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The importance of real browser choice on iOS is not just "philosophical". It's not about bookmarks. It's about control of the web itself. All major parts of th

by SiVal 6y ago

The importance of real browser choice on iOS is not just "philosophical". It's not about bookmarks. It's about control of the web itself. All major parts of the web now allow users to freely choose their browser with one glaring exception: iOS. Unfortunately, iOS is big enough that it has veto power over the entire web platform. If it won't work on iOS, it won't work on "the web". It's just like the old days of Internet Explorer or Java before it, where a proprietary platform maker had the precious ability to sabotage its open platform competition.

kalleboo 6y ago
Without iOS enforcing Safari, Google will own the web. Safari being a requirement adds "test in other browsers" to the requirements list of any web app. If you can just tell iOS users to install Chrome, that development step goes away, and the incremental work to support for Firefox will also go away. And then we will have the real Internet Explorer web again, where it is owned by one company.
alwillis 6y ago
Unfortunately, iOS is big enough that it has veto power over the entire web platform. This is so untrue. Google goes ahead and implements stuff regardless of what Apple does or doesn't do. Any major feature gets worked out by Google, Apple and Mozilla—like Flexbox and Grid. All of these companies operate on what's in their interest vs. what makes sense for the web. Folks should be somewhat satisfied with Apple’s Safari/Webkit announcements today: General New Features * Added Safari Web Extensions support for macOS. * Added Webpage Translation (Beta) for English, Spanish, Simplified Chinese, French, German, Russian, and Brazilian Portuguese. Safari will automatically detect if a translation is available based on your Preferred Languages list. * Added support for HTTP/3. * Improved Web Platform Tests pass rate for WebDriver, XHR+Fetch, Service Workers, CSS, and SVG. Removed Features * Safari no longer supports Flash. Performance New Features * Supported incremental loading of PDF files. * Implemented asynchronous scrolling for overflow: scroll, and <iframe> on macOS. * Improved tab closing performance. * Improved IndexedDB performance. * Improved JavaScript cookie access performance. * Improved for-of performance. Privacy New Features * Added a Privacy Report that shows the trackers that Intelligent Tracking Prevention prevented from accessing identifying information. * Enabled full third-party cookie blocking, and the Storage Access API in Private Browsing mode. Authentication and Passwords New Features * Added a Web Authentication platform authenticator using Face ID or Touch ID, depending on which capability is present. * Added support for PIN entry and account selection on external Web Authentication security keys. * Added notifying users when one of their saved passwords in iCloud Keychain has shown up in a data breach; requesting a password change uses the well-known URL for changing passwords (https://example.com/.well-known/change-password https://example.com/.well-known/change-password), enabling websites to specify the page to open for updating a password. * Added support to Security Code AutoFill for domain-bound, one-time codes sent over SMS; in the following 2FA SMS, Safari only offers to fill the code on example.com, and no other domain. Your Example code is 123446. @example.com #123446 JavaScript New Features * Added support for the BigInt data type. * Added support for creating custom instances of EventTarget. * Added logical assignment operator support. * Added public class fields support. Media New Features * Added WebP image support. * Added HDR video playback support. * Changed to derive <img> aspect ratio from size attributes. * Support for the Picture-in-Picture API is now available in iOS on iPhone. CSS New Features * Updated image-set() to support all other image functions including image(), -webkit-canvas(), -webkit-cross-fade(), and -webkit--gradient(). Added :is() pseudo-selector support as a synonym for :matches(). * Added :where() pseudo-selector support for specificity adjustment. * Added support for image-orientation. Web Inspector New Features * Added support for a bootstrap script. * Added a Sources Tab that combines the Resources tab and Debugger tab. * Added an HSL color picker with P3 support. * Added information about Web Animations, CSS animations, and CSS transitions to the Timelines tab. * Improved VoiceOver support.
notatoad 6y ago
>It's about control of the web itself. yes, that's exactly what i mean by philosophical.

by SiVal 6y ago

kalleboo 6y ago

Without iOS enforcing Safari, Google will own the web. Safari being a requirement adds "test in other browsers" to the requirements list of any web app. If you can just tell iOS users to install Chrome, that development step goes away, and the incremental work to support for Firefox will also go away. And then we will have the real Internet Explorer web again, where it is owned by one company.

alwillis 6y ago

Unfortunately, iOS is big enough that it has veto power over the entire web platform. This is so untrue. Google goes ahead and implements stuff regardless of what Apple does or doesn't do. Any major feature gets worked out by Google, Apple and Mozilla—like Flexbox and Grid. All of these companies operate on what's in their interest vs. what makes sense for the web. Folks should be somewhat satisfied with Apple’s Safari/Webkit announcements today: General New Features * Added Safari Web Extensions support for macOS. * Added Webpage Translation (Beta) for English, Spanish, Simplified Chinese, French, German, Russian, and Brazilian Portuguese. Safari will automatically detect if a translation is available based on your Preferred Languages list. * Added support for HTTP/3. * Improved Web Platform Tests pass rate for WebDriver, XHR+Fetch, Service Workers, CSS, and SVG. Removed Features * Safari no longer supports Flash. Performance New Features * Supported incremental loading of PDF files. * Implemented asynchronous scrolling for overflow: scroll, and <iframe> on macOS. * Improved tab closing performance. * Improved IndexedDB performance. * Improved JavaScript cookie access performance. * Improved for-of performance. Privacy New Features * Added a Privacy Report that shows the trackers that Intelligent Tracking Prevention prevented from accessing identifying information. * Enabled full third-party cookie blocking, and the Storage Access API in Private Browsing mode. Authentication and Passwords New Features * Added a Web Authentication platform authenticator using Face ID or Touch ID, depending on which capability is present. * Added support for PIN entry and account selection on external Web Authentication security keys. * Added notifying users when one of their saved passwords in iCloud Keychain has shown up in a data breach; requesting a password change uses the well-known URL for changing passwords (https://example.com/.well-known/change-password https://example.com/.well-known/change-password), enabling websites to specify the page to open for updating a password. * Added support to Security Code AutoFill for domain-bound, one-time codes sent over SMS; in the following 2FA SMS, Safari only offers to fill the code on example.com, and no other domain. Your Example code is 123446. @example.com #123446 JavaScript New Features * Added support for the BigInt data type. * Added support for creating custom instances of EventTarget. * Added logical assignment operator support. * Added public class fields support. Media New Features * Added WebP image support. * Added HDR video playback support. * Changed to derive <img> aspect ratio from size attributes. * Support for the Picture-in-Picture API is now available in iOS on iPhone. CSS New Features * Updated image-set() to support all other image functions including image(), -webkit-canvas(), -webkit-cross-fade(), and -webkit--gradient(). Added :is() pseudo-selector support as a synonym for :matches(). * Added :where() pseudo-selector support for specificity adjustment. * Added support for image-orientation. Web Inspector New Features * Added support for a bootstrap script. * Added a Sources Tab that combines the Resources tab and Debugger tab. * Added an HSL color picker with P3 support. * Added information about Web Animations, CSS animations, and CSS transitions to the Timelines tab. * Improved VoiceOver support.

notatoad 6y ago

>It's about control of the web itself. yes, that's exactly what i mean by philosophical.