19 ms·

If your app only works in Webkit / Blink, you've written a Chrome App and not a Web App. Your CUSTOMERS do not want to see "To use this site / app, stop using

by skrowl 10y ago

If your app only works in Webkit / Blink, you've written a Chrome App and not a Web App. Your CUSTOMERS do not want to see "To use this site / app, stop using the web browser you've chosen to use (or your company has chosen for you) and go install this instead!"

nathancahill 10y ago
Here's a thought exercise: how will this trend be exacerbated by the Electron/Chromium stack? Should Mozilla develop a competing engine for "native" apps?
- Etzos 10y ago
  They are actually already doing this[1]. [1] https://github.com/mozilla/positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron
- ronjouch 10y ago
  Mozilla is developing a competing engine for native apps. The word "embedded" is part of Servo's [1] elevator pitch: Servo is a modern, high-performance browser engine designed for both application and embedded use. Sponsored by Mozilla and written in the new systems programming language Rust, the Servo project aims to achieve better parallelism, security, modularity, and performance. [1] https://servo.org/ https://servo.org/ EDIT seeing Etzos's answer, I see better what you meant (de-facto "standardizing" around electron). positron looks like a better answer then. But long term, there's clear interest from Servo developers, see http://blog.servo.org/2015/05/01/forward/ http://blog.servo.org/2015/05/01/forward/ and Ctrl+F for "Chromium Embedded Framework"
  - nathancahill 10y ago
    Great. I'd prefer to see Servo and browser.html replace the heavy Electron stack.
    - tehbeard 10y ago
      How light is servo + browser.html? you seem to be implying it's much less than electron. Any figures? I haven't looked at Servo / browser.html / rust at all apart from seeing a few news articles pop up on HN the last few months.
      - nathancahill 10y ago
        Hard to say since it's still in development. Maybe someone with more knowledge can chime in. But it's focus is on parallelism and performance, so I have high hopes. Slack (a flagship of Electron apps) is currently using 850mb of ram, idle in the background. Firefox with 50 tabs open is using the same amount.
        nickpsecurity 10y ago
        Holy crap! 850MB for a chat client!? Just made the argument for truly, native apps right there.
      - nachtigall 10y ago
        See this demo comparing Chrome, Firefox and Servo WebRender: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0hYIRQRiws https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0hYIRQRiws Servo WebRender uses the GPU making it much faster than classic renderers (besides CPU parallelism), think of it like a Webbrowser using Video Gaming technology. There's a talk about this at https://air.mozilla.org/bay-area-rust-meetup-february-2016/ https://air.mozilla.org/bay-area-rust-meetup-february-2016/ (HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11175258 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11175258) browser.html is just the current "skin" for Servo.
        tehbeard 10y ago
        Any tests done on integrated graphics such as those in normal laptops?
        ronjouch 10y ago
  - Manishearth 10y ago
    Servo is super long term; it is more of a testing ground than a product. It is possible that it will become a product in the future, and embedding is a really lucrative space for us to try, but no plans for a product right now. Positron is indeed the thing you are looking for.
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  Don't forget Cordova where most views are also Chrome based. (The exception being Windows, by default, and many don't seem to test on Windows.) Obviously Mozilla tried and failed with Firefox OS to play in that market at the mobile level. It might be nice to see an Electron and/or Cordova-compatible view engine from Mozilla, but I'm not sure how much adoption or testing it would see unless it became the default (and even then you probably would have a bunch of web developers revert to Chrome views simply because its comfortable to what they know).
- latortuga 10y ago
  Mozilla actually had one for years, called XULRunner.
  - dfabulich 10y ago
    It's not good; people use Electron instead of XULRunner because XULRunner was barely maintained. It would randomly stop working on major Firefox releases, and would stay broken for weeks, because nobody noticed or cared that XULRunner didn't work, as long as core Firefox kept working. Even when it did work, working with XPCOM sucked. Positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron is the new XULRunner. WIP, doesn't actually work yet. :-(
tomjen3 10y ago
The trouble with that is what do you do with older versions of the browsers? Edge is okay with features, but then you have people who complain that your website looks funny in your browser because they still run IE 8 or 10.

by skrowl 10y ago

nathancahill 10y ago

Here's a thought exercise: how will this trend be exacerbated by the Electron/Chromium stack? Should Mozilla develop a competing engine for "native" apps?

Etzos 10y ago
They are actually already doing this[1]. [1] https://github.com/mozilla/positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron
ronjouch 10y ago
Mozilla is developing a competing engine for native apps. The word "embedded" is part of Servo's [1] elevator pitch: Servo is a modern, high-performance browser engine designed for both application and embedded use. Sponsored by Mozilla and written in the new systems programming language Rust, the Servo project aims to achieve better parallelism, security, modularity, and performance. [1] https://servo.org/ https://servo.org/ EDIT seeing Etzos's answer, I see better what you meant (de-facto "standardizing" around electron). positron looks like a better answer then. But long term, there's clear interest from Servo developers, see http://blog.servo.org/2015/05/01/forward/ http://blog.servo.org/2015/05/01/forward/ and Ctrl+F for "Chromium Embedded Framework"
- nathancahill 10y ago
  Great. I'd prefer to see Servo and browser.html replace the heavy Electron stack.
  - tehbeard 10y ago
    How light is servo + browser.html? you seem to be implying it's much less than electron. Any figures? I haven't looked at Servo / browser.html / rust at all apart from seeing a few news articles pop up on HN the last few months.
    - nathancahill 10y ago
      Hard to say since it's still in development. Maybe someone with more knowledge can chime in. But it's focus is on parallelism and performance, so I have high hopes. Slack (a flagship of Electron apps) is currently using 850mb of ram, idle in the background. Firefox with 50 tabs open is using the same amount.
      - nickpsecurity 10y ago
        Holy crap! 850MB for a chat client!? Just made the argument for truly, native apps right there.
    - nachtigall 10y ago
      See this demo comparing Chrome, Firefox and Servo WebRender: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0hYIRQRiws https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0hYIRQRiws Servo WebRender uses the GPU making it much faster than classic renderers (besides CPU parallelism), think of it like a Webbrowser using Video Gaming technology. There's a talk about this at https://air.mozilla.org/bay-area-rust-meetup-february-2016/ https://air.mozilla.org/bay-area-rust-meetup-february-2016/ (HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11175258 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11175258) browser.html is just the current "skin" for Servo.
      - tehbeard 10y ago
        Any tests done on integrated graphics such as those in normal laptops?
        ronjouch 10y ago
- Manishearth 10y ago
  Servo is super long term; it is more of a testing ground than a product. It is possible that it will become a product in the future, and embedding is a really lucrative space for us to try, but no plans for a product right now. Positron is indeed the thing you are looking for.
WorldMaker 10y ago
Don't forget Cordova where most views are also Chrome based. (The exception being Windows, by default, and many don't seem to test on Windows.) Obviously Mozilla tried and failed with Firefox OS to play in that market at the mobile level. It might be nice to see an Electron and/or Cordova-compatible view engine from Mozilla, but I'm not sure how much adoption or testing it would see unless it became the default (and even then you probably would have a bunch of web developers revert to Chrome views simply because its comfortable to what they know).
latortuga 10y ago
Mozilla actually had one for years, called XULRunner.
- dfabulich 10y ago
  It's not good; people use Electron instead of XULRunner because XULRunner was barely maintained. It would randomly stop working on major Firefox releases, and would stay broken for weeks, because nobody noticed or cared that XULRunner didn't work, as long as core Firefox kept working. Even when it did work, working with XPCOM sucked. Positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron https://github.com/mozilla/positron is the new XULRunner. WIP, doesn't actually work yet. :-(

tomjen3 10y ago

The trouble with that is what do you do with older versions of the browsers? Edge is okay with features, but then you have people who complain that your website looks funny in your browser because they still run IE 8 or 10.