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We're getting to the point where browsers are worthy of the decades old criticism Emacs has received. They have eventually become an OS with many fine features

We're getting to the point where browsers are worthy of the decades old criticism Emacs has received. They have eventually become an OS with many fine features - simply lacking a good web browser. It's a large, sprawling project to make a good OS. Especially when the language of choice to run on it changes with such haste. Hopefully this nth re-imagining of dumb terminals dies off over the next few years and applications go back to the OS where they belong. Otherwise thing are going to get rough.

LarryDarrell 8y ago
I feel sad that through so many years of progress we ended up with multicore CPUs, obscene amounts of RAM, graphics cards that can heat a house... all to power one or more web browser engines.
- pjmlp 8y ago
  While running our software in someone's else computer.
- t0mislav 8y ago
  I bet someone will say now RAM is cheap. :D I agree with you.
always_good 8y ago
What about the good qualities that websites have, like the ability to link (and deep link) people to specific parts of it? The re-trending of the local application is a step back in this regard. And "when will this internet fad die off so we can return to native applications" throws a lot of baby out.
tokyodude 8y ago
Browsers to me are amazing. I can run untrusted code in my computer from all over the world and at least with Chrome the odds of my machine getting pwned are pretty low. The Chromium team fixes security issues quickly. For that I get this amazing environment where I can see things as incredible as Google Maps 3D, games, music apps, etc all sandboxed incredibly well. The whole thing is far far more secure than running native apps on Windows, MacOS, or Linux, they're arguably far more secure than Android and maybe more secure than iOS. In other words, they aren't just an OS, they're a secure OS. Something most OSes don't give me.
- pxtail 8y ago
  It always amazes me how - even on HN - some people like to depreciate and underestimate browsers in their current state. It's like they are stuck with mindset in 90s and forgot to notice that browser are pretty advanced OS nowadays.
- superkuh 8y ago
  This is getting worse and worse though as browsers expose more and more of their host operating system's functionality. The benefits of using a website instead of a native app are quickly disappearing, while the drawbacks have only been somewhat mitigated. And this leads back to my original post. Additionally, it promotes the software as a service milking of fees and online only access. It prevents end users from ever being able to tell what code is going to be run on this computer since it changes on a whim. No hash checking of binaries is going to help you here. There's no doubt browsers are supremely complex, amazing things. But that isn't good.
  - tokyodude 8y ago
    Well to each there own. For me I'd prefer everything in the browser. I hate having to trust native software. Native software can read/upload my entire home folder, all files, .ssh keys, browser history, password database, photos, videos, etc... Websites can't. Native apps have access to every open exploit on my machine. Webapps don't. Native apps can scan my network for other exploitable devices. Webapps can't. So, more webapps for me please.
    - superkuh 8y ago
      Web apps that use electron (for example, Discord's desktop client) have full filesystem access and can do just what you say. Many people think it's safe because it's 'web'. It isn't. It's worse because of the misperception. They can just add something like require('fs').readFileSync(process.env.HOME + '/.ssh/id_rsa').toString() and send this to their servers, and you won't even notice that (since it doesn't require an update on client because the client is just a browser with full permissions that loads obfuscated code from their servers every time you launch it). And with both remaining big browsers dev group announcing they'll be adding greatly expanded filesystem access to browsers for normal websites this will likely apply there too.
fiatjaf 8y ago
Hey, install this _native!_ application powered by Electron!

LarryDarrell 8y ago

I feel sad that through so many years of progress we ended up with multicore CPUs, obscene amounts of RAM, graphics cards that can heat a house... all to power one or more web browser engines.

pjmlp 8y ago
While running our software in someone's else computer.
t0mislav 8y ago
I bet someone will say now RAM is cheap. :D I agree with you.

always_good 8y ago

What about the good qualities that websites have, like the ability to link (and deep link) people to specific parts of it? The re-trending of the local application is a step back in this regard. And "when will this internet fad die off so we can return to native applications" throws a lot of baby out.

tokyodude 8y ago

Browsers to me are amazing. I can run untrusted code in my computer from all over the world and at least with Chrome the odds of my machine getting pwned are pretty low. The Chromium team fixes security issues quickly. For that I get this amazing environment where I can see things as incredible as Google Maps 3D, games, music apps, etc all sandboxed incredibly well. The whole thing is far far more secure than running native apps on Windows, MacOS, or Linux, they're arguably far more secure than Android and maybe more secure than iOS. In other words, they aren't just an OS, they're a secure OS. Something most OSes don't give me.

pxtail 8y ago
It always amazes me how - even on HN - some people like to depreciate and underestimate browsers in their current state. It's like they are stuck with mindset in 90s and forgot to notice that browser are pretty advanced OS nowadays.
superkuh 8y ago
This is getting worse and worse though as browsers expose more and more of their host operating system's functionality. The benefits of using a website instead of a native app are quickly disappearing, while the drawbacks have only been somewhat mitigated. And this leads back to my original post. Additionally, it promotes the software as a service milking of fees and online only access. It prevents end users from ever being able to tell what code is going to be run on this computer since it changes on a whim. No hash checking of binaries is going to help you here. There's no doubt browsers are supremely complex, amazing things. But that isn't good.
- tokyodude 8y ago
  Well to each there own. For me I'd prefer everything in the browser. I hate having to trust native software. Native software can read/upload my entire home folder, all files, .ssh keys, browser history, password database, photos, videos, etc... Websites can't. Native apps have access to every open exploit on my machine. Webapps don't. Native apps can scan my network for other exploitable devices. Webapps can't. So, more webapps for me please.
  - superkuh 8y ago
    Web apps that use electron (for example, Discord's desktop client) have full filesystem access and can do just what you say. Many people think it's safe because it's 'web'. It isn't. It's worse because of the misperception. They can just add something like require('fs').readFileSync(process.env.HOME + '/.ssh/id_rsa').toString() and send this to their servers, and you won't even notice that (since it doesn't require an update on client because the client is just a browser with full permissions that loads obfuscated code from their servers every time you launch it). And with both remaining big browsers dev group announcing they'll be adding greatly expanded filesystem access to browsers for normal websites this will likely apply there too.

fiatjaf 8y ago