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Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

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Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#91

Post by vezycash »

gwbas1c wrote: post #87
gregdoesit wrote: post #67

Original Skype for Web developer here. I was part of the launch team who built the first version for this product in 2014[1]. Back then we supported Chrome, IE 9+, Safari and Firefox. Already we had internal debates to support Opera, but the decision was to focus on the largest browsers. For each browser, we had to add support in our standalone plugin, that was (and still is) required to install for audio/video calls…

Edge did the right thing. I can't stand it when a product comes bundled with a bunch of bloat that I'll never use.

How about a 1-click install on first use?

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#92

Post by zsrxx »

jacquesm wrote: post #84
Spivak wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not really about that -- most shops don't support the latest version of Opera or Brave except by accident since they're Chromium backed. If they introduced a breaking incompatbility there is very little chance we would carry patches for them. 'supported browsers' are browsers that you lose customers if you don't support. You don't lose customers by telling them to switch to Chrome. Firefox's market share is smal…

> 'supported browsers' are browsers that you lose customers if you don't support. That's a great attitude towards your users. No, you, the vendor, adapt to what your users bring. That is the standard that the web was built around. Lazy developers that only wish to cater to the one browser that they have on their desk and that refuse to recognize that the world is a bit larger than their minimal view (including screen…

Firefox is sitting at 8.3% quota in NA and dwindling. It's reasonable not to support it.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#93

Post by [deleted] »

Spivak wrote: post #41
mcv wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we back to the "built for Netscape 4.7" days? Sites shouldn't support browsers, but standards. By all means check if a browser supports a certain standard, and provide an error message for browsers that are too far behind, but don't ban them simply for having the wrong user agent.

This is a nice sentiment but for actual products you end up having to say X versions of Y browsers are supported. It ends up being a feature requested by customer support teams that you prevent the app from working on unsupported browsers because users don’t read banners or pop ups and it generates pointless tickets. If you make your users change their UA there’s an awareness that things might break.

[deleted]

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#94

Post by vezycash »

cameronbrown wrote: post #70
gregdoesit wrote: post #67

Original Skype for Web developer here. I was part of the launch team who built the first version for this product in 2014[1]. Back then we supported Chrome, IE 9+, Safari and Firefox. Already we had internal debates to support Opera, but the decision was to focus on the largest browsers. For each browser, we had to add support in our standalone plugin, that was (and still is) required to install for audio/video calls…

> no dependencies and prioritised performance above anything Edge was in a weird position where it somehow looked fast but felt sluggish. A real shame it didn't work out though.

It was sluggish and hung for no reason. It was super bare boned and still slow. So, if I installed the same number of extensions as I have on Firefox, it would grind to a halt. I guess that's what we get when they prioritize looks or design over functionality.

The most annoying part for me was updates. They supposedly created Edge as a browser decoupled from the OS unlike Internet Explorer. They claimed that with Edge, they would be able to iterate quickly with regular updates - like Chrome.

Yet, for 4 years, updating edge required a major OS update AFAIK.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#95

Post by Santosh83 »

The_rationalist wrote: post #47
SmellyGeekBoy wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sad thing is that we've lived through all of this with Internet Explorer. I'd be willing to be that we will once more when Chrome stagnates and something bigger and better comes along...

Why would chromium stagnate? Everybody can improve it, even mozilla.

And that is truly disturbing, because it is not an implausible future where even Mozilla is finally compelled to rebase Firefox upon yet another Chromium fork, just to stay relevant with the fast-moving, extremely complex web ecosystem. Of course if their market share improves then they'll still be able to exercise relatively significant influence upon the Web's direction, but the big challenge in front of them is expanding their user base. They're in a kind of catch-22 situation I feel... it is going to be difficult to reclaim the slipping ground.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#96

Post by debaserab2 »

zsrxx wrote: post #92
jacquesm wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 'supported browsers' are browsers that you lose customers if you don't support. That's a great attitude towards your users. No, you, the vendor, adapt to what your users bring. That is the standard that the web was built around. Lazy developers that only wish to cater to the one browser that they have on their desk and that refuse to recognize that the world is a bit larger than their minimal view (including screen…

Firefox is sitting at 8.3% quota in NA and dwindling. It's reasonable not to support it.

I can’t imagine making the case to anyone at my work that we can/should voluntarily stop supporting 8.3% of our audience.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#97

Post by dhimes »

diydsp wrote: post #80
dhimes wrote: post #44

OT, but check out the comments in the code. It doesn't instill confidence: // Adjusts the position of the given element WebDeveloper.Common.adjustElementPosition = function(element, xPosition, yPosition, offset) { // If the element is set if(element) { var contentWindow = WebDeveloper.Common.getContentWindow(); var innerHeight = contentWindow.innerHeight; var innerWidth = contentWindow.innerWidth; var offsetHeight =…

one may snicker at the redundancy of the "is less than 0" pair and so son, but I'm grateful for "if the element will fit at the x position." It puts into words what isn't obvious from the code.

Fair enough. But if they are going to do that, wouldn't a comment about what the positions are in each case (especially the case where it doesn't fit) be helpful?

    // If it fits, put it there.  If not, align to the right side
or whatever.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#98

Post by DJHenk »

Spivak wrote: post #81
jacquesm wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'unsupported browsers' are browsers that are old or broken. FireFox is a perfectly good browser, it is current and should be supported.

It's not really about that -- most shops don't support the latest version of Opera or Brave except by accident since they're Chromium backed. If they introduced a breaking incompatbility there is very little chance we would carry patches for them. 'supported browsers' are browsers that you lose customers if you don't support. You don't lose customers by telling them to switch to Chrome. Firefox's market share is smal…

> You don't lose customers by telling them to switch to Chrome

Yes, you do. It might be a very, very small number, so small that you decide not to care about it, but you definitely lose people.

The tricky part is that most companies have no idea how many people they lose and why. It's just marketeers guessing and anecdotal evidence. The number is probably bigger than they think, because generally speaking, marketeers are not the type of persons that about browsers.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#99

Post by mellosouls »

gregdoesit wrote: post #67

Original Skype for Web developer here. I was part of the launch team who built the first version for this product in 2014[1]. Back then we supported Chrome, IE 9+, Safari and Firefox. Already we had internal debates to support Opera, but the decision was to focus on the largest browsers. For each browser, we had to add support in our standalone plugin, that was (and still is) required to install for audio/video calls…

I appreciate the inside perspective on this, and the frustration is understandable from the pov of the Skype for Web team.

The Edge team made the right decision though from this user's perspective.

I want a browser, not a Microsoft utility dashboard.

Another vote against bloat here I'm afraid.

Re: Tell HN: Skype on web does not support Firefox

#100

Post by mcv »

zsrxx wrote: post #92
jacquesm wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 'supported browsers' are browsers that you lose customers if you don't support. That's a great attitude towards your users. No, you, the vendor, adapt to what your users bring. That is the standard that the web was built around. Lazy developers that only wish to cater to the one browser that they have on their desk and that refuse to recognize that the world is a bit larger than their minimal view (including screen…

Firefox is sitting at 8.3% quota in NA and dwindling. It's reasonable not to support it.

That number should grow again. It's becoming increasingly obvious what a privacy leak Chrome is, and Firefox is just as good, making it an obvious choice for anyone who cares about privacy.
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