3 ms·

The initial load of the site takes more than 4 seconds on a Wifi on iPhone 6s. Also, edge swipe from right or left on iPhone completely doesn't work.

ClayFerguson 10y ago
lol. I forgot to say look at the github code, not the site, because I have minification turned off right now, and I do have all modules loaded into a single file (so, big initial download right now). The app is not ready for users, it's in development. I will edit to show the github link instead. thanks. (It's the architecture of it that I'm bragging on, it's not fully production-ready code yet.)
- ec109685 10y ago
  But what about it do you think is better than a traditional quickly rendered sever HTML? You have to do all this work that the browser would do for you via complicated JavaScript frameworks, merely to simulate a traditional HTML rendered page. Compare your site to Wikipedia for example. Which feels smoother, especially on a mobile page?
  - ClayFerguson 10y ago
    Here's one of a million scenarios i can think of: Say someone is browsing nodes on the meta64 tree, then decides to edit one. I popup an editor and let them edit, they can then cancel out and go back EXACTLY where they were, without a page reload and scrolling back to where they were. SPAs are all about the fact that everything maintains state in a Javascript app until it's changed. A javascript application is like a computer program running in your browser. Whether you realize it or not, every page reload is a 'restart' of that app. Do you think an app needs to RESTART just because someone changes screens or soemthing? It's insane right? Without an SPA that is that is genuinely whats really happening.
    - ec109685 10y ago
      The browser will maintain the history if you opened the editor in a new page like HN does. For example, if I hit the back button or if there was a cancel button when composing this comment, I would return to exactly where I left off in the full list of comments. I agree you can get into a slightly weird situation if you hit the back button after composing a new comment but your site would suffer the same.
      - ClayFerguson 10y ago
        In my site, the back button takes you to the app you were at BEFORE you went to meta64. If you want to call that a problem fine. Most SPAs abhor the back button, don't want it, don't need it, etc. There is a reason native apps don't use the 'back' feature, but simply have 'cancel' buttons to get out of things etc. The fact that the back button is such a thorn in the side of non-spa apps is a good hint that non-spa apps are not ideal, unless browsing static documents. BTW even hacker news has a 'back functionality' that sucks. You have to go back then refresh. Meta64 is already vastly superior to other online social media experiences including wikipedia and including better than this HN site.
        ec109685 10y ago
        Most Native apps do have a back button. On android it is built into the phone. Also, serious question: if I navigate your rss outline, how do I go back and chose a different section to browse? Right now you are stuck in the section you chose and the back button closes the app.
        ClayFerguson 10y ago
        My GUI design is definitely not yet perfected. I experiment with lots of different things. The website is not ready for users, but mostly DOES work. The RSS is pretty much usable however. One of my own main news sources. The triangle icon at the top is what takes you to the Parent node. BTW, i'm 49yrs old so my definition of "native" still means "desktop". lol. Apps like MSFT Word (and all others) don't have back buttons, becasue the back button was invented for web browsers showing static documents, back in 1993. It just still exists, but today but is valueless (and even problematic) for SPAs.
  - flukus 10y ago
    Or stick with client side rendering and make it a proper desktop app.
    - ClayFerguson 10y ago
      In a way modern SPAs with a large JS installed payload/app on a browser are very simiar to a 'desktop' app communicating via a form of RPC to some remote services. The main "epiphany" most developers are still missing today is how to make a SPA/WebApp consume ONLY a data-serving API in the browser that gets back ONLY JSON (no HTML) from the server calls, and yet be able to render itself into HTML. The main leap of knowledge is to learn how to do HTML rendering on the browser, and not the client. Let the server be only an raw Data API, that sends back DATA and no presentation. Like Microservices.

ClayFerguson 10y ago

lol. I forgot to say look at the github code, not the site, because I have minification turned off right now, and I do have all modules loaded into a single file (so, big initial download right now). The app is not ready for users, it's in development. I will edit to show the github link instead. thanks. (It's the architecture of it that I'm bragging on, it's not fully production-ready code yet.)

ec109685 10y ago
But what about it do you think is better than a traditional quickly rendered sever HTML? You have to do all this work that the browser would do for you via complicated JavaScript frameworks, merely to simulate a traditional HTML rendered page. Compare your site to Wikipedia for example. Which feels smoother, especially on a mobile page?
- ClayFerguson 10y ago
  Here's one of a million scenarios i can think of: Say someone is browsing nodes on the meta64 tree, then decides to edit one. I popup an editor and let them edit, they can then cancel out and go back EXACTLY where they were, without a page reload and scrolling back to where they were. SPAs are all about the fact that everything maintains state in a Javascript app until it's changed. A javascript application is like a computer program running in your browser. Whether you realize it or not, every page reload is a 'restart' of that app. Do you think an app needs to RESTART just because someone changes screens or soemthing? It's insane right? Without an SPA that is that is genuinely whats really happening.
  - ec109685 10y ago
    The browser will maintain the history if you opened the editor in a new page like HN does. For example, if I hit the back button or if there was a cancel button when composing this comment, I would return to exactly where I left off in the full list of comments. I agree you can get into a slightly weird situation if you hit the back button after composing a new comment but your site would suffer the same.
    - ClayFerguson 10y ago
      In my site, the back button takes you to the app you were at BEFORE you went to meta64. If you want to call that a problem fine. Most SPAs abhor the back button, don't want it, don't need it, etc. There is a reason native apps don't use the 'back' feature, but simply have 'cancel' buttons to get out of things etc. The fact that the back button is such a thorn in the side of non-spa apps is a good hint that non-spa apps are not ideal, unless browsing static documents. BTW even hacker news has a 'back functionality' that sucks. You have to go back then refresh. Meta64 is already vastly superior to other online social media experiences including wikipedia and including better than this HN site.
      - ec109685 10y ago
        Most Native apps do have a back button. On android it is built into the phone. Also, serious question: if I navigate your rss outline, how do I go back and chose a different section to browse? Right now you are stuck in the section you chose and the back button closes the app.
        ClayFerguson 10y ago
        My GUI design is definitely not yet perfected. I experiment with lots of different things. The website is not ready for users, but mostly DOES work. The RSS is pretty much usable however. One of my own main news sources. The triangle icon at the top is what takes you to the Parent node. BTW, i'm 49yrs old so my definition of "native" still means "desktop". lol. Apps like MSFT Word (and all others) don't have back buttons, becasue the back button was invented for web browsers showing static documents, back in 1993. It just still exists, but today but is valueless (and even problematic) for SPAs.
- flukus 10y ago
  Or stick with client side rendering and make it a proper desktop app.
  - ClayFerguson 10y ago
    In a way modern SPAs with a large JS installed payload/app on a browser are very simiar to a 'desktop' app communicating via a form of RPC to some remote services. The main "epiphany" most developers are still missing today is how to make a SPA/WebApp consume ONLY a data-serving API in the browser that gets back ONLY JSON (no HTML) from the server calls, and yet be able to render itself into HTML. The main leap of knowledge is to learn how to do HTML rendering on the browser, and not the client. Let the server be only an raw Data API, that sends back DATA and no presentation. Like Microservices.