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Why would it take five years for Chrome to implement it?

fabiospampinato 5y ago
It's already implemented in Chrome latest, available under a flag. Although support for <svg> and <math> elements is not in yet.
skrebbel 5y ago
It won't, but it will take a while (not sure about five years) for everybody to be on the latest version. Chrome has nice auto-update but not everybody has it enabled, for all kinds of good and bad reasons.
- wongarsu 5y ago
  According to statcounter.com any new Chrome version is adopted by a large majority of users within 30 days [1]. Sure, some cooperate users hold out much longer, but those seem to be a tiny minority. 1: https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-version-market-share https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-version-market-share
  - codedokode 5y ago
    There are other browsers except for Chrome. For example there are built-in browsers in smartphones that will never be updated. It is wrong to rely on everyone using a latest version of a browser. Every site should support at least 5 years old browsers and a good site will be usable in 10 years old browser including builtin browser of Windows. Sadly, in reality most sites are made so poorly that they don't open on 5-years old smartphone. It shows how low qualified became modern web developers.
    - wongarsu 5y ago
      I agree that apps will need a fallback for a couple years. So far only Chrome and Firefox are implementing it, and given that Safari took 2.5 years for IntersectionObserver I wouldn't hold my breath until we can even claim that all major browsers implement this. But this API doesn't implement anything we couldn't do before, it's a more correct and much faster implementation of something we already have libraries for. The vast majority of users will have an almost immediate benefit from sites using this API, both in speed and security. That's what I take this comment chain to be about, since talking about "a majority" doesn't make sense otherwise. Supporting browser versions used by at most 2% of all users is the name of the game in webdev, that's what made IE so annoying.
19870213 5y ago
You're forgetting 'legacy' devices, as in, older than a couple of minutes. I maintain an application that is used in primary education in the Netherlands, and the oldest device thus far with issues is an iPad4 with iOS10.3, which the school only invested in a couple of years ago (I don't know any further details). And in their infinite wisdom Apple fixed the safari version to the ios version, and no alternative browsers allowed. /rant
- TheCoelacanth 5y ago
  Well, they did say "majority", which would be covered just by Chrome users alone. Granted, most sites aren't going to be willing to write off Safari users, so they are almost always going to be the ones you are waiting on.

It's already implemented in Chrome latest, available under a flag. Although support for <svg> and <math> elements is not in yet.

skrebbel 5y ago

It won't, but it will take a while (not sure about five years) for everybody to be on the latest version. Chrome has nice auto-update but not everybody has it enabled, for all kinds of good and bad reasons.

wongarsu 5y ago
According to statcounter.com any new Chrome version is adopted by a large majority of users within 30 days [1]. Sure, some cooperate users hold out much longer, but those seem to be a tiny minority. 1: https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-version-market-share https://gs.statcounter.com/browser-version-market-share
- codedokode 5y ago
  There are other browsers except for Chrome. For example there are built-in browsers in smartphones that will never be updated. It is wrong to rely on everyone using a latest version of a browser. Every site should support at least 5 years old browsers and a good site will be usable in 10 years old browser including builtin browser of Windows. Sadly, in reality most sites are made so poorly that they don't open on 5-years old smartphone. It shows how low qualified became modern web developers.
  - wongarsu 5y ago
    I agree that apps will need a fallback for a couple years. So far only Chrome and Firefox are implementing it, and given that Safari took 2.5 years for IntersectionObserver I wouldn't hold my breath until we can even claim that all major browsers implement this. But this API doesn't implement anything we couldn't do before, it's a more correct and much faster implementation of something we already have libraries for. The vast majority of users will have an almost immediate benefit from sites using this API, both in speed and security. That's what I take this comment chain to be about, since talking about "a majority" doesn't make sense otherwise. Supporting browser versions used by at most 2% of all users is the name of the game in webdev, that's what made IE so annoying.

19870213 5y ago

You're forgetting 'legacy' devices, as in, older than a couple of minutes. I maintain an application that is used in primary education in the Netherlands, and the oldest device thus far with issues is an iPad4 with iOS10.3, which the school only invested in a couple of years ago (I don't know any further details). And in their infinite wisdom Apple fixed the safari version to the ios version, and no alternative browsers allowed. /rant

TheCoelacanth 5y ago
Well, they did say "majority", which would be covered just by Chrome users alone. Granted, most sites aren't going to be willing to write off Safari users, so they are almost always going to be the ones you are waiting on.