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New WebKit features in Safari 15.4

390 points by ezfe 5y ago

selectodude 5y ago
Until Apple fixes the mess they made with ad-blocking and allows full-fat ublock origin to work on Safari again, it could be 100x better than any other browser and it would still be worthless compared to Firefox. Shame, because I really do like Safari.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Are there any comparisons of where content blockers fail and ublock origin is better for a casual user?
  - nathanasmith 5y ago
    Somebody correct me if I'm wrong but last time I checked I couldn't find any content blocker for MacOS Safari that would block pre-roll Youtube ads whereas uBlock Origin in Chrome, Firefox, etc. does not have this problem.
    - olliej 5y ago
      1Blocker works for me and has good support
    - ezfe 5y ago
      Wipr blocks them for me
      - smoldesu 5y ago
        Right, for $2 and no access to the source code.
        olliej 5y ago
        Ah, so you mean you want a free solution, because why should the devs of an extension that you obviously value earn anything from their work?
        endisneigh 5y ago
        Well that’s why they’re adblocking to begin with - to prevent monetization
        _jal 5y ago
        Speaking only for me, I'm OK with paying, but trusting browser extensions, as they currently exist, is hard.
        ruohola 5y ago
        Do you know how Safari content blockers are implemented? They by design cannot do much malicious stuff.
        smoldesu 5y ago
        I want a free solution because that's the standard in the space. I shouldn't have to pay money to make a browser with less features have parity with a better developed one.
        iknowstuff 5y ago
        Safari content blockers don’t get access to the website. They merely present a list of selectors to block, and Safari does the rest. So the lack of source code access is benign, by design.
        frankjr 5y ago
        Content blockers don't have access to websites, but they themselves need to be "hosted" within a native application, right? And that application can potentially do more than just provide a list of rules to Safari.
      - lotsofpulp 5y ago
        I use Wipr too, but it seems like a couple months ago, Google figured out how to get past it since I see shippable ads 50% or more of the time. I used to never see them.
        ezfe 5y ago
        It comes and goes - the Wipr guy does make a lot of tweaks pretty frequently, if you pull up his twitter
    - knolan 5y ago
      Probably the best use for a Touch Bar is scrubbing through Youtube ads.
    - gilgoomesh 5y ago
      Vinegar
    - happybuy 5y ago
      I develop an ad blocker - Magic Lasso Adblock [1] for Safari that flawlessly and completely blocks all ads in YouTube. It works across iPhone, iPad and Mac. So it can be done and the experience works when implemented correctly. [1] https://www.magiclasso.co/ https://www.magiclasso.co/
- ezfe 5y ago
  I use Wipr and it doesn't seem to have any trouble keeping my viewing experience ad free, including on Youtube
- olliej 5y ago
  I use 1Blocker and have no issues with ads, so I'm unsure what you're after?
- freediver 5y ago
  This is one of the main reasons we built Orion browser. Native app, with the same rendering engine and with native extensions support. https://browser.kagi.com https://browser.kagi.com
  - kruxigt 5y ago
  - daypay 5y ago
    Any invites that you could share without having to wait 3 weeks for the next round to go out?
    - u2077 5y ago
      You can use mine, but it may only work for mobile. https://testflight.apple.com/join/DeC8ZDnu https://testflight.apple.com/join/DeC8ZDnu
      - daypay 5y ago
        How were you able to share this? Didn’t know TestFlight allowed you to do that. How do I give it back later?
        u2077 5y ago
        It’s within the testflight app, there’s a share button and you can copy the link. Borrow was an incorrect term, the link is still valid for anyone afaik.
        daypay 5y ago
        Ah okay, thanks for clarifying. Learned something new today.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- tgv 5y ago
  Try Firefox on iOS. It’s webkit, but not bad.
- fouc 5y ago
  I do my ad blocking at the /etc/hosts level. Pihole is also good too.
- Angostura 5y ago
  Does full-fat ublock origin work without leaking the sites you are browsing to its developers?
yohannparis 5y ago
Funny how the <dialog> test button does not work on Safari 15.3, if it's not backward compatible, it might not be worth implementing. But kudos on the gradiant and CSS improvements.
- crooked-v 5y ago
  It seems fairly straightforward functionality to polyfill, though.
- silvestrov 5y ago
  This does not make sense. Of course new functionality won't work on old browsers. <dialog> is easy to polyfill well: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/dialog-polyfill https://github.com/GoogleChrome/dialog-polyfill
- chadlavi 5y ago
  They're literally announcing that they are adding support for it as of 15.4. None of the other things mentioned here will work on 15.3 either.
- tehbeard 5y ago
  This is like complaining you can't use electricity to fill up a petrol car... This is something that can and has been polyfilled for the moment, but runs into some a11y issues with screen readers and the usual style/compatibility ones that a native implantation won't.
bobbylarrybobby 5y ago
A lot of good (if long-awaited) changes in there, like smooth scrolling. Interesting to see how hard they're pushing the fact that they are the first browser to implement a bunch of features.
- alwillis 5y ago
  If you go back, you’ll see this highlighted by Apple when they’re first, which happens more often than the prevailing narrative would suggest.
  - andybak 5y ago
    Web developers are interested in the features that are widely supported. "Being first" helps no one.
    - doctor_eval 5y ago
      Unless you’re Chrome, in which case it’s really great. /s
      - alwillis 5y ago
        So true. When Chrome is first with a new CSS feature, it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. When Apple does it, it’s looked at with derision.
        magicalist 5y ago
        > When Apple does it, it’s looked at with derision. By...who? There's 100 comments in this thread right now and not one is criticizing the new features.
        codehalo 5y ago
        https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30679187 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30679187
jimkleiber 5y ago
Edit: removing the snark/sarcasm I put into it. I was really hoping this announcement would include support for push notifications for PWAs. I've been trying to build a few Discourse forums and they work very well as PWAs except for the fact that iOS doesn't support PWAs sending push notifications. So here's to hoping the next iteration will.
- Someone1234 5y ago
  I want it so I can uninstall Facebook Messager. On Android I can log into Facebook's website, and receive push notifications via the web-browser. On iOS my choices are either the native iOS app (which has substantially more data hooks) or nothing at all. Essentially browser Push Notifications increase my privacy. PS - I am sympathetic to complaints about push notification request spam, but that feels like a solvable issue without throwing the dishes out with the bathwater. You shouldn't need an "app" just for notifications.
  - js2 5y ago
    I interact with FB messages solely through mbasic.facebook.com, even on my phone. It’s painful enough to keep me off the site, a benefit.
    - jimkleiber 5y ago
      Whoa I didn't know that this existed, thank you for sharing it.
    - toastal 5y ago
      I've used it in a container for ages (SlimSocial on F-Droid store). I removed it being listed by my launcher so I have to go through Settings > Apps and scroll that list. It's so annoying to use and get to it that I barely use Facebook anymore.
  - muhehe 5y ago
    How do you use messenger like this? When I go to messenger.com a get pretty much just button with link play store...
nikodunk 5y ago
Now all major browsers support the <dialog> element without polyfill. Yay! https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/dialog#browser_compatibility https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/di...
- phantomread 5y ago
  On that note, TIL about screen reader issues related to dialogs in general, including this built-in. Seems like the question is primarily around how to update the focus target from the "invoking element" to the dialog's content in a reader-friendly way. There's a linked post from the MDN docs with more detail https://www.scottohara.me/blog/2019/03/05/open-dialog.html#incoming-dialog https://www.scottohara.me/blog/2019/03/05/open-dialog.html#i.... They actually still recommend a custom implementation that's considered more robust when used with screen readers: https://github.com/KittyGiraudel/a11y-dialog https://github.com/KittyGiraudel/a11y-dialog. I'm glad there's a callout on the MDN docs as I would have assumed this dialog element is screen reader clean. Focus management is always a tough thing regardless.
  - dmitriid 5y ago
    And this was one of the many reasons why neither Safari nor Firefox implemented <dialog>. It was only implemented in Chrome. In 2018 Domenic Denicola mentioned that it's possible dialog should be fully removed as there's no interest in implementing it: https://github.com/whatwg/html/pull/4184#issuecomment-440405059 https://github.com/whatwg/html/pull/4184#issuecomment-440405... Fast forward to 2021, and Chrome breaks the web by removing built-in alert/prompt/confirm dialogs: https://dev.to/richharris/stay-alert-d https://dev.to/richharris/stay-alert-d Now the same very people, including Domenic, were arguing that alert is bad for security, bad for the Javascript engine etc. It looks like browser implementors agreed to remove those from all three browsers. Chrome was just the first. And yet there's literally no replacement for those. Skip to Safari 15, and we're suddenly getting <dialog> even though: - Safari (and Mozilla) have been opposed to the current state of the spec for 10 years now - Safari (and Mozilla) have had no interest in implementing this element as it's currently specced - None of the decade-long issues with dialog have been fixed, including these accessibility issues So something tells me it's there only because of the planned removal of the built-in alert/confirm/prompt, and not for any other reason.
CharlesW 5y ago
A nice/useful bulleted summary thread by Apple's Jen Simmons: https://twitter.com/jensimmons/status/1503454398487408640?s=21 https://twitter.com/jensimmons/status/1503454398487408640?s=...
- teekert 5y ago
  Nice list but arg that Twitter… HNers complain when sites break the back button, but Twitter breaks back scrolling!
  - jeroenhd 5y ago
    I tend to use Nitter for reading threads. Replace the twitter.com in the URL with nitter.net and your reading experience is a lot smoother!
  - barkerja 5y ago
    This is one of the best features Twitter Blue has to offer; the "Reader" feature for threads.
endemic 5y ago
What's the best way to access newer features in Safari if one's work computer is locked to the previous version of macOS?
- r00fus 5y ago
  Get the developer preview of Webkit if you can download apps given your locked down profile. https://webkit.org/downloads/ https://webkit.org/downloads/
- gpmcadam 5y ago
  Not a lawyer etc. but in my experience? Remove the corporate build and install what you want. Carry an Ethernet adapter.
  - Uehreka 5y ago
    Most workplaces, upon seeing that you’ve done this, will say “look, you can reinstall the corporate profile, or you can hand back the computer, or you can be fired.” (And if they catch you doing any circumvention to prevent them from finding out, then your options are likely to be “you can be fired”)
- ezfe 5y ago
  Safari 15 (including this release) is compatible with Catalina and Big Sur, you don't need to upgrade macOS releases.
fabiospampinato 5y ago
Here I am still waiting for ES2018 regex look-behinds to be implemented. The folks working on the regex engine must have jumped ship or something.
- tgv 5y ago
  What use do you have for that in a web application? Anecdote: I tried (limited) CSS validation to through a regexp some time ago, and it worked, except that Chrome’s implementation jumped from a few 100ms to over 5 minutes on adding a single character. Made the whole thing quite useless.
  - olliej 5y ago
    look behind assertions can be super useful - obviously you can workaround the lack of them, but sometimes simply having them there makes life easier. OTOH get look behind perf to not be horrific is challenging
  - thiht 5y ago
    I recently used a lookbehind to replace \n by \r\n only if it’s not already preceded by \r. It was in a VSCode extension, because the output channel of the testing workbench stupidly requires \r\n, otherwise it doesn’t go to the beginning of the line. I could have done it without a lookbehind but occasions to use it are quite rare to me :)
MBCook 5y ago
Great to see Safari add lazy loading for images! I’ve been hoping for that one, I wasn’t aware it was in the works.
burtonator 5y ago
> New support for BroadcastChannel allows tabs, windows, iframes, and Workers from an origin to send messages to each other. This enables experiences like syncing login state for a site across multiple tabs. This is SUPER nice... there are other hacks like IndexedDB or localStorage but this is way better! But the frustrating part her is that we're excited about Webkit finally starting to catch up. Chrome is just perpetually innovating and then Webkit is constantly lagging. Supporting Safari is BY FAR the hardest part of my job.
- taf2 5y ago
  I think this means SharedWorkers are not too far behind. Pretty sure I saw a issue tracker indicating maybe SharedWorkers had been restored in a nightly build?
  - jcbrand 5y ago
    That's great news if true. Last I saw (maybe a year ago), Safari claimed they won't support shared workers at all.
    - taf2 5y ago
      SharedWorkers are in safari now as a feature you can toggle on in settings on iOS
- jensimmons 5y ago
  Safari is ahead in implementing things like :has() and the new Viewport Units.
  - epolanski 5y ago
    APIs that hardly change my job..
  - mushyhammer 5y ago
    Yeah I saw that tweet. +1 for Safari, but we’re still -24. I’m still waiting for regex lookbehinds, a ES2018 syntax that I can’t use. Literally Safari does not execute the whole file if you use such regex literals.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
butz 5y ago
With so many new features being added to browsers lately it is easy to forget, that not all browsers on old devices are updated, be it older iPad or even laptop with ChromeOS. Dear web developers, please don't forget to add fallbacks or polyfills for older devices.
- wahnfrieden 5y ago
  this news is also relevant to wkwebview users
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  That's the risk you take by buying iPhone or ChromeOS: you're buying into a platform where you don't have the option to find alternatives for "core" system functionality. I care as much about outdated browsers as I care about Internet Explorer. If you want a modern experience, buy devices that allow you to update the browser (or complain to your manufacturer that you can't). Every other website has given up on my old second hand iPad, there are no new apps available for it and the old APIs are all shut down. Why should I still care about it as a web developer? It's still a nice device to read PDFs on.
  - Jyaif 5y ago
    > you're buying into a platform where you don't have the option to find alternatives On ChromeOS devices you usually can install a regular linux distribution though.
    - jeroenhd 5y ago
      Not on all models (especially not on the older ones), and even then it's unnecessarily complicated by design. There are workarounds that come with a performance impact, but most Chromebooks aren't exactly powerful machines. A shame, really, because Linux could keep the Chromebooks that have somehow become too outdated alive for a few more years. Luckily Safari (and to some extend Firefox) is out there lacking common features that were in Chrome years ago, so polyfills will probably still be used for a few years.
noja 5y ago
Web MIDI? Still surprised that's missing on Apple.
- alwillis 5y ago
  I believe Apple and Mozilla’s position is it can’t be done in a privacy preserving way as currently specified.
  - lern_too_spel 5y ago
    WebMIDI support in Firefox is almost complete. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=836897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=836897
    - eternityforest 5y ago
      Finally Mozilla does something sane! This is really great news, and I could see this being a pretty big thing or even a major way of doing web enabled IoT.
    - lioeters 5y ago
      I've been regularly checking that page, delighted with every step of progress as WebMIDI gets implemented in Firefox. In about:config, I have dom.webmidi.enabled set to true. I'm using this test page and waiting for the day it starts working for regular version of Firefox. https://versioduo.com/webmidi-test/ https://versioduo.com/webmidi-test/
      - ukfarmer 5y ago
        In Firefox 98.0, it actually works but is well-hidden. You not only have to turn on dom.webmidi.enabled in about:config as you've already done, but also need to manually add 'Access MIDI devices' and 'Access MIDI devices with SysEx support' permissions for the page in Tools -> Page Info before reloading, as otherwise it silently fails instead of prompting for confirmation. Hot-plugging interfaces after the browser is launched also doesn't seem to work yet.
Yaina 5y ago
Wohoo to :focus-visible support. The suffering is over!
donatj 5y ago
> WebKit added support for lazy-loading images with the loading attribute on the <img> element, providing web developers with an easy way to instruct the browser to defer loading certain images until the user scrolls near them Maybe there's hope that I can then just turn this off on a browser level? I've got gigabit internet at home, and your images popping in on scroll makes it feel like I'm on dial up. Lazy loading images is at best user hostile bandwidth saving, and it's not even that much in this day and age.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- ezfe 5y ago
  If it's implemented properly, and your internet is actually that fast, you won't actually see them loading.
- dmw_ng 5y ago
  > Lazy loading images is at best user hostile bandwidth saving It can easily be the vast majority of bandwidth spend even on a lightweight site. Add video widgets and bring that closer to 99%. Lazy loading is frequently a "can afford an extra 5 full time engineers" optimization
  - donatj 5y ago
    > Lazy loading is frequently a "can afford an extra 5 full time engineers" optimization I find this figure suspect. I work on a site with millions of users whose core service is essentially displaying a stream of images to end users, and our spend on CDN bandwidth is barely into five figures
    - HWR_14 5y ago
      I suspect he was talking about the cost, not the benefit
    - dmw_ng 5y ago
      I picked 5 at random, but I guess it really depends on where you are. Assuming 5 was the real number, that's only $28k/month bandwidth spend given the average SWE salary in the UK (£38,561 going by google), including 33% for tax and non-salary costs. That's about 327 TB worth of undiscounted AWS bandwidth, or roughly a site averaging 993 Mbit/s. A small video site might start at 3 Gbit/s, a medium sized one closer to 30. These estimates really are quite conservative depending on the context
tiffanyh 5y ago
> Developers can now enable Navigation Preload in ServiceWorker to improve load performance and avoid ServiceWorker startup delays that block network requests Does that mean <link rel='preload'> finally works on Safari?
- om2 5y ago
  Navigation Preload is a different feature that is specific to Service Workers. `<link rel=preload>` has been supported in Safari for a while, since 11.x.
  - tiffanyh 5y ago
    Whoops, I meant ‘prefetch’, not preload. https://caniuse.com/?search=prefetch https://caniuse.com/?search=prefetch Thanks for catching my mistake.
stimpson_j_cat 5y ago
> added support for the <dialog> element Might as well get started on those uBlock filters! dialog[class*="newsletter" i] dialog[id*="newsletter" i] dialog[class*="social" i] dialog[id*="social" i] dialog[id*="mailchimp" i]
- musicale 5y ago
  Every so often I daydream about a magical web browser with my preferred settings: [x] Block javascript popups and scrollovers [x] Block newsletter and notification solicitations [x] Really block all forms of auto-playing video in a way that actually works
  - KarlKemp 5y ago
    A „JavaScript popup“ is indistinguishable from a div (or other block element) or its visibility being toggled.
    - mushyhammer 5y ago
      Not true in most cases. Usually popups have use position:fixed so they can be “easily” targeted. I remember seeing some extension that disabled position:fixed across the board (I assume it had terrible perf though)
- kyleee 5y ago
  how about just dialog*
  - anhner 5y ago
    Because you might just need that dialog to edit an entry in a table?
- throwra620 5y ago
brrrrrm 5y ago
dang, still no SIMD for WebAssembly. Chrome and Firefox are meanwhile hitting 45gflops (85% of peak) on my M1 Air. Safari only gets to 12.5gflops
- dan_g__ 5y ago
- Jarred 5y ago
  They’re working on it You can follow along here https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=222382 https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=222382
  - brrrrrm 5y ago
    this is awesome, thanks for the link!
imbnwa 5y ago
Wake me when they finally fix the GPU acceleration bug breaking <canvas>
traspler 5y ago
> Apps on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS can now control allowing or preventing web content from using the Fullscreen API. Too bad Safari still does not offer this as a toggle on iPadOS. I really hate the fullscreen video players on my iPad. They are mostly unusable with touch. Maybe it can be controlled using an Extension?
SippinLean 5y ago
seumars 5y ago
Really looking forward to start using cascade layers. Hopefully it'll encourage the community to work closer to pure CSS and leave behind some of the madness out there like CSS-in-JS or Svelte's scoped styles.
FullyFunctional 5y ago
I immediately looked for haptic feedback support but alas it's not there. I get that it could be abused so I'd want it as an opt-in feature. It's really useful for soft keyboards (of all kinds).
alisne00193 5y ago
acidosis282883 5y ago
avazhi 5y ago
Is Apple going to do anything about Safari (on my 2021 16" M1 Pro) hitting 200 points in BrowserBench, while Chrome hits 299? Sure, Safari battery life is great, but the browser is slow, buggy (refreshes the page when I back a page half the time; can't speed up videos without audio distortion; typing into the search bar is laggy and I on a daily basis arrow down to select a previously used URL, hit enter, and then find that Safari moved my selection up or down, almost like it had to sync or something). I try really hard to love Safari, I really do, but it's just a shitshow outside of battery life. Also, Brave is consistently 20-30 points below vanilla Chrome on BrowserBench? Any ideas why? And finally, and this is pretty egregious, but the 1Password browser extension is a 20-30% (yes) performance hit (on the BrowserBench benchmark) on any Chromium based browser that I use, and on Firefox. What the fuck, AgileBits? See for yourself: https://browserbench.org/Speedometer2.0/ https://browserbench.org/Speedometer2.0/
- ezfe 5y ago
  Well, on my M1 MacBook Air Safari hits 275, whereas Edge is 246 Safari: https://i.imgur.com/LcPD5eE.png https://i.imgur.com/LcPD5eE.png Edge: https://i.imgur.com/eWhgSuU.png https://i.imgur.com/eWhgSuU.png
  - avazhi 5y ago
    what extensions do you have?
    - Sidnicious 5y ago
      Not the OP, but this is super cool as a way to measure extensions' performance impact (in a super limited way, admittedly). For me… Chrome 99.0.4844.51: - 1Password + µBlock Origin: 277 ± 2.9 - No extensions: 303 ± 5.1 (9% faster) Safari 15.3: - 1Password: 251 ± 2.6 - No extensions: 280.5 ± 2.6 (11% faster)
      - sp332 5y ago
        Wow, LastPass on Win10 Firefox cuts my performance in half there.
bawolff 5y ago
Woo, csp strict-dynamic. Safari was the last major browser not to support, and it makes csp so much easier to use.
eternityforest 5y ago
Finally Safari stops holding up the entire internet! I mean I'm sure they still are, just slightly less now.
jeffchien 5y ago
I was just in despair this last weekend when I discovered that vh decreases when the onscreen keyboard shows up and thus reflows my page where some elements have max-height: Xvh. I'm glad this is being addressed with lvh!
arilotter 5y ago
Aaaand they introduced WebGL bugs that broke our product, and iPhone users will experience these bugs until we can hack a workaround in, or until Apple acknowledges a bug report (that I have to make a minimal test case for and report, and haven't narrowed down yet), patches the issue in Safari, and decides if it's important enough to release as a 15.4.1 (which they probably won't, which means I'm stuck finding a workaround) - or if it comes out in iOS 16, then a good chunk of our users will never get the fix - so I'm stuck finding a workaround, still. The bundling of Safari versions with iOS, combined with the draconian policy of "Safari is the only legal rendering engine on iOS", bites me every day as a developer that's working on a mobile site for iDevices.
- enos_feedler 5y ago
  I am sorry you have to go through this painful exercise. But, how would an alternative rendering engine fix this problem?
  - ben-schaaf 5y ago
    "Our product doesn't work in safari, use chrome or firefox instead"
    - Humphrey 5y ago
      Unfortunately, Apple have a policy that the inbuilt webkit is the only browser engine that is allowed to be used on an iOS device. The iOS Chrome, Firefox, & Edge apps are just thin wrappers around the same Safari engine included in iOS.
      - paavohtl 5y ago
        We all know. @ben-schaaf was answering the question "how would an alternative rendering engine fix this problem".
    - enos_feedler 5y ago
      The web is built on the foundation I can use any browser. You are going to break the fundamental promise just to avoid working around a bug?
ZYinMD 5y ago
When will they support webp on macOS 10? I guess never?
- kalleboo 5y ago
  I wish they'd add an option to disable webp, it's really annoying to save a photo and get it in a format that's supported almost nowhere.
  - ksec 5y ago
    It was just the other day I am thinking, may be all photos saved from the web should either be JPEG ( direct download from the page ) or it would be saved as lossless PNG. We now end up adding AVIF, WebP, possibly JPEGXL, the upcoming WebP2, and what else? I am not entirely sure more format is a good idea.
    - astrange 5y ago
      WebP is a bad idea, which is why they're updating it. We should all ignore it until it goes away. Amusingly there's also a WebP lossless which is a completely different algorithm they just let a random employee invent.
      - ksec 5y ago
        I thinking more in the line of an image codec that gets constantly updated with browser. And only release it as a standard when it is good enough. So you can iterate and not be bounded by the spec. The server / CDN will serve image that fit that browser requirement, and fall back to jpeg as baseline. This idea wouldn't work for video due to how computational intensive video encoding are and storage space concern. But may be it would work for image? Or if we could somehow magically improve the JPEGXL encoder quality by another 20-30%.
    - ZYinMD 5y ago
      WebP is strictly better than jpeg though.
tuankiet65 5y ago
I'm happy to contribute two new features as part of my WebKit internship: the ic unit (as mentioned in the changelog), and CSS Motion Path, which I'm honestly surprised is not mentioned.
- mohas 5y ago
  Congrats!
  - tuankiet65 5y ago
    Thank you!
- mindhunter 5y ago
  Awesome that you contributed to CSS Motion Path! Such a powerful feature :)
everydaypanos 5y ago
Been waiting for this for so long. Especially the BroadcastChanel feature since there is currently no way for PWAs installed twice on the Home Screen to “share” data between them. Hope that BC fixes that
mohas 5y ago
It is scary how many basic features it didn't support before
rtpg 5y ago
Very excited about dialog being its own thing. There are of course a lot of nice built-in solutions to things, but having a quick-and-easy modal mechanism allows people to have cleaner code for something they're gonna try to do one way or another.
fleddr 5y ago
Credit where credit is due: this is a rarely good release. Cynical me has observed this annual pattern where Apple just before their developer conference suddenly becomes "genuinely" interested in the web community and actively listens to feedback. Then, things get back to normal, which means they don't implement anything, all feedback goes to /dev/null, documentation is lacking and bugs are never solved. It's hard to get past this cynical angle because even in this release they're boasting about how they're "first" to implement something, whilst it remains to be the browser lagging years behind. Typical Apple, fluffy marketing with zero self-reflection. I did see there's lots of webkit vacancies at Apple now, so one can hope things are changing for the better. Probably because it looks better to regulators.
- Jcowell 5y ago
  > Cynical me has observed this annual pattern where Apple just before their developer conference suddenly becomes "genuinely" interested in the web community and actively listens to feedback. Then, things get back to normal, which means they don't implement anything, all feedback goes to /dev/null, documentation is lacking and bugs are never solved. This doesn’t make sense to me. Features takes time to discuss, roadmap, argue , implement, test, and ship. These things aren’t something you just ramp up just before their developer conference. I would be furious if I were a WebKit developer and told I don’t implement anything or take feedback all year up until a Yearly conference. Especially when Safari updated 7 times last year alone.
  - fleddr 5y ago
    None of this is aimed at any individual Webkit developer. The state of Safari (stagnation and underinvestment) is on Apple, not on the team. Apple not taking feedback or taking it and it being completely pointless is well documented behavior. This guy... https://firt.dev/ https://firt.dev/ ...has basically been doing Apple's job for ages. Testing releases, documenting endless bugs, providing feedback, usually leading to absolutely nothing at all. Recently, he kept score from what was actually handled based on last year's feedback. It was close to nothing. Which is business as usual, it's like talking to a brick wall. Things couldn't be more dramatically different with the Chrome team. When I register a bug there, I get feedback within hours. They will scrutinize it immediately and confirm if its reproducible or not. They will indicate if its per spec or not, refer to discussions and assign it to a group/member when it's a valid bug. If it's anything remotely serious, it's often solved within 2 releases, so within 12 weeks. Further, one can directly interact with the Chrome team on Twitter and I regularly have long email conversations with them by personal email. They are accessible and take your feedback serious. Apple is the exact opposite. As for Safari updates, they're usually meh. Small list of bug fixes and some web inspector improvements. Hence my remark that this is an unusually valuable release.
darinf 5y ago
Appreciate the work the WebKit team is doing, but would love to see more support for WKWebView devs. The WKPreference updates are nice, but such a small step. As a browser developer targeting iOS (where one is forced to use WKWebView), it is shocking how many hacks are required to build table stakes features on top of WKWebView. Of course, I can imagine the Safari team would have little motivation to help in this regard since it is about enabling competition.
sccxy 5y ago
Safari 15.4 broke my web app. Impossible debug and workes fine in 15.3.x and any other browser. Awkward disappearing elements & zindex or canvas bug. Worst browser especially it is impossible to debug in windows.
- imbnwa 5y ago
  WebKit broke my org's <canvas>-based product with 15.x release, have to disable GPU Acceleration in order to prevent full page refreshes while drawing anything complicated after about 20 seconds and its consistent to reproduce. Checkout Apple Dev forum or any HTML5 Game Engine Disco/Board/Tracker
- grumpyDev66 5y ago
  I wrote a PWA for my personal use that appears to be broken now that I upgraded to 15.4. I use it for time tracking, so I think it has something to do with Dates or Inputs of type datetime. Haven't had a chance to debug it yet. Yeah, Safari is the worst...
petarb 5y ago
It doesn’t look like the Push API made it

390 points by ezfe 5y ago

Until Apple fixes the mess they made with ad-blocking and allows full-fat ublock origin to work on Safari again, it could be 100x better than any other browser and it would still be worthless compared to Firefox. Shame, because I really do like Safari.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
Are there any comparisons of where content blockers fail and ublock origin is better for a casual user?
- nathanasmith 5y ago
  Somebody correct me if I'm wrong but last time I checked I couldn't find any content blocker for MacOS Safari that would block pre-roll Youtube ads whereas uBlock Origin in Chrome, Firefox, etc. does not have this problem.
  - olliej 5y ago
    1Blocker works for me and has good support
  - ezfe 5y ago
    Wipr blocks them for me
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      Right, for $2 and no access to the source code.
      - olliej 5y ago
        Ah, so you mean you want a free solution, because why should the devs of an extension that you obviously value earn anything from their work?
        endisneigh 5y ago
        Well that’s why they’re adblocking to begin with - to prevent monetization
        _jal 5y ago
        Speaking only for me, I'm OK with paying, but trusting browser extensions, as they currently exist, is hard.
        ruohola 5y ago
        Do you know how Safari content blockers are implemented? They by design cannot do much malicious stuff.
        smoldesu 5y ago
        I want a free solution because that's the standard in the space. I shouldn't have to pay money to make a browser with less features have parity with a better developed one.
      - iknowstuff 5y ago
        Safari content blockers don’t get access to the website. They merely present a list of selectors to block, and Safari does the rest. So the lack of source code access is benign, by design.
        frankjr 5y ago
        Content blockers don't have access to websites, but they themselves need to be "hosted" within a native application, right? And that application can potentially do more than just provide a list of rules to Safari.
    - lotsofpulp 5y ago
      I use Wipr too, but it seems like a couple months ago, Google figured out how to get past it since I see shippable ads 50% or more of the time. I used to never see them.
      - ezfe 5y ago
        It comes and goes - the Wipr guy does make a lot of tweaks pretty frequently, if you pull up his twitter
  - knolan 5y ago
    Probably the best use for a Touch Bar is scrubbing through Youtube ads.
  - gilgoomesh 5y ago
    Vinegar
  - happybuy 5y ago
    I develop an ad blocker - Magic Lasso Adblock [1] for Safari that flawlessly and completely blocks all ads in YouTube. It works across iPhone, iPad and Mac. So it can be done and the experience works when implemented correctly. [1] https://www.magiclasso.co/ https://www.magiclasso.co/
ezfe 5y ago
I use Wipr and it doesn't seem to have any trouble keeping my viewing experience ad free, including on Youtube
olliej 5y ago
I use 1Blocker and have no issues with ads, so I'm unsure what you're after?
freediver 5y ago
This is one of the main reasons we built Orion browser. Native app, with the same rendering engine and with native extensions support. https://browser.kagi.com https://browser.kagi.com
- kruxigt 5y ago
- daypay 5y ago
  Any invites that you could share without having to wait 3 weeks for the next round to go out?
  - u2077 5y ago
    You can use mine, but it may only work for mobile. https://testflight.apple.com/join/DeC8ZDnu https://testflight.apple.com/join/DeC8ZDnu
    - daypay 5y ago
      How were you able to share this? Didn’t know TestFlight allowed you to do that. How do I give it back later?
      - u2077 5y ago
        It’s within the testflight app, there’s a share button and you can copy the link. Borrow was an incorrect term, the link is still valid for anyone afaik.
        daypay 5y ago
        Ah okay, thanks for clarifying. Learned something new today.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
tgv 5y ago
Try Firefox on iOS. It’s webkit, but not bad.
fouc 5y ago
I do my ad blocking at the /etc/hosts level. Pihole is also good too.
Angostura 5y ago
Does full-fat ublock origin work without leaking the sites you are browsing to its developers?

yohannparis 5y ago

Funny how the <dialog> test button does not work on Safari 15.3, if it's not backward compatible, it might not be worth implementing. But kudos on the gradiant and CSS improvements.

crooked-v 5y ago
It seems fairly straightforward functionality to polyfill, though.
silvestrov 5y ago
This does not make sense. Of course new functionality won't work on old browsers. <dialog> is easy to polyfill well: https://github.com/GoogleChrome/dialog-polyfill https://github.com/GoogleChrome/dialog-polyfill
chadlavi 5y ago
They're literally announcing that they are adding support for it as of 15.4. None of the other things mentioned here will work on 15.3 either.
tehbeard 5y ago
This is like complaining you can't use electricity to fill up a petrol car... This is something that can and has been polyfilled for the moment, but runs into some a11y issues with screen readers and the usual style/compatibility ones that a native implantation won't.

bobbylarrybobby 5y ago

A lot of good (if long-awaited) changes in there, like smooth scrolling. Interesting to see how hard they're pushing the fact that they are the first browser to implement a bunch of features.

alwillis 5y ago
If you go back, you’ll see this highlighted by Apple when they’re first, which happens more often than the prevailing narrative would suggest.
- andybak 5y ago
  Web developers are interested in the features that are widely supported. "Being first" helps no one.
  - doctor_eval 5y ago
    Unless you’re Chrome, in which case it’s really great. /s
    - alwillis 5y ago
      So true. When Chrome is first with a new CSS feature, it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread. When Apple does it, it’s looked at with derision.
      - magicalist 5y ago
        > When Apple does it, it’s looked at with derision. By...who? There's 100 comments in this thread right now and not one is criticizing the new features.
        codehalo 5y ago
        https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30679187 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30679187

jimkleiber 5y ago

Edit: removing the snark/sarcasm I put into it. I was really hoping this announcement would include support for push notifications for PWAs. I've been trying to build a few Discourse forums and they work very well as PWAs except for the fact that iOS doesn't support PWAs sending push notifications. So here's to hoping the next iteration will.

Someone1234 5y ago
I want it so I can uninstall Facebook Messager. On Android I can log into Facebook's website, and receive push notifications via the web-browser. On iOS my choices are either the native iOS app (which has substantially more data hooks) or nothing at all. Essentially browser Push Notifications increase my privacy. PS - I am sympathetic to complaints about push notification request spam, but that feels like a solvable issue without throwing the dishes out with the bathwater. You shouldn't need an "app" just for notifications.
- js2 5y ago
  I interact with FB messages solely through mbasic.facebook.com, even on my phone. It’s painful enough to keep me off the site, a benefit.
  - jimkleiber 5y ago
    Whoa I didn't know that this existed, thank you for sharing it.
  - toastal 5y ago
    I've used it in a container for ages (SlimSocial on F-Droid store). I removed it being listed by my launcher so I have to go through Settings > Apps and scroll that list. It's so annoying to use and get to it that I barely use Facebook anymore.
- muhehe 5y ago
  How do you use messenger like this? When I go to messenger.com a get pretty much just button with link play store...

nikodunk 5y ago

Now all major browsers support the <dialog> element without polyfill. Yay! https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/dialog#browser_compatibility https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/di...

phantomread 5y ago
On that note, TIL about screen reader issues related to dialogs in general, including this built-in. Seems like the question is primarily around how to update the focus target from the "invoking element" to the dialog's content in a reader-friendly way. There's a linked post from the MDN docs with more detail https://www.scottohara.me/blog/2019/03/05/open-dialog.html#incoming-dialog https://www.scottohara.me/blog/2019/03/05/open-dialog.html#i.... They actually still recommend a custom implementation that's considered more robust when used with screen readers: https://github.com/KittyGiraudel/a11y-dialog https://github.com/KittyGiraudel/a11y-dialog. I'm glad there's a callout on the MDN docs as I would have assumed this dialog element is screen reader clean. Focus management is always a tough thing regardless.
- dmitriid 5y ago
  And this was one of the many reasons why neither Safari nor Firefox implemented <dialog>. It was only implemented in Chrome. In 2018 Domenic Denicola mentioned that it's possible dialog should be fully removed as there's no interest in implementing it: https://github.com/whatwg/html/pull/4184#issuecomment-440405059 https://github.com/whatwg/html/pull/4184#issuecomment-440405... Fast forward to 2021, and Chrome breaks the web by removing built-in alert/prompt/confirm dialogs: https://dev.to/richharris/stay-alert-d https://dev.to/richharris/stay-alert-d Now the same very people, including Domenic, were arguing that alert is bad for security, bad for the Javascript engine etc. It looks like browser implementors agreed to remove those from all three browsers. Chrome was just the first. And yet there's literally no replacement for those. Skip to Safari 15, and we're suddenly getting <dialog> even though: - Safari (and Mozilla) have been opposed to the current state of the spec for 10 years now - Safari (and Mozilla) have had no interest in implementing this element as it's currently specced - None of the decade-long issues with dialog have been fixed, including these accessibility issues So something tells me it's there only because of the planned removal of the built-in alert/confirm/prompt, and not for any other reason.

CharlesW 5y ago

A nice/useful bulleted summary thread by Apple's Jen Simmons: https://twitter.com/jensimmons/status/1503454398487408640?s=21 https://twitter.com/jensimmons/status/1503454398487408640?s=...

teekert 5y ago
Nice list but arg that Twitter… HNers complain when sites break the back button, but Twitter breaks back scrolling!
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  I tend to use Nitter for reading threads. Replace the twitter.com in the URL with nitter.net and your reading experience is a lot smoother!
- barkerja 5y ago
  This is one of the best features Twitter Blue has to offer; the "Reader" feature for threads.

endemic 5y ago

What's the best way to access newer features in Safari if one's work computer is locked to the previous version of macOS?

r00fus 5y ago
Get the developer preview of Webkit if you can download apps given your locked down profile. https://webkit.org/downloads/ https://webkit.org/downloads/
gpmcadam 5y ago
Not a lawyer etc. but in my experience? Remove the corporate build and install what you want. Carry an Ethernet adapter.
- Uehreka 5y ago
  Most workplaces, upon seeing that you’ve done this, will say “look, you can reinstall the corporate profile, or you can hand back the computer, or you can be fired.” (And if they catch you doing any circumvention to prevent them from finding out, then your options are likely to be “you can be fired”)
ezfe 5y ago
Safari 15 (including this release) is compatible with Catalina and Big Sur, you don't need to upgrade macOS releases.

fabiospampinato 5y ago

Here I am still waiting for ES2018 regex look-behinds to be implemented. The folks working on the regex engine must have jumped ship or something.

tgv 5y ago
What use do you have for that in a web application? Anecdote: I tried (limited) CSS validation to through a regexp some time ago, and it worked, except that Chrome’s implementation jumped from a few 100ms to over 5 minutes on adding a single character. Made the whole thing quite useless.
- olliej 5y ago
  look behind assertions can be super useful - obviously you can workaround the lack of them, but sometimes simply having them there makes life easier. OTOH get look behind perf to not be horrific is challenging
- thiht 5y ago
  I recently used a lookbehind to replace \n by \r\n only if it’s not already preceded by \r. It was in a VSCode extension, because the output channel of the testing workbench stupidly requires \r\n, otherwise it doesn’t go to the beginning of the line. I could have done it without a lookbehind but occasions to use it are quite rare to me :)

MBCook 5y ago

Great to see Safari add lazy loading for images! I’ve been hoping for that one, I wasn’t aware it was in the works.

burtonator 5y ago

> New support for BroadcastChannel allows tabs, windows, iframes, and Workers from an origin to send messages to each other. This enables experiences like syncing login state for a site across multiple tabs. This is SUPER nice... there are other hacks like IndexedDB or localStorage but this is way better! But the frustrating part her is that we're excited about Webkit finally starting to catch up. Chrome is just perpetually innovating and then Webkit is constantly lagging. Supporting Safari is BY FAR the hardest part of my job.

taf2 5y ago
I think this means SharedWorkers are not too far behind. Pretty sure I saw a issue tracker indicating maybe SharedWorkers had been restored in a nightly build?
- jcbrand 5y ago
  That's great news if true. Last I saw (maybe a year ago), Safari claimed they won't support shared workers at all.
  - taf2 5y ago
    SharedWorkers are in safari now as a feature you can toggle on in settings on iOS
jensimmons 5y ago
Safari is ahead in implementing things like :has() and the new Viewport Units.
- epolanski 5y ago
  APIs that hardly change my job..
- mushyhammer 5y ago
  Yeah I saw that tweet. +1 for Safari, but we’re still -24. I’m still waiting for regex lookbehinds, a ES2018 syntax that I can’t use. Literally Safari does not execute the whole file if you use such regex literals.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

butz 5y ago

With so many new features being added to browsers lately it is easy to forget, that not all browsers on old devices are updated, be it older iPad or even laptop with ChromeOS. Dear web developers, please don't forget to add fallbacks or polyfills for older devices.

wahnfrieden 5y ago
this news is also relevant to wkwebview users
jeroenhd 5y ago
That's the risk you take by buying iPhone or ChromeOS: you're buying into a platform where you don't have the option to find alternatives for "core" system functionality. I care as much about outdated browsers as I care about Internet Explorer. If you want a modern experience, buy devices that allow you to update the browser (or complain to your manufacturer that you can't). Every other website has given up on my old second hand iPad, there are no new apps available for it and the old APIs are all shut down. Why should I still care about it as a web developer? It's still a nice device to read PDFs on.
- Jyaif 5y ago
  > you're buying into a platform where you don't have the option to find alternatives On ChromeOS devices you usually can install a regular linux distribution though.
  - jeroenhd 5y ago
    Not on all models (especially not on the older ones), and even then it's unnecessarily complicated by design. There are workarounds that come with a performance impact, but most Chromebooks aren't exactly powerful machines. A shame, really, because Linux could keep the Chromebooks that have somehow become too outdated alive for a few more years. Luckily Safari (and to some extend Firefox) is out there lacking common features that were in Chrome years ago, so polyfills will probably still be used for a few years.

noja 5y ago

Web MIDI? Still surprised that's missing on Apple.

alwillis 5y ago
I believe Apple and Mozilla’s position is it can’t be done in a privacy preserving way as currently specified.
- lern_too_spel 5y ago
  WebMIDI support in Firefox is almost complete. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=836897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=836897
  - eternityforest 5y ago
    Finally Mozilla does something sane! This is really great news, and I could see this being a pretty big thing or even a major way of doing web enabled IoT.
  - lioeters 5y ago
    I've been regularly checking that page, delighted with every step of progress as WebMIDI gets implemented in Firefox. In about:config, I have dom.webmidi.enabled set to true. I'm using this test page and waiting for the day it starts working for regular version of Firefox. https://versioduo.com/webmidi-test/ https://versioduo.com/webmidi-test/
    - ukfarmer 5y ago
      In Firefox 98.0, it actually works but is well-hidden. You not only have to turn on dom.webmidi.enabled in about:config as you've already done, but also need to manually add 'Access MIDI devices' and 'Access MIDI devices with SysEx support' permissions for the page in Tools -> Page Info before reloading, as otherwise it silently fails instead of prompting for confirmation. Hot-plugging interfaces after the browser is launched also doesn't seem to work yet.

Yaina 5y ago

Wohoo to :focus-visible support. The suffering is over!

donatj 5y ago

> WebKit added support for lazy-loading images with the loading attribute on the <img> element, providing web developers with an easy way to instruct the browser to defer loading certain images until the user scrolls near them Maybe there's hope that I can then just turn this off on a browser level? I've got gigabit internet at home, and your images popping in on scroll makes it feel like I'm on dial up. Lazy loading images is at best user hostile bandwidth saving, and it's not even that much in this day and age.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ezfe 5y ago
If it's implemented properly, and your internet is actually that fast, you won't actually see them loading.
dmw_ng 5y ago
> Lazy loading images is at best user hostile bandwidth saving It can easily be the vast majority of bandwidth spend even on a lightweight site. Add video widgets and bring that closer to 99%. Lazy loading is frequently a "can afford an extra 5 full time engineers" optimization
- donatj 5y ago
  > Lazy loading is frequently a "can afford an extra 5 full time engineers" optimization I find this figure suspect. I work on a site with millions of users whose core service is essentially displaying a stream of images to end users, and our spend on CDN bandwidth is barely into five figures
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    I suspect he was talking about the cost, not the benefit
  - dmw_ng 5y ago
    I picked 5 at random, but I guess it really depends on where you are. Assuming 5 was the real number, that's only $28k/month bandwidth spend given the average SWE salary in the UK (£38,561 going by google), including 33% for tax and non-salary costs. That's about 327 TB worth of undiscounted AWS bandwidth, or roughly a site averaging 993 Mbit/s. A small video site might start at 3 Gbit/s, a medium sized one closer to 30. These estimates really are quite conservative depending on the context

tiffanyh 5y ago

> Developers can now enable Navigation Preload in ServiceWorker to improve load performance and avoid ServiceWorker startup delays that block network requests Does that mean <link rel='preload'> finally works on Safari?

om2 5y ago
Navigation Preload is a different feature that is specific to Service Workers. `<link rel=preload>` has been supported in Safari for a while, since 11.x.
- tiffanyh 5y ago
  Whoops, I meant ‘prefetch’, not preload. https://caniuse.com/?search=prefetch https://caniuse.com/?search=prefetch Thanks for catching my mistake.

stimpson_j_cat 5y ago

> added support for the <dialog> element Might as well get started on those uBlock filters! dialog[class*="newsletter" i] dialog[id*="newsletter" i] dialog[class*="social" i] dialog[id*="social" i] dialog[id*="mailchimp" i]

musicale 5y ago
Every so often I daydream about a magical web browser with my preferred settings: [x] Block javascript popups and scrollovers [x] Block newsletter and notification solicitations [x] Really block all forms of auto-playing video in a way that actually works
- KarlKemp 5y ago
  A „JavaScript popup“ is indistinguishable from a div (or other block element) or its visibility being toggled.
  - mushyhammer 5y ago
    Not true in most cases. Usually popups have use position:fixed so they can be “easily” targeted. I remember seeing some extension that disabled position:fixed across the board (I assume it had terrible perf though)
kyleee 5y ago
how about just dialog*
- anhner 5y ago
  Because you might just need that dialog to edit an entry in a table?
throwra620 5y ago

brrrrrm 5y ago

dang, still no SIMD for WebAssembly. Chrome and Firefox are meanwhile hitting 45gflops (85% of peak) on my M1 Air. Safari only gets to 12.5gflops

dan_g__ 5y ago
Jarred 5y ago
They’re working on it You can follow along here https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=222382 https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=222382
- brrrrrm 5y ago
  this is awesome, thanks for the link!

imbnwa 5y ago

Wake me when they finally fix the GPU acceleration bug breaking <canvas>

traspler 5y ago

> Apps on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS can now control allowing or preventing web content from using the Fullscreen API. Too bad Safari still does not offer this as a toggle on iPadOS. I really hate the fullscreen video players on my iPad. They are mostly unusable with touch. Maybe it can be controlled using an Extension?

SippinLean 5y ago

seumars 5y ago

Really looking forward to start using cascade layers. Hopefully it'll encourage the community to work closer to pure CSS and leave behind some of the madness out there like CSS-in-JS or Svelte's scoped styles.

FullyFunctional 5y ago

I immediately looked for haptic feedback support but alas it's not there. I get that it could be abused so I'd want it as an opt-in feature. It's really useful for soft keyboards (of all kinds).

alisne00193 5y ago

acidosis282883 5y ago

avazhi 5y ago

Is Apple going to do anything about Safari (on my 2021 16" M1 Pro) hitting 200 points in BrowserBench, while Chrome hits 299? Sure, Safari battery life is great, but the browser is slow, buggy (refreshes the page when I back a page half the time; can't speed up videos without audio distortion; typing into the search bar is laggy and I on a daily basis arrow down to select a previously used URL, hit enter, and then find that Safari moved my selection up or down, almost like it had to sync or something). I try really hard to love Safari, I really do, but it's just a shitshow outside of battery life. Also, Brave is consistently 20-30 points below vanilla Chrome on BrowserBench? Any ideas why? And finally, and this is pretty egregious, but the 1Password browser extension is a 20-30% (yes) performance hit (on the BrowserBench benchmark) on any Chromium based browser that I use, and on Firefox. What the fuck, AgileBits? See for yourself: https://browserbench.org/Speedometer2.0/ https://browserbench.org/Speedometer2.0/

ezfe 5y ago
Well, on my M1 MacBook Air Safari hits 275, whereas Edge is 246 Safari: https://i.imgur.com/LcPD5eE.png https://i.imgur.com/LcPD5eE.png Edge: https://i.imgur.com/eWhgSuU.png https://i.imgur.com/eWhgSuU.png
- avazhi 5y ago
  what extensions do you have?
  - Sidnicious 5y ago
    Not the OP, but this is super cool as a way to measure extensions' performance impact (in a super limited way, admittedly). For me… Chrome 99.0.4844.51: - 1Password + µBlock Origin: 277 ± 2.9 - No extensions: 303 ± 5.1 (9% faster) Safari 15.3: - 1Password: 251 ± 2.6 - No extensions: 280.5 ± 2.6 (11% faster)
    - sp332 5y ago
      Wow, LastPass on Win10 Firefox cuts my performance in half there.

bawolff 5y ago

Woo, csp strict-dynamic. Safari was the last major browser not to support, and it makes csp so much easier to use.

eternityforest 5y ago

Finally Safari stops holding up the entire internet! I mean I'm sure they still are, just slightly less now.

jeffchien 5y ago

I was just in despair this last weekend when I discovered that vh decreases when the onscreen keyboard shows up and thus reflows my page where some elements have max-height: Xvh. I'm glad this is being addressed with lvh!

arilotter 5y ago

Aaaand they introduced WebGL bugs that broke our product, and iPhone users will experience these bugs until we can hack a workaround in, or until Apple acknowledges a bug report (that I have to make a minimal test case for and report, and haven't narrowed down yet), patches the issue in Safari, and decides if it's important enough to release as a 15.4.1 (which they probably won't, which means I'm stuck finding a workaround) - or if it comes out in iOS 16, then a good chunk of our users will never get the fix - so I'm stuck finding a workaround, still. The bundling of Safari versions with iOS, combined with the draconian policy of "Safari is the only legal rendering engine on iOS", bites me every day as a developer that's working on a mobile site for iDevices.

enos_feedler 5y ago
I am sorry you have to go through this painful exercise. But, how would an alternative rendering engine fix this problem?
- ben-schaaf 5y ago
  "Our product doesn't work in safari, use chrome or firefox instead"
  - Humphrey 5y ago
    Unfortunately, Apple have a policy that the inbuilt webkit is the only browser engine that is allowed to be used on an iOS device. The iOS Chrome, Firefox, & Edge apps are just thin wrappers around the same Safari engine included in iOS.
    - paavohtl 5y ago
      We all know. @ben-schaaf was answering the question "how would an alternative rendering engine fix this problem".
  - enos_feedler 5y ago
    The web is built on the foundation I can use any browser. You are going to break the fundamental promise just to avoid working around a bug?

ZYinMD 5y ago

When will they support webp on macOS 10? I guess never?

kalleboo 5y ago
I wish they'd add an option to disable webp, it's really annoying to save a photo and get it in a format that's supported almost nowhere.
- ksec 5y ago
  It was just the other day I am thinking, may be all photos saved from the web should either be JPEG ( direct download from the page ) or it would be saved as lossless PNG. We now end up adding AVIF, WebP, possibly JPEGXL, the upcoming WebP2, and what else? I am not entirely sure more format is a good idea.
  - astrange 5y ago
    WebP is a bad idea, which is why they're updating it. We should all ignore it until it goes away. Amusingly there's also a WebP lossless which is a completely different algorithm they just let a random employee invent.
    - ksec 5y ago
      I thinking more in the line of an image codec that gets constantly updated with browser. And only release it as a standard when it is good enough. So you can iterate and not be bounded by the spec. The server / CDN will serve image that fit that browser requirement, and fall back to jpeg as baseline. This idea wouldn't work for video due to how computational intensive video encoding are and storage space concern. But may be it would work for image? Or if we could somehow magically improve the JPEGXL encoder quality by another 20-30%.
  - ZYinMD 5y ago
    WebP is strictly better than jpeg though.

tuankiet65 5y ago

I'm happy to contribute two new features as part of my WebKit internship: the ic unit (as mentioned in the changelog), and CSS Motion Path, which I'm honestly surprised is not mentioned.

mohas 5y ago
Congrats!
- tuankiet65 5y ago
  Thank you!
mindhunter 5y ago
Awesome that you contributed to CSS Motion Path! Such a powerful feature :)

everydaypanos 5y ago

Been waiting for this for so long. Especially the BroadcastChanel feature since there is currently no way for PWAs installed twice on the Home Screen to “share” data between them. Hope that BC fixes that

mohas 5y ago

It is scary how many basic features it didn't support before

rtpg 5y ago

Very excited about dialog being its own thing. There are of course a lot of nice built-in solutions to things, but having a quick-and-easy modal mechanism allows people to have cleaner code for something they're gonna try to do one way or another.

fleddr 5y ago

Credit where credit is due: this is a rarely good release. Cynical me has observed this annual pattern where Apple just before their developer conference suddenly becomes "genuinely" interested in the web community and actively listens to feedback. Then, things get back to normal, which means they don't implement anything, all feedback goes to /dev/null, documentation is lacking and bugs are never solved. It's hard to get past this cynical angle because even in this release they're boasting about how they're "first" to implement something, whilst it remains to be the browser lagging years behind. Typical Apple, fluffy marketing with zero self-reflection. I did see there's lots of webkit vacancies at Apple now, so one can hope things are changing for the better. Probably because it looks better to regulators.

Jcowell 5y ago
> Cynical me has observed this annual pattern where Apple just before their developer conference suddenly becomes "genuinely" interested in the web community and actively listens to feedback. Then, things get back to normal, which means they don't implement anything, all feedback goes to /dev/null, documentation is lacking and bugs are never solved. This doesn’t make sense to me. Features takes time to discuss, roadmap, argue , implement, test, and ship. These things aren’t something you just ramp up just before their developer conference. I would be furious if I were a WebKit developer and told I don’t implement anything or take feedback all year up until a Yearly conference. Especially when Safari updated 7 times last year alone.
- fleddr 5y ago
  None of this is aimed at any individual Webkit developer. The state of Safari (stagnation and underinvestment) is on Apple, not on the team. Apple not taking feedback or taking it and it being completely pointless is well documented behavior. This guy... https://firt.dev/ https://firt.dev/ ...has basically been doing Apple's job for ages. Testing releases, documenting endless bugs, providing feedback, usually leading to absolutely nothing at all. Recently, he kept score from what was actually handled based on last year's feedback. It was close to nothing. Which is business as usual, it's like talking to a brick wall. Things couldn't be more dramatically different with the Chrome team. When I register a bug there, I get feedback within hours. They will scrutinize it immediately and confirm if its reproducible or not. They will indicate if its per spec or not, refer to discussions and assign it to a group/member when it's a valid bug. If it's anything remotely serious, it's often solved within 2 releases, so within 12 weeks. Further, one can directly interact with the Chrome team on Twitter and I regularly have long email conversations with them by personal email. They are accessible and take your feedback serious. Apple is the exact opposite. As for Safari updates, they're usually meh. Small list of bug fixes and some web inspector improvements. Hence my remark that this is an unusually valuable release.

darinf 5y ago

Appreciate the work the WebKit team is doing, but would love to see more support for WKWebView devs. The WKPreference updates are nice, but such a small step. As a browser developer targeting iOS (where one is forced to use WKWebView), it is shocking how many hacks are required to build table stakes features on top of WKWebView. Of course, I can imagine the Safari team would have little motivation to help in this regard since it is about enabling competition.

sccxy 5y ago

Safari 15.4 broke my web app. Impossible debug and workes fine in 15.3.x and any other browser. Awkward disappearing elements & zindex or canvas bug. Worst browser especially it is impossible to debug in windows.

imbnwa 5y ago
WebKit broke my org's <canvas>-based product with 15.x release, have to disable GPU Acceleration in order to prevent full page refreshes while drawing anything complicated after about 20 seconds and its consistent to reproduce. Checkout Apple Dev forum or any HTML5 Game Engine Disco/Board/Tracker
grumpyDev66 5y ago
I wrote a PWA for my personal use that appears to be broken now that I upgraded to 15.4. I use it for time tracking, so I think it has something to do with Dates or Inputs of type datetime. Haven't had a chance to debug it yet. Yeah, Safari is the worst...

petarb 5y ago

It doesn’t look like the Push API made it