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So you "got out" of JS around 2006, before module systems, before node.js, before anything resembling modern build tools, before even jQuery was really a thing
by pluma 9y ago
So you "got out" of JS around 2006, before module systems, before node.js, before anything resembling modern build tools, before even jQuery was really a thing (it was created that very year), before all development tools (firebug was also originally created in 2006).
And you think you have any idea what you're talking about when you talk about modern JS just came outdevelopment?
You know when AJAX first became possible? 2005. ES3, the latest version of JavaScript available at the time, was released all the way back in 1999, the next version (ES5) wouldn't come out until 2009. Strict mode didn't exist.
MSIE had an 80%+ market share, Firefox was hovering around 12%. 2006 was the year IE7 came out. Building a website meant you were targeting IE6 if you were lucky but had to worry about compatibility with IE5 (and also the completely different but identically named MacOS version of IE5) -- but in practice IE4 and Netscape 4 were still a concern.
You know the song "IE is being mean to me"[0]? That was first published in 2009.
Your comment is the equivalent of showing pride about "getting out of" automobiles in 1903, when Ford started working on the first mass-produced car.
[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTTzwJsHpU8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTTzwJsHpU8
- blub 9y agoAh yes, those were the days. One could open a website and it worked. You could save it, bookmark it, share it and it worked. No invasive ads, no pervasive tracking, accessibility was starting to become an important topic. JavaScript was used mostly for decorative purposes and AJAX where it improved experience. As far as benefits to the users are concerned, why is today's web better? It's just a souped up Model T with bilboards on all sides, a 360 degree camera on top and more cameras on the inside. But I get why it's awesome for front-end developers, they get to rewrite everything in the framework of the day every couple of years and they are handsomely paid. They get to invent new contraptions to keep up in the eternal race with native apps. It does get a little annoying when someone points out that the emperor is naked, but otherwise life is good.
- pluma 9y agoYes, clearly the web was better when half the sites were broken because you didn't have the latest version of Flash/Shockwave/Java and the entire website just showed a sad rectangle. There's nostalgia and then there's outright denial. The reason you think the web was glorious in 2006 is that you forgot everything that was shit about it. Want to know what made those shitty parts go away? Modern JavaScript.
- blub 9y agoJava was irrelevant by then, shockwave was not really used for websites, that would be Flash, which was already installed on most clients and was working fine. Flash was not shitty, it was quite good for writing apps, but it was proprietary and like a lot of contemporary tech it was (becoming) a security liability. You're giving waaay too much credit to JS. Apple almost single-handedly buried Flash.
- ryanbrunner 9y ago2006 is maybe not the correct year, but I'd say the was a period around JQuery's heyday that had a lot of advantages compared to today. JavaScript, while used frequently, was mostly for progressive enhancement, CSS was beggining to be a saner language to work with (particularly with sass), and overall, I generally felt more productive than I do today in the JS-driven world of the web. Absolutely there's a class of applications that wouldn't be possible with this approach, and I'm glad they exist. But it seems the "correct" answer to any problem to be solved on the web, no matter how straightforward, is to reach for React or a similar framework.
- zeveb 9y agoModern JavaScript is just as bad as Flash, Shockwave & Java; indeed, it's worse: those plugins could be enabled or disabled within particular pages and everything else would continue to work just fine, but modern SPAs are utterly unusable without JavaScript. Modern web sites use JavaScript to insert text & images into the DOM; it's impossible to usefully view the web without a full-fledged JavaScript implementation. It's impossible to read a blog without exposing yourself to security & privacy risks due to JavaScript. It used to be possible to escape; now it no longer is. > Want to know what made those shitty parts go away? > Modern JavaScript. Modern JavaScript didn't make the shitty parts go away; modern JavaScript made the shitty parts universal.
- welly 9y ago> As far as benefits to the users are concerned, why is today's web better? It does more. Significantly more than "back in the day".
- blub 9y agoIt does more or less what Flash did back then. Probably less. JS is nicer because it's a standard and it's supported everywhere.
- ashark 9y agoIt seems to me that modern JS and CSS are mostly used to make much-worse-performing and even-more-annoying replacements for frames, and a plague of worse-than-ever popups. :-/
- oblio 9y agoI, for one, like webmail and don't pine for the days before Oddpost/Gmail and AJAX in general.
- mratzloff 9y agoI mean, there was webmail back then... Besides a prettier interface and hitting refresh to check for new messages, there's no substantive difference.