4 ms·

Because browsers are now disabling autoplay even for silent videos, GIFs are going to be with us for at least another 10 years.

karmakaze 7y ago
There's no rational reason why a browser should autoplay a GIF and not a silent video.
- mattmaroon 7y ago
  True. I don't care about the file format so much as whether or not it has sound and how big it is.
- Thorrez 7y ago
  There are a lot of people asking to disable autoplay even on silent videos. The main reason is they want to save bandwidth. https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=514102 https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=514102
  - sp332 7y ago
    Firefox Nightly supports this and I use it. It's not perfect but overall I'd say it's better than letting videos autoplay.
thinkloop 7y ago
You can disable gif autoplay
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  There was a relatively well-known binary edit of the Netscape browser which would disable the looping of GIFs. Animations would animate, but only play through once. https://web.archive.org/web/20040116134137/linuxmafia.com/faq/Web/animated-gif-killing.html https://web.archive.org/web/20040116134137/linuxmafia.com/fa...
lonelappde 7y ago
Which browsers and inbuilt support to disable autoplay video?
- zamadatix 7y ago
  Chrome, Firefox. Safari, Edge. Ol' IE doesn't though.
  - Thorrez 7y ago
    How do you do it in Chrome?
pstch 7y ago
"Disabling autoplay" for silent videos is impossible whenever Javascript is enabled, and it usually is. What's the difference (to the user) between an animated <canvas> and a silent video ?
- rasz 7y ago
  Its possible to shim Video decoding API and block/ignore until user input. https://github.com/Eloston/disable-html5-autoplay/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/Eloston/disable-html5-autoplay/blob/maste...
  - pstch 7y ago
    I think you missed the point of my comment : as long as JavaScript is enabled, the website can bypass the "Video decoding API" and just show the media in a <canvas> tag. Of course, we might be able to find a middle ground between disabling JS entirely and auto-playing all media, but it may be very hard, and that "middle ground" might be changing as website developers find new way to deliver auto-playing media that bypasses the browser's restrictions.

karmakaze 7y ago

There's no rational reason why a browser should autoplay a GIF and not a silent video.

mattmaroon 7y ago
True. I don't care about the file format so much as whether or not it has sound and how big it is.
Thorrez 7y ago
There are a lot of people asking to disable autoplay even on silent videos. The main reason is they want to save bandwidth. https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=514102 https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=514102
- sp332 7y ago
  Firefox Nightly supports this and I use it. It's not perfect but overall I'd say it's better than letting videos autoplay.

thinkloop 7y ago

You can disable gif autoplay

dredmorbius 7y ago
There was a relatively well-known binary edit of the Netscape browser which would disable the looping of GIFs. Animations would animate, but only play through once. https://web.archive.org/web/20040116134137/linuxmafia.com/faq/Web/animated-gif-killing.html https://web.archive.org/web/20040116134137/linuxmafia.com/fa...

lonelappde 7y ago

Which browsers and inbuilt support to disable autoplay video?

zamadatix 7y ago
Chrome, Firefox. Safari, Edge. Ol' IE doesn't though.
- Thorrez 7y ago
  How do you do it in Chrome?

pstch 7y ago

"Disabling autoplay" for silent videos is impossible whenever Javascript is enabled, and it usually is. What's the difference (to the user) between an animated <canvas> and a silent video ?

rasz 7y ago
Its possible to shim Video decoding API and block/ignore until user input. https://github.com/Eloston/disable-html5-autoplay/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/Eloston/disable-html5-autoplay/blob/maste...
- pstch 7y ago
  I think you missed the point of my comment : as long as JavaScript is enabled, the website can bypass the "Video decoding API" and just show the media in a <canvas> tag. Of course, we might be able to find a middle ground between disabling JS entirely and auto-playing all media, but it may be very hard, and that "middle ground" might be changing as website developers find new way to deliver auto-playing media that bypasses the browser's restrictions.