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Please excuse this off-topic comment, but the webpage is severely dysfunctional. Unless JavaScript is enabled in the browser, the page will just display a loadi

Please excuse this off-topic comment, but the webpage is severely dysfunctional. Unless JavaScript is enabled in the browser, the page will just display a loading screen. All the content is right there in the HTML and it would be perfectly readable if it wasn't deliberately obscured by the "loading" screen.[1] I'm sure the idea is that the page will load perfectly all at once, there won't be flashes of unstyled text and so on, but for me it just means that the real content won't load at all. Curiously, mobile users (or other users with small screens) are spared the loading page.[2] That's nice for mobile users, I guess, but as a desktop user it's just salt in the wound. If the plain page is good enough for mobile users, why isn't it good enough for me? Please, web developers, stop doing this. It's not just the minority of people who browse with JavaScript disabled who are bothered by this, think of all the people on slow Internet connections who have to wait for your megabyte+ JavaScript program to download and execute before they can read the content of the 50 KB HTML page. I understand that it is not feasible to accommodate no-JS browsers for Single Page Applications because JavaScript is essential to their functionality, but this page is not an application and JS is obviously not essential to it. Use JavaScript to enhance webpages, not degrade them. - [1] Yes, Reader View in Firefox (and similar) are able to render the page properly. It's a wonderful utility, but I shouldn't have to strip away your broken web design to read your content. - [2] https://streamable.com/b390d https://streamable.com/b390d (no JS mirror: https://cgt.name/files/fortheloveofgod.ogv https://cgt.name/files/fortheloveofgod.ogv)

Karunamon 9y ago
Ye gods! uBlock Origin had a whopping 29 items blocked here here. I know mainstream corporate news sites with less garbage in them!
aaronbrethorst 9y ago
I felt the same way. I was expecting an article about Python, not a loading indicator on my broadband connection.
drivingmenuts 9y ago
What's amusing, and by amusing, I mean not amusing at all, is that there isn't any heavy content in the page - it's all text until you get to the comments, which aren't going to be seen until you get to the end of the article. When all you have is a hammer and so on and so forth ...
make3 9y ago
let's be honest here, no company is going to make change for the 0.001% who happen to disable javascript
- snakeanus 9y ago
  I would assume that more than 0.001% of the people use the Tor browser.
  - infinite8s 9y ago
    The number of people using Tor is probably less then the number if people who disable JavaScript.
  - joshuamorton 9y ago
    If you count bridges, then .001% is pretty close (not more than .005%). Apparently about 1/3 of people on earth have a mobile broadband connection, so approximately 2 billion of those, and ~60K tor bridge connections.
- insertnickname 9y ago
  As I said, this isn't just a problem for no-JS browsers, it's also a problem for people with slow Internet connections. They might be able to load the HTML and CSS reasonably fast, but then they'll have to sit around waiting while megabytes of JS is downloaded and then executed before they can finally read the article. I'm not asking developers to do extra work to accommodate no-JS browsers, I'm asking them to not do extra work to deliberately prevent sites from working without JS. The page would have worked perfectly if the author had not done extra work to add a useless loading screen. I'm asking developers to do less work, not more.
- camus2 9y ago
  No reason to generate that page using Javascript, it's just a blog post. It took 10 seconds to load on my computer by the way, when loading should be almost immediate considering the little amount of text on that page. If you are going to show me a pre-loader at least inform me about what is about to be loaded. 1 second more of wait and i would have left that page.
smrq 9y ago
I feel like every page posted to HN that has any JavaScript gets this comment. It's usually an overreaction in my opinion. For this page, it wasn't. Holy moly, it took a rather generous amount of time until it loaded the loading spinner, followed by enough loading time that I would have closed the tab if not for my curiosity on how long it was going to take in the end. And all that for a brief article with mild syntax highlighting.
- Spivak 9y ago
  > HN that has any JavaScript It's really only pages that use JS to create a user experience that's worse than not having it at all.
mplewis 9y ago
Just profiled the page via Chrome's "Fast 3G" network preset. I saw 3.5 MB download over 21 seconds before the spinner disappeared. The DOM content was ready at 7.8 seconds – still far too long.
- ColinCochrane 9y ago
  I ran a performance audit from the Chrome dev tools: First meaningful paint: 8,820 ms First Interactive : 11,420 ms Those are brutal numbers for just about anything, let alone a simple blog post.
  - yoodenvranx 9y ago
    Info like this should be automatically added as a flair right next to each submission on HN. Time to first interactive, download sizes, number of ads, ... This would actually be a nice side project. Throw each link which was submitted to HN at a headless Chrome/Firefox, do performance/ads/size analysis, save everything to a database and then make it available to the HN user through a browser plugin which adds this info next to each submission. And then you can even display badges of shame for the worst offender or block links and other stuff. Any takers?
    - jl6 9y ago
      This is why I always go to the comments on HN first. I can usually rely on the top comment to do one or all of the following: * neutralize clickbait * provide an instant endorsement (worth reading) or rebuttal (not) * warn of slow/heavy/ad-ridden user experience
  - graysonk 9y ago
    Wow it got a 15/100 Pagespeed score on Mobile https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.chrisbarra.xyz%2Fposts%2Flet-me-introduce-slots%2F&tab=mobile https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=...
zeveb 9y ago
I have flagged the submission for exactly this reason: the page is not fit for purpose, and indeed appears to maliciously require code execution in order to display some text. Even after I allow one bit of JavaScript, I can briefly see the text and then … back to the loading animation.
feelin_googley 9y ago
"Use Javascript to enhance webpages, not degrade them." That sounds like something the user could do, client-side. Why do users have to blindly accept and execute Javascript payloads from every website? What if the website said, "Hey I have some cool Javascript that can really enhance the content of this website. Do you want to download it to memory and run it on your computer, in your browser?" The user might respond, "Sure, run it!" or "No thanks, I have some Javascript I wrote myself to enhance website content and would prefer to use that instead. Just give me the content." I recall in the 1990's browser pop-ups where users were asked if they wanted to (download and) run Java applets. I believe there are still some websites out there that use Java applets. Not sure how browsers deal with this today. Doubtful that web developers will listen to your plea although it is admirable. What they care about directly is browsers. The way to send them a message as a user is in the choice of what browser you use, what shows up in their logs. Using a browser that enables all Javascript by default signifies your agreement with what they are doing today. Using a browser that does not read Javascript sends a message that you can do without it. If the logs started showing a majority of user agents were browsers that do not read Javascript how would web developers respond? User Agent header is still surprisingly influential.
- warent 9y ago
  I think what you're describing is basically just RSS feeds, no?
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

Karunamon 9y ago

Ye gods! uBlock Origin had a whopping 29 items blocked here here. I know mainstream corporate news sites with less garbage in them!

aaronbrethorst 9y ago

I felt the same way. I was expecting an article about Python, not a loading indicator on my broadband connection.

drivingmenuts 9y ago

What's amusing, and by amusing, I mean not amusing at all, is that there isn't any heavy content in the page - it's all text until you get to the comments, which aren't going to be seen until you get to the end of the article. When all you have is a hammer and so on and so forth ...

make3 9y ago

let's be honest here, no company is going to make change for the 0.001% who happen to disable javascript

snakeanus 9y ago
I would assume that more than 0.001% of the people use the Tor browser.
- infinite8s 9y ago
  The number of people using Tor is probably less then the number if people who disable JavaScript.
- joshuamorton 9y ago
  If you count bridges, then .001% is pretty close (not more than .005%). Apparently about 1/3 of people on earth have a mobile broadband connection, so approximately 2 billion of those, and ~60K tor bridge connections.
insertnickname 9y ago
As I said, this isn't just a problem for no-JS browsers, it's also a problem for people with slow Internet connections. They might be able to load the HTML and CSS reasonably fast, but then they'll have to sit around waiting while megabytes of JS is downloaded and then executed before they can finally read the article. I'm not asking developers to do extra work to accommodate no-JS browsers, I'm asking them to not do extra work to deliberately prevent sites from working without JS. The page would have worked perfectly if the author had not done extra work to add a useless loading screen. I'm asking developers to do less work, not more.
camus2 9y ago
No reason to generate that page using Javascript, it's just a blog post. It took 10 seconds to load on my computer by the way, when loading should be almost immediate considering the little amount of text on that page. If you are going to show me a pre-loader at least inform me about what is about to be loaded. 1 second more of wait and i would have left that page.

smrq 9y ago

I feel like every page posted to HN that has any JavaScript gets this comment. It's usually an overreaction in my opinion. For this page, it wasn't. Holy moly, it took a rather generous amount of time until it loaded the loading spinner, followed by enough loading time that I would have closed the tab if not for my curiosity on how long it was going to take in the end. And all that for a brief article with mild syntax highlighting.

Spivak 9y ago
> HN that has any JavaScript It's really only pages that use JS to create a user experience that's worse than not having it at all.

mplewis 9y ago

Just profiled the page via Chrome's "Fast 3G" network preset. I saw 3.5 MB download over 21 seconds before the spinner disappeared. The DOM content was ready at 7.8 seconds – still far too long.

ColinCochrane 9y ago
I ran a performance audit from the Chrome dev tools: First meaningful paint: 8,820 ms First Interactive : 11,420 ms Those are brutal numbers for just about anything, let alone a simple blog post.
- yoodenvranx 9y ago
  Info like this should be automatically added as a flair right next to each submission on HN. Time to first interactive, download sizes, number of ads, ... This would actually be a nice side project. Throw each link which was submitted to HN at a headless Chrome/Firefox, do performance/ads/size analysis, save everything to a database and then make it available to the HN user through a browser plugin which adds this info next to each submission. And then you can even display badges of shame for the worst offender or block links and other stuff. Any takers?
  - jl6 9y ago
    This is why I always go to the comments on HN first. I can usually rely on the top comment to do one or all of the following: * neutralize clickbait * provide an instant endorsement (worth reading) or rebuttal (not) * warn of slow/heavy/ad-ridden user experience
- graysonk 9y ago
  Wow it got a 15/100 Pagespeed score on Mobile https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.chrisbarra.xyz%2Fposts%2Flet-me-introduce-slots%2F&tab=mobile https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=...

zeveb 9y ago

I have flagged the submission for exactly this reason: the page is not fit for purpose, and indeed appears to maliciously require code execution in order to display some text. Even after I allow one bit of JavaScript, I can briefly see the text and then … back to the loading animation.

feelin_googley 9y ago

"Use Javascript to enhance webpages, not degrade them." That sounds like something the user could do, client-side. Why do users have to blindly accept and execute Javascript payloads from every website? What if the website said, "Hey I have some cool Javascript that can really enhance the content of this website. Do you want to download it to memory and run it on your computer, in your browser?" The user might respond, "Sure, run it!" or "No thanks, I have some Javascript I wrote myself to enhance website content and would prefer to use that instead. Just give me the content." I recall in the 1990's browser pop-ups where users were asked if they wanted to (download and) run Java applets. I believe there are still some websites out there that use Java applets. Not sure how browsers deal with this today. Doubtful that web developers will listen to your plea although it is admirable. What they care about directly is browsers. The way to send them a message as a user is in the choice of what browser you use, what shows up in their logs. Using a browser that enables all Javascript by default signifies your agreement with what they are doing today. Using a browser that does not read Javascript sends a message that you can do without it. If the logs started showing a majority of user agents were browsers that do not read Javascript how would web developers respond? User Agent header is still surprisingly influential.

warent 9y ago
I think what you're describing is basically just RSS feeds, no?

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]