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I don't know what kind of web you are using. But The sites I'm visiting on a daily basis are, in fact, applications and not documents. Slack, Asana, GitHub, Gr

by k__ 6y ago

I don't know what kind of web you are using. But The sites I'm visiting on a daily basis are, in fact, applications and not documents. Slack, Asana, GitHub, Gravit Designer, Google Docs/Sheets/Mail...

phreeza 6y ago
The sad reality is that many of these actual applications load faster than pages that could really just be pages but still load vast amounts of JS...
- k__ 6y ago
  Yes. Probably because people who create "real apps" and not just "docs on steroids" know what they're in for right from the start. If you start with a doc, you can get the feeling that there is much more headroom than there actually is.
- jug 6y ago
  Static website generators in contexts where they make sense (heaps of the web) are still criminally underused. :-(
superkuh 6y ago
Of those I only go to github. And for now it still works without javascript execution. Sites that want or have to serve everyone do not use the web as an application because they know it doesn't work. Gov.uk and amazon.com for example went out of their way to work for all people of the world. And Gov.uk has found approximately 1 in 96 actual people do not have JS turned on[1]. For fancy businesses with other businesses as their end users you can get away with not supporting everyone. It doesn't effect their income so it doesn't matter. But the reality is that JS-application sites fail 1% of users and for actually serving everyone that 1% matters. [1] https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many-people-are-missing-out-on-javascript-enhancement/ https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many-people-are-missi...
- nitrogen 6y ago
  And Gov.uk has found approximately 1 in 96 actual people do not have JS turned on[1]. It's challenging to convince a PM that people who block stats don't show up in their stats, but do still have money to spend. Often, a simple try/catch in the onclick handler that fires analytics events, and a quick happy path test with ublock on, is all it would take to fix a site. Well worth the 1% of extra revenue for a few minutes effort.
  - edoceo 6y ago
    The math is $500 expense today for the test code. $0.01 each time the test runs and +$ for each client acquired. At $20/mo MRR it's 3 clients/year. Easily pays for itself.
  - jandrese 6y ago
    I suspect that 1 in 96 figure is mostly people who have uMatrix or NoScript installed, not people who have disabled JavaScript entirely. A little judicious blocking can greatly improve browsing experience at the cost of having to set up rules for sites when you first visit them sometimes. It can be a real hassle when someone has embedded a video you want to watch and there are like 8 layers of embedded scripts from different domains necessary before you get to the actual video content.
- capitainenemo 6y ago
  gmail works without JS too . I use it routinely with w3m
smadge 6y ago
GitHub fits the document model pretty well in my opinion.
- k__ 6y ago
  And the one that doesn't require JS in that list. Bad example, I give you that.
  - superkuh 6y ago
    Gmail also has a perfectly working non-javscript interface. Or you can just use pop3 or imap with a real client and avoid the web crap all together.
    - postalrat 6y ago
      I'd argue that gmail without js is an application made to act like a document when it just isn't.
    - rootusrootus 6y ago
      > Or you can just use pop3 or imap This is my choice, except that periodically I have to go back to the web interface because searching over IMAP barely works at all. Maybe it's not even implemented and I'm only really searching downloaded mail, I'm not sure.
      - superkuh 6y ago
        The imap interface will also never deliver any of the mail that gmail mailservers accept but then tag spam. That's pretty much mail from any independent mailserver that's not some megacorp or spamming so much that they can use google's postmaster tools to get approved because they spam so much.
gjs278 6y ago
and all of those are slow as hell
vbezhenar 6y ago
Everyone lives in its own bubble. Among websites that I routinely visit, only Youtube could be counted as web application, but I'd argue that its main function could be simplified to a <video> tag.

by k__ 6y ago

phreeza 6y ago

The sad reality is that many of these actual applications load faster than pages that could really just be pages but still load vast amounts of JS...

k__ 6y ago
Yes. Probably because people who create "real apps" and not just "docs on steroids" know what they're in for right from the start. If you start with a doc, you can get the feeling that there is much more headroom than there actually is.
jug 6y ago
Static website generators in contexts where they make sense (heaps of the web) are still criminally underused. :-(

superkuh 6y ago

Of those I only go to github. And for now it still works without javascript execution. Sites that want or have to serve everyone do not use the web as an application because they know it doesn't work. Gov.uk and amazon.com for example went out of their way to work for all people of the world. And Gov.uk has found approximately 1 in 96 actual people do not have JS turned on[1]. For fancy businesses with other businesses as their end users you can get away with not supporting everyone. It doesn't effect their income so it doesn't matter. But the reality is that JS-application sites fail 1% of users and for actually serving everyone that 1% matters. [1] https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many-people-are-missing-out-on-javascript-enhancement/ https://gds.blog.gov.uk/2013/10/21/how-many-people-are-missi...

nitrogen 6y ago
And Gov.uk has found approximately 1 in 96 actual people do not have JS turned on[1]. It's challenging to convince a PM that people who block stats don't show up in their stats, but do still have money to spend. Often, a simple try/catch in the onclick handler that fires analytics events, and a quick happy path test with ublock on, is all it would take to fix a site. Well worth the 1% of extra revenue for a few minutes effort.
- edoceo 6y ago
  The math is $500 expense today for the test code. $0.01 each time the test runs and +$ for each client acquired. At $20/mo MRR it's 3 clients/year. Easily pays for itself.
- jandrese 6y ago
  I suspect that 1 in 96 figure is mostly people who have uMatrix or NoScript installed, not people who have disabled JavaScript entirely. A little judicious blocking can greatly improve browsing experience at the cost of having to set up rules for sites when you first visit them sometimes. It can be a real hassle when someone has embedded a video you want to watch and there are like 8 layers of embedded scripts from different domains necessary before you get to the actual video content.
capitainenemo 6y ago
gmail works without JS too . I use it routinely with w3m

smadge 6y ago

GitHub fits the document model pretty well in my opinion.

k__ 6y ago
And the one that doesn't require JS in that list. Bad example, I give you that.
- superkuh 6y ago
  Gmail also has a perfectly working non-javscript interface. Or you can just use pop3 or imap with a real client and avoid the web crap all together.
  - postalrat 6y ago
    I'd argue that gmail without js is an application made to act like a document when it just isn't.
  - rootusrootus 6y ago
    > Or you can just use pop3 or imap This is my choice, except that periodically I have to go back to the web interface because searching over IMAP barely works at all. Maybe it's not even implemented and I'm only really searching downloaded mail, I'm not sure.
    - superkuh 6y ago
      The imap interface will also never deliver any of the mail that gmail mailservers accept but then tag spam. That's pretty much mail from any independent mailserver that's not some megacorp or spamming so much that they can use google's postmaster tools to get approved because they spam so much.

gjs278 6y ago

and all of those are slow as hell

vbezhenar 6y ago

Everyone lives in its own bubble. Among websites that I routinely visit, only Youtube could be counted as web application, but I'd argue that its main function could be simplified to a <video> tag.