4 ms·

The old-fashioned way: breathe a sigh of relief, and move on to less egregious sites.

shadowgovt 5y ago
It's a nice sentiment, but these days it's almost impossible to conduct business with JavaScript disabled. At least business in the parts of the economy I work in. The moment somebody sends me a Google Drive link (about three times a week), w3m goes back on the shelf and I have to pick up a modern standard-compliant browser.
- bscphil 5y ago
  I don't anyone is suggesting that you should, in practice, adopt w3m or any other text browser as your exclusive way to access web resources.
  - lupire 5y ago
    grandparent comment was suggesting exactly that, with "breathe a sigh of relief".
    - inopinatus 5y ago
      I wrote that remark, and I was not. I’m not even using w3m right now, and observe that the comment I replied to was more general, relating to all browsing without Javascript. Extreme positions and interpretations are for nutters. In the specific case of Google Drive access, I like the Ruby client.
      - shadowgovt 5y ago
        The Ruby Client is great for data storage and retrieval, but I meant editing Drive docs (sheets, docs, etc.). Colleagues don't appreciate it when I drop their doc into another editor instead of commenting / recommending corrections in-place
        inopinatus 5y ago
        Oh, for sure. I don't perceive those as websites, though. Sheets and Docs et al are basically thick-client office applications that happen to be written in Javascript. In this circumstance I just use Chrome since it's Google's official runtime. Or the "native" apps on a tablet, which I'd wager are just a packaged variant of the same code. I see this as congruent to the old-school Lotus Notes/Domino architecture, and not really about the web at all. There's no value in being an ideologue about it. My reasons for browsing with JS disabled-by-default are fourfold: 1. to defeat many/most active tracking methods, 2. as a sort of passive ad blocker, 3. because it's very often much faster, and 4. for written content JS dependence is moderately correlated to a poor S:N ratio. None of that has much bearing on an office application.
- rkta 5y ago
  Fortunately w3m has an external browser commands which let's you open the current URL in a browser.
  - shadowgovt 5y ago
    If using a regular modern browser is a superset of the experience of w3m, why do I want to add the extra level of inconvenient indirection?
    - LeFantome 5y ago
      Actually, the idea that I so can easily launch a full browser in context is what has me wanting to give this a shot. I would love a less cluttered and less resource intensive web experience. I also know is unrealistic in 2022 to have a normal day of browser activity without needing JavaScript and / or CSS. If I can use a text browser much of the time and easily switch to a full browser only when I need it, that sounds like the best of both worlds. Lots of what I browse would likely be even nicer text only. This very site comes to mind.
    - rkta 5y ago
      If it is a inconvenient indirection for you, than w3m is probably not the right tool. The linked article mentions some reasons. I use it, because it fits my console-focused work style. It's blanzigly fast, removes all the distractions like unnecessary images and ads, doesn't require me to take my hands of the keyboard, works very well if I'm working on a mobile hotspot, can be used while being ssh'd into a server... and because opening the side in a regular modern browser is only a key press away.
    - zeveb 5y ago
      > If using a regular modern browser is a superset of the experience of w3m, why do I want to add the extra level of inconvenient indirection? Because using a 'regular modern browser' is not a superset; it also lacks certain things, such as freedom from JavaScript, freedom from some forms of tracking and it is incompatible with the terminal or other text-based environments. Some folks find those things to be worthwhile.

It's a nice sentiment, but these days it's almost impossible to conduct business with JavaScript disabled. At least business in the parts of the economy I work in. The moment somebody sends me a Google Drive link (about three times a week), w3m goes back on the shelf and I have to pick up a modern standard-compliant browser.

bscphil 5y ago
I don't anyone is suggesting that you should, in practice, adopt w3m or any other text browser as your exclusive way to access web resources.
- lupire 5y ago
  grandparent comment was suggesting exactly that, with "breathe a sigh of relief".
  - inopinatus 5y ago
    I wrote that remark, and I was not. I’m not even using w3m right now, and observe that the comment I replied to was more general, relating to all browsing without Javascript. Extreme positions and interpretations are for nutters. In the specific case of Google Drive access, I like the Ruby client.
    - shadowgovt 5y ago
      The Ruby Client is great for data storage and retrieval, but I meant editing Drive docs (sheets, docs, etc.). Colleagues don't appreciate it when I drop their doc into another editor instead of commenting / recommending corrections in-place
      - inopinatus 5y ago
        Oh, for sure. I don't perceive those as websites, though. Sheets and Docs et al are basically thick-client office applications that happen to be written in Javascript. In this circumstance I just use Chrome since it's Google's official runtime. Or the "native" apps on a tablet, which I'd wager are just a packaged variant of the same code. I see this as congruent to the old-school Lotus Notes/Domino architecture, and not really about the web at all. There's no value in being an ideologue about it. My reasons for browsing with JS disabled-by-default are fourfold: 1. to defeat many/most active tracking methods, 2. as a sort of passive ad blocker, 3. because it's very often much faster, and 4. for written content JS dependence is moderately correlated to a poor S:N ratio. None of that has much bearing on an office application.
rkta 5y ago
Fortunately w3m has an external browser commands which let's you open the current URL in a browser.
- shadowgovt 5y ago
  If using a regular modern browser is a superset of the experience of w3m, why do I want to add the extra level of inconvenient indirection?
  - LeFantome 5y ago
    Actually, the idea that I so can easily launch a full browser in context is what has me wanting to give this a shot. I would love a less cluttered and less resource intensive web experience. I also know is unrealistic in 2022 to have a normal day of browser activity without needing JavaScript and / or CSS. If I can use a text browser much of the time and easily switch to a full browser only when I need it, that sounds like the best of both worlds. Lots of what I browse would likely be even nicer text only. This very site comes to mind.
  - rkta 5y ago
    If it is a inconvenient indirection for you, than w3m is probably not the right tool. The linked article mentions some reasons. I use it, because it fits my console-focused work style. It's blanzigly fast, removes all the distractions like unnecessary images and ads, doesn't require me to take my hands of the keyboard, works very well if I'm working on a mobile hotspot, can be used while being ssh'd into a server... and because opening the side in a regular modern browser is only a key press away.
  - zeveb 5y ago
    > If using a regular modern browser is a superset of the experience of w3m, why do I want to add the extra level of inconvenient indirection? Because using a 'regular modern browser' is not a superset; it also lacks certain things, such as freedom from JavaScript, freedom from some forms of tracking and it is incompatible with the terminal or other text-based environments. Some folks find those things to be worthwhile.