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There was a period of time when sites pretty much worked everywhere. In the last five years or so, the number of sites that only work in Chrome was risen preci

There was a period of time when sites pretty much worked everywhere. In the last five years or so, the number of sites that only work in Chrome was risen precipitously. It's either malice or incompetence, and I have no trouble believing either.

nness 3y ago
Gotta protect your ad revenue some how...
nness 3y ago
Gotta protect that ad revenue some how...
isodev 3y ago
Even Microsoft’s GitHub has all kinds of glitches unless you’re using a chromium browser. The general push towards a single engine is just undeniable at this point. Whoever controls the browser, controls the web.
- rascul 3y ago
  > Even Microsoft’s GitHub has all kinds of glitches unless you’re using a chromium browser. What are some of the glitches? I'm curious if I've ran into any of them.
  - Thin_icE 3y ago
    Same, never found any glitch.
  - ForkMeOnTinder 3y ago
    ctrl-/ doesn't work in firefox for me (the shortcut for "Focus secondary search bar") But all things considered that's pretty minor
  - inferiorhuman 3y ago
    Given how bad the current Github UI is (and how sloppy the rollout was) I'm quite content to attribute it to incompetence rather than malice, but: Type a long blurb into a text input widget e.g. a comment on a pull request. The text just bounces up and down as you type. I've noticed this with whatever the extended support version of Firefox (macos 10.14) is and with the current Firefox (macos 14.1). To be fair GH renders widgets partially off screen with whatever version of Safari comes with macos 10.14 There is no more static text on GH so if you go back further than that (or have javascript disabled) nothing renders at all. There's no issue tracker (because why would there be?) but there was a discussion thread. Last I saw someone posted detailed steps to reproduce a search bug and the GH response was to lock the discussion thread.
    - isodev 3y ago
      The star repository button sometimes doesn’t work in Safari and you have to toggle it twice (which is lol, you had one job) Repository settings have a whole lot of knobs and toggles that don’t save or remain disabled unless you manage them from a chromium-something. I agree that while it doesn’t need to be targeted at specific agents, the fact that they don’t spend the time to test their things on other agents is saying enough.
- beej71 3y ago
  > The general push towards a single engine is just undeniable at this point. Whoever controls the browser, controls the web. I fear you're right. Evidence: IE6. But eventually we will come out the other side.
nerdjon 3y ago
When Google decided to fork Webkit we should have all seen this coming. Safari and Chrome being on the same engine was great, now we are seeing more divergence since we have 3 main engines and more and more are only testing on Chrome.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  No one targeting an American market would be crazy enough to ignore Safari because of iOS’s market share.
- bryanlarsen 3y ago
  Wouldn't it be the opposite? When Safari & Chrome were more similar you could get away with testing only one. Now you have to test on at least both Safari & Chrome, and anything that works on both of those is more likely to work on Firefox than something that only works on Chrome.
beiller 3y ago
Maybe a counter point here, but I've doubled down on Firefox only, even at work. Things like hangouts and many other Goog services seem to have started working more at parity compared to Chromium at least I've found, in the last year or so.
- iforgotpassword 3y ago
  Same for me. Teams didn't even allow me to join about a year ago, but a few weeks ago it just worked. I can't even remember the last time I encountered a site that wouldn't work in Firefox tbh. Am I just lucky?
  - nottheengineer 3y ago
    Teams will let you use chat and join meetings in firefox, but as soon as you try to make a call you'll get the "fuck you" popup.
kolinko 3y ago
I've been using Safari on MacOS for the last 3-4 years (switching from Chrome), and I can't remember a single site that wouldn't work properly. With one notable exception of Google Meet, which consistently tended to fail on anything but Chrome.
- throwaway2203 3y ago
  I reckon it's more webkit rather than Chrome. I think Mozilla is the only major non-webkit browser now.
  - danaris 3y ago
    Chrome isn't really WebKit anymore, though—it's Chromium.
scarface_74 3y ago
There was never that time. 1. At first it was “works best with Netscape Navigator” 2. Then it was the same with IE 3. Now it’s Chrome.
- plorkyeran 3y ago
  There was a step in between #2 and #3 where web developers all used FF while non-technical users used IE6, so supporting both was unavoidable. Chrome didn't become dominant until a decade later.
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    And web developers then ignored Safari from 2001-2007 before the iPhone came out…
- glenstein 3y ago
  I'm with you on 2 and 3, but was Netscape Navigator similarly anti-competitive in a way that is analogous to Chrome or IE?
  - scarface_74 3y ago
    Yes. They added all sorts of proprietary extensions that didn’t go through a standards body. Thad’s how we got the “navigator” object in all browsers.
dmbche 3y ago
Really? Could you point me to one of those sites?
marssaxman 3y ago
I wonder why I have not encountered any; it has been well over five years since I last used Chrome at all!

nness 3y ago

Gotta protect your ad revenue some how...

nness 3y ago

Gotta protect that ad revenue some how...

isodev 3y ago

Even Microsoft’s GitHub has all kinds of glitches unless you’re using a chromium browser. The general push towards a single engine is just undeniable at this point. Whoever controls the browser, controls the web.

rascul 3y ago
> Even Microsoft’s GitHub has all kinds of glitches unless you’re using a chromium browser. What are some of the glitches? I'm curious if I've ran into any of them.
- Thin_icE 3y ago
  Same, never found any glitch.
- ForkMeOnTinder 3y ago
  ctrl-/ doesn't work in firefox for me (the shortcut for "Focus secondary search bar") But all things considered that's pretty minor
- inferiorhuman 3y ago
  Given how bad the current Github UI is (and how sloppy the rollout was) I'm quite content to attribute it to incompetence rather than malice, but: Type a long blurb into a text input widget e.g. a comment on a pull request. The text just bounces up and down as you type. I've noticed this with whatever the extended support version of Firefox (macos 10.14) is and with the current Firefox (macos 14.1). To be fair GH renders widgets partially off screen with whatever version of Safari comes with macos 10.14 There is no more static text on GH so if you go back further than that (or have javascript disabled) nothing renders at all. There's no issue tracker (because why would there be?) but there was a discussion thread. Last I saw someone posted detailed steps to reproduce a search bug and the GH response was to lock the discussion thread.
  - isodev 3y ago
    The star repository button sometimes doesn’t work in Safari and you have to toggle it twice (which is lol, you had one job) Repository settings have a whole lot of knobs and toggles that don’t save or remain disabled unless you manage them from a chromium-something. I agree that while it doesn’t need to be targeted at specific agents, the fact that they don’t spend the time to test their things on other agents is saying enough.
beej71 3y ago
> The general push towards a single engine is just undeniable at this point. Whoever controls the browser, controls the web. I fear you're right. Evidence: IE6. But eventually we will come out the other side.

nerdjon 3y ago

When Google decided to fork Webkit we should have all seen this coming. Safari and Chrome being on the same engine was great, now we are seeing more divergence since we have 3 main engines and more and more are only testing on Chrome.

scarface_74 3y ago
No one targeting an American market would be crazy enough to ignore Safari because of iOS’s market share.
bryanlarsen 3y ago
Wouldn't it be the opposite? When Safari & Chrome were more similar you could get away with testing only one. Now you have to test on at least both Safari & Chrome, and anything that works on both of those is more likely to work on Firefox than something that only works on Chrome.

beiller 3y ago

Maybe a counter point here, but I've doubled down on Firefox only, even at work. Things like hangouts and many other Goog services seem to have started working more at parity compared to Chromium at least I've found, in the last year or so.

iforgotpassword 3y ago
Same for me. Teams didn't even allow me to join about a year ago, but a few weeks ago it just worked. I can't even remember the last time I encountered a site that wouldn't work in Firefox tbh. Am I just lucky?
- nottheengineer 3y ago
  Teams will let you use chat and join meetings in firefox, but as soon as you try to make a call you'll get the "fuck you" popup.

kolinko 3y ago

I've been using Safari on MacOS for the last 3-4 years (switching from Chrome), and I can't remember a single site that wouldn't work properly. With one notable exception of Google Meet, which consistently tended to fail on anything but Chrome.

throwaway2203 3y ago
I reckon it's more webkit rather than Chrome. I think Mozilla is the only major non-webkit browser now.
- danaris 3y ago
  Chrome isn't really WebKit anymore, though—it's Chromium.

scarface_74 3y ago

There was never that time. 1. At first it was “works best with Netscape Navigator” 2. Then it was the same with IE 3. Now it’s Chrome.

plorkyeran 3y ago
There was a step in between #2 and #3 where web developers all used FF while non-technical users used IE6, so supporting both was unavoidable. Chrome didn't become dominant until a decade later.
- scarface_74 3y ago
  And web developers then ignored Safari from 2001-2007 before the iPhone came out…
glenstein 3y ago
I'm with you on 2 and 3, but was Netscape Navigator similarly anti-competitive in a way that is analogous to Chrome or IE?
- scarface_74 3y ago
  Yes. They added all sorts of proprietary extensions that didn’t go through a standards body. Thad’s how we got the “navigator” object in all browsers.

dmbche 3y ago

Really? Could you point me to one of those sites?

marssaxman 3y ago

I wonder why I have not encountered any; it has been well over five years since I last used Chrome at all!