate websites is they will only allow Chrome and will block any other browser. I would say in 9/10 cases, this isn't because the site uses features not supported in other browsers but rather, developers restrict it to Chrome because that's all their QA's test on.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#89

Post by giantrobot »

saghm wrote: post #77
theshrike79 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do know that Edge is Chromium repackaged, like all other browsers except Safari and Firefox?

So then why does Microsoft try to push it so hard on users who are trying to use Chrome? It's hard to believe they're just trying to save everyone the minimal time and effort that's being spent installing a different browser by randomly deciding to force a full-screen ad on an OS update. At absolute best, it's benign but worth not using simply to avoid rewarding whatever misguided incentives lead to them to "market"…

The Edge browser engine is just Chromium. But the Edge browser has loads of telemetry active. Microsoft wants you to use Edge because the telemetry makes them money, rendering websites doesn't really make them money.

Re: Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

#90

Post by alganet »

m4rtink wrote: post #83
alganet wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then why does it feel like standards lost? We don't have float:right;zoom1: but our "necessities" nowadays are even crazier. Babel, vdom, frameworks provided by browser-vendors. Those are several orders of magnitude more complex than previous "workaround" approaches to the web, all unstandardized. How about Electron? Do we see any Firefox-based desktop apps around or is that market completely dominated by the Chrome…

Isn't this a Firefox/Mozilla fault as well ? Afaik there is really no API or support for embedding Gecko & anyone who tries to do that, is on their own, having to periodically rebase large patch sets for embedding.

Possibly. I guess XUL was that API, but XUL is no more.

It helps if your company uses the embedded stuff in other products. Like Microsoft used the Trident engine from IE6 all over Windows components. In that way, allocating resources for developing an embeddable engine is justifiable. Can Mozilla do that? I don'know. Google can (and does it! why wouldn't they?).

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