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It’s pretty incredible to see the amount of steaming developers commenting on this issue. What tools do developers have, when platform providers turn a deaf ear

by nikanj 6y ago

It’s pretty incredible to see the amount of steaming developers commenting on this issue. What tools do developers have, when platform providers turn a deaf ear to their needs?

Spivak 6y ago
The problem is that you’re only seeing angry developers and not the angry users frustrated that they can’t use autofill on sites that disable it for no real reason. Sites being able to change the behavior of the user-agent is almost always a bad thing. autocomplete=off should just be removed and it be entirely up to the user-agent whether it gets used like reader mode.
- xirbeosbwo1234 6y ago
  The browser can (and should) totally disregard what the webpage says if the user tells it to. The default should never be "break websites without asking the user".
- cosmotic 6y ago
  Well.... As a user of forms that intentionally add autocomplete=off so that their own autocomplete forms show instead, it is very not good to see both autocomplete mechanisms compete with each other.
- mantap 6y ago
  You've got to consider the 2nd order effects. Remove autocomplete=off? Developers will be forced to make their own DIY crappy text inputs just to get rid of it. And break everything but English input in the process.
  - Spivak 6y ago
    I mean sure but there’s no reason this can’t occupy the same space as the other website toggles like reader mode and permissions. I think these features should be like the notifications pop-ups “This site requested that Chrome not automatically fill out forms. Tap here to enable autofill anyway for this site.”
- crznp 6y ago
  Alternately: User-agents changing the behavior of well-written sites without user knowledge is almost always a bad thing. Giving the user more control is great: things like reader mode, option to disable auto-play video or options to kill resource-intensive scripts. This isn't a tool for the user, it is the browser's behavior whether the user wants it or not. If autocomplete=off is user-hostile, then it should be changed in the spec. The spec gives a few use cases (site has its own autocomplete, field is sensitive information that shouldn't be cached, field is a one-time key). If autocomplete=off is removed, how would those cases be handled? https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastructure.html#autofilling-form-controls:-the-autocomplete-attribute https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastr...
- wbercx 6y ago
  I've had several of our users call up over the years, angrily asking why we made certain fields in our app "dropdowns" with rubbish in them. Chrome decided to add autocomplete to some of our fields with contextually irrelevant options. As far as I know there isn't anything I can reliably do about it.
  - fmajid 6y ago
    Make the form field names randomly generated each time the page is loaded, and decrypt them server-side.

by nikanj 6y ago

It’s pretty incredible to see the amount of steaming developers commenting on this issue. What tools do developers have, when platform providers turn a deaf ear to their needs?

Spivak 6y ago

The problem is that you’re only seeing angry developers and not the angry users frustrated that they can’t use autofill on sites that disable it for no real reason. Sites being able to change the behavior of the user-agent is almost always a bad thing. autocomplete=off should just be removed and it be entirely up to the user-agent whether it gets used like reader mode.

xirbeosbwo1234 6y ago
The browser can (and should) totally disregard what the webpage says if the user tells it to. The default should never be "break websites without asking the user".
cosmotic 6y ago
Well.... As a user of forms that intentionally add autocomplete=off so that their own autocomplete forms show instead, it is very not good to see both autocomplete mechanisms compete with each other.
mantap 6y ago
You've got to consider the 2nd order effects. Remove autocomplete=off? Developers will be forced to make their own DIY crappy text inputs just to get rid of it. And break everything but English input in the process.
- Spivak 6y ago
  I mean sure but there’s no reason this can’t occupy the same space as the other website toggles like reader mode and permissions. I think these features should be like the notifications pop-ups “This site requested that Chrome not automatically fill out forms. Tap here to enable autofill anyway for this site.”
crznp 6y ago
Alternately: User-agents changing the behavior of well-written sites without user knowledge is almost always a bad thing. Giving the user more control is great: things like reader mode, option to disable auto-play video or options to kill resource-intensive scripts. This isn't a tool for the user, it is the browser's behavior whether the user wants it or not. If autocomplete=off is user-hostile, then it should be changed in the spec. The spec gives a few use cases (site has its own autocomplete, field is sensitive information that shouldn't be cached, field is a one-time key). If autocomplete=off is removed, how would those cases be handled? https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastructure.html#autofilling-form-controls:-the-autocomplete-attribute https://html.spec.whatwg.org/multipage/form-control-infrastr...
wbercx 6y ago
I've had several of our users call up over the years, angrily asking why we made certain fields in our app "dropdowns" with rubbish in them. Chrome decided to add autocomplete to some of our fields with contextually irrelevant options. As far as I know there isn't anything I can reliably do about it.
- fmajid 6y ago
  Make the form field names randomly generated each time the page is loaded, and decrypt them server-side.