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The people stewarding the Web platform have neglected a lot of nice things, among them this—a major version two major versions ahead of what's in browsers, is e

The people stewarding the Web platform have neglected a lot of nice things, among them this—a major version two major versions ahead of what's in browsers, is eight years old. That it still has any use on notable sites at all seems like a decent cue to at least try not neglecting it before declaring nobody wants to use it. ... however, it's mostly useful for doing things that owners of walled Web platforms have no interest in, like working with interoperable protocols & formats. They've been killing those through active moves and neglect for 15 years, so why would they do something that makes that easier & nicer?

otterley 1y ago
It seems like a long logical leap that browser authors have no interest in working with interoperable protocols and formats--despite all the work they put into maintaining and improving Javascript (a terrible language since the day it was born), HTML, CSS, downloadable fonts, TLS and other security protocols, SVG and other image formats, security tokens and keys, WebUSB (!), WebRTC, etc.--because they want to drop a feature that practically nobody uses.
- simoncion 1y ago
  > ...because they want to drop a feature that practically nobody uses. Outside of the Googleplex, I expect that far, far, far fewer people use WebUSB than use XSLT. Plus, attaching devices that have field-reprogrammable firmware and have always assumed that the only thing that can access them is software running on the local system directly to the worst parts of the Internet seems like a shockingly poor idea, from a security perspective.
  - otterley 1y ago
    I'm no champion of WebUSB, and I have no idea what its usage stats are. I'm only saying that the idea that browser vendors are on some sort of mission to stifle open standards and interoperability is ludicrous on its face.
    - simoncion 1y ago
      There are some that would say that moving a standard that covers a large number of complicated things from a versioned standard to a "living standard" makes interoperability impossible for all but the most well-financed organizations. I agree with this assertion. I'll also point out that (for quite a long while now) only two companies produce the major browser engines: Google and Apple. Mozilla Firefox doesn't count as an independent entity because without the funding from Google, it would have shut down long, long ago. So, anyway. If Google wants to remove a complicated, security-compromising feature that very, very, very few people use, they should REALLY start with WebUSB.

otterley 1y ago

It seems like a long logical leap that browser authors have no interest in working with interoperable protocols and formats--despite all the work they put into maintaining and improving Javascript (a terrible language since the day it was born), HTML, CSS, downloadable fonts, TLS and other security protocols, SVG and other image formats, security tokens and keys, WebUSB (!), WebRTC, etc.--because they want to drop a feature that practically nobody uses.

simoncion 1y ago
> ...because they want to drop a feature that practically nobody uses. Outside of the Googleplex, I expect that far, far, far fewer people use WebUSB than use XSLT. Plus, attaching devices that have field-reprogrammable firmware and have always assumed that the only thing that can access them is software running on the local system directly to the worst parts of the Internet seems like a shockingly poor idea, from a security perspective.
- otterley 1y ago
  I'm no champion of WebUSB, and I have no idea what its usage stats are. I'm only saying that the idea that browser vendors are on some sort of mission to stifle open standards and interoperability is ludicrous on its face.
  - simoncion 1y ago
    There are some that would say that moving a standard that covers a large number of complicated things from a versioned standard to a "living standard" makes interoperability impossible for all but the most well-financed organizations. I agree with this assertion. I'll also point out that (for quite a long while now) only two companies produce the major browser engines: Google and Apple. Mozilla Firefox doesn't count as an independent entity because without the funding from Google, it would have shut down long, long ago. So, anyway. If Google wants to remove a complicated, security-compromising feature that very, very, very few people use, they should REALLY start with WebUSB.