6 ms·

This is so true, the two dimensions allow such a nice simplification of what should be rendered even in UX terms. What I personally didn't like about it though

This is so true, the two dimensions allow such a nice simplification of what should be rendered even in UX terms. What I personally didn't like about it though are the tech specific parts (e.g. xhr and other both require script anyways, as not a single website will work with xhr disabled). So for my browser project [1] I decided to split it up into "text", "image", "audio", "video" and "other" which I hope will make more sense for most people. Back in February when the debate about the manifest and requests api started, I started my own semantic browser project which aims to filter out all UX-interfering CSS and HTML and probably won't allow JS anyhow. It tries to focus on the automation and caching parts that are broken in current web browsers, so that everything is peer to peer, and that other trusted peers can be used to share bandwidth, content, or metadata with each other and that each one has a 100% persistent local cache that only gets refreshed once the user tells the browser to. If there'll be a need to support webapps later, they will probably be sandboxed in a new window that represents a temporary cache located in /tmp/... in order to prevent abuse of local storage and cookies. I've learned to not trust any site these days, even my bank's website uses foreign overseas-located trackers, which is technically a GDPR violation. [1] https://github.com/tholian-network/stealth https://github.com/tholian-network/stealth

liability 6y ago
> not a single website will work with xhr disabled That's total nonsense. I browse with uMatrix blocking everything by default and I rarely need to enable xhr to make a site work. Most of the time it's only used to bloat a site, not deliver the actual content. The same is mostly true of javascript as well. This is particularly true on newspaper websites. A great many news sites are reasonable with everything disabled but utter cancer by (typical) default.
- cookiengineer 6y ago
  > That's total nonsense. Well, maybe we have a different pool of websites we visit. But usually, in my case, pretty much all websites built with vue.js, react, angular and others usually don't have server side rendering implemented correctly. Just as an example, what I visited just yesterday: https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2020-1472 https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad... Doesn't contain content, it's just a blank page without the XHR request. And all webapps I've seen so far basically just scaffold all polyfills and stuff, without any kind of content being delivered (or serialized) inside the HTML. Additionally, all newspaper websites that I've seen in my country blank out everything with white-on-white if you don't allow JS with XHR. Either that or the article teaser is faded out with an overlayed blur image. Well, that is at least when you don't set the user-agent to Googlebot :)
  - liability 6y ago
    Yeah man I'm talking about really obscure websites like The New York Times which works great without any javascript enabled. https://0x0.st/ilMO.png https://0x0.st/ilMO.png
    - Cyphase 6y ago
      It looks a lot better if you allow CSS and images from *.nyt.com. A bunch of images still won't load, but the layout and some images are there.
  - nullc 6y ago
    One of the great things about umatrix is the above mentioned multidimensionality. Your example displays content for me just fine in my default config, because the XHR requests are to the origin. Yet it blocks useless requests for two dozen different resources on other domains.
  - inetknght 6y ago
    > Just as an example, what I visited just yesterday: https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad... Well there's your problem. Microsoft counts as one of the sites that uses web tech to invade your privacy. Many parts of microsoft-dot-com don't work without javascript.
  - m463 6y ago
    > white-on-white if you don't allow JS with XHR umatrix -> reader mode -> read your article
    - cookiengineer 6y ago
      Nope, because then I can only read the teaser, not the whole article.
  - matheusmoreira 6y ago
    > Well, that is at least when you don't set the user-agent to Googlebot :) Isn't serving different pages to users and search engines against Google's policies? They call it cloaking. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355 https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355
bonestamp2 6y ago
> and probably won't allow JS anyhow. You're not going to allow JS? I don't know the answer, but I'm curious what percentage of sites are unusable without JS? It might be fine for basic browsing, but nearly any ecommerce or site with "interactive" content uses JS. Many video players require JS. It seems like a very niche solution that won't have mass appeal if you're not going to allow JS. To me, the perfect solution would be something similar to uMatrix where power users can choose the settings they think are best. Anyone else can use simplified controls to indicate if they're seeing ads or if site functionality is broken. Then there's some aggregation software that looks at all of those inputs and determines the best default settings for each site. If ads are seen then the blocking levels are increased toward the fringe of advanced user inputs, if functionality is broken then it walks back the blocking levels until broken functionality reports end. This would be a never ending eb and flow for each site so it would be important to automate it as much as possible.
- m463 6y ago
  I think it should be clear how to use umatrix. Turn everything OFF for all sites by default. I turn off third party stuff and all scripting. Then visit a new site. Then opt-in until you either - decide the site sucks and leave, or get something acceptable and read your article. Then press SAVE to save the settings for that site. It's worth mentioning that many sites do not render well without javascript, but reader mode renders a perfectly readable article. but also it's much MORE prevalent that you turn on javascript and the site will do much worse things.
  - Technetium 6y ago
    This is the point to me, and this is the way I've used it for years. Everything always loads almost instantly, I enjoy not burning my bandwidth for things I don't care about. I regularly have over 150 tabs, and at that point blocking unneeded/unwanted content makes a very noticeable difference, especially on older machines. I enjoyed the ride.
- sergeykish 6y ago
  Most of the web is static, allow "all" (or its columns media, script, XHR), ads still blocked. uBlock Origin has blocking mode [1], it should be possible to start with hard mode and degrade with shortcut. Disabling part of the page make it broken for one user and improves for another. No cookies - no previously viewed; no javascript - no interaction; no css - hidden content displayed; no media - faster load. Just like with Stylus a lot of opinions. I can mark what works with my setup, but it does not necessary matches your accepted level of "brokennes". [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode
seanhunter 6y ago
> my bank's website uses foreign overseas-located trackers, which is technically a GDPR violation. Foreign overseas-located trackers isn't technically a GDPR violation. It's a GDPR violation if the trackers don't treat data in a GDPR-compliant fashion, and it's your bank's responsibility to ensure they do.

liability 6y ago

> not a single website will work with xhr disabled That's total nonsense. I browse with uMatrix blocking everything by default and I rarely need to enable xhr to make a site work. Most of the time it's only used to bloat a site, not deliver the actual content. The same is mostly true of javascript as well. This is particularly true on newspaper websites. A great many news sites are reasonable with everything disabled but utter cancer by (typical) default.

cookiengineer 6y ago
> That's total nonsense. Well, maybe we have a different pool of websites we visit. But usually, in my case, pretty much all websites built with vue.js, react, angular and others usually don't have server side rendering implemented correctly. Just as an example, what I visited just yesterday: https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/advisory/CVE-2020-1472 https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad... Doesn't contain content, it's just a blank page without the XHR request. And all webapps I've seen so far basically just scaffold all polyfills and stuff, without any kind of content being delivered (or serialized) inside the HTML. Additionally, all newspaper websites that I've seen in my country blank out everything with white-on-white if you don't allow JS with XHR. Either that or the article teaser is faded out with an overlayed blur image. Well, that is at least when you don't set the user-agent to Googlebot :)
- liability 6y ago
  Yeah man I'm talking about really obscure websites like The New York Times which works great without any javascript enabled. https://0x0.st/ilMO.png https://0x0.st/ilMO.png
  - Cyphase 6y ago
    It looks a lot better if you allow CSS and images from *.nyt.com. A bunch of images still won't load, but the layout and some images are there.
- nullc 6y ago
  One of the great things about umatrix is the above mentioned multidimensionality. Your example displays content for me just fine in my default config, because the XHR requests are to the origin. Yet it blocks useless requests for two dozen different resources on other domains.
- inetknght 6y ago
  > Just as an example, what I visited just yesterday: https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad https://portal.msrc.microsoft.com/en-US/security-guidance/ad... Well there's your problem. Microsoft counts as one of the sites that uses web tech to invade your privacy. Many parts of microsoft-dot-com don't work without javascript.
- m463 6y ago
  > white-on-white if you don't allow JS with XHR umatrix -> reader mode -> read your article
  - cookiengineer 6y ago
    Nope, because then I can only read the teaser, not the whole article.
- matheusmoreira 6y ago
  > Well, that is at least when you don't set the user-agent to Googlebot :) Isn't serving different pages to users and search engines against Google's policies? They call it cloaking. https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355 https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66355

bonestamp2 6y ago

> and probably won't allow JS anyhow. You're not going to allow JS? I don't know the answer, but I'm curious what percentage of sites are unusable without JS? It might be fine for basic browsing, but nearly any ecommerce or site with "interactive" content uses JS. Many video players require JS. It seems like a very niche solution that won't have mass appeal if you're not going to allow JS. To me, the perfect solution would be something similar to uMatrix where power users can choose the settings they think are best. Anyone else can use simplified controls to indicate if they're seeing ads or if site functionality is broken. Then there's some aggregation software that looks at all of those inputs and determines the best default settings for each site. If ads are seen then the blocking levels are increased toward the fringe of advanced user inputs, if functionality is broken then it walks back the blocking levels until broken functionality reports end. This would be a never ending eb and flow for each site so it would be important to automate it as much as possible.

m463 6y ago
I think it should be clear how to use umatrix. Turn everything OFF for all sites by default. I turn off third party stuff and all scripting. Then visit a new site. Then opt-in until you either - decide the site sucks and leave, or get something acceptable and read your article. Then press SAVE to save the settings for that site. It's worth mentioning that many sites do not render well without javascript, but reader mode renders a perfectly readable article. but also it's much MORE prevalent that you turn on javascript and the site will do much worse things.
- Technetium 6y ago
  This is the point to me, and this is the way I've used it for years. Everything always loads almost instantly, I enjoy not burning my bandwidth for things I don't care about. I regularly have over 150 tabs, and at that point blocking unneeded/unwanted content makes a very noticeable difference, especially on older machines. I enjoyed the ride.
sergeykish 6y ago
Most of the web is static, allow "all" (or its columns media, script, XHR), ads still blocked. uBlock Origin has blocking mode [1], it should be possible to start with hard mode and degrade with shortcut. Disabling part of the page make it broken for one user and improves for another. No cookies - no previously viewed; no javascript - no interaction; no css - hidden content displayed; no media - faster load. Just like with Stylus a lot of opinions. I can mark what works with my setup, but it does not necessary matches your accepted level of "brokennes". [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Blocking-mode

seanhunter 6y ago

> my bank's website uses foreign overseas-located trackers, which is technically a GDPR violation. Foreign overseas-located trackers isn't technically a GDPR violation. It's a GDPR violation if the trackers don't treat data in a GDPR-compliant fashion, and it's your bank's responsibility to ensure they do.