3 ms·

> On top of all that the web is incredibly messy. That is arguably both a bug and a feature. The web is an untended jungle, possibly the most diverse of any te

by lukifer 14y ago

> On top of all that the web is incredibly messy. That is arguably both a bug and a feature. The web is an untended jungle, possibly the most diverse of any technical ecosystem. Democracy and markets are messy too, but I think most of us would rather not give those up.

jacquesm 14y ago
When it comes to technology messy is not a feature but a drawback. It precludes a very important thing from manifesting itself, reliability. The difference between the backbone of the internet (TCP/IP) compared to the maze that is web development is simply astounding. The amount of hoops you have to jump through to do stuff that was child's play on any computer 20+ years ago just because it is on the web completely baffles me. People are actually proud of being able to make simple games or chat services using a browser. That is because it is so terribly difficult to do such simple things using the web as a delivery device. - HTML - JavaScript - CSS - Server side code (pick your flavor) - HTTP - websockets - some real time extension (node or whatever) - a persistence layer And all that for the basic functionality of tying a few people on graphics terminals to each other. Oh, and to make it more interesting we're shipping actual code from one location to another so you have a few security nightmares extra.
- zevyoura 14y ago
  I think you're underestimating the complexity of native apps. To duplicate functionality of a web app, you're still going to need to know your networking layer, whatever it is, and you still need to write a server and persistence layer; the only difference is on the client, where instead of HTML/CSS/JS you're building in one language... plus probably a GUI framework (which are not exactly known for their simplicity or ease of use). And there are security issues related to distributing native binaries too. When you say there are tons of extra 'hoops' to jump through, what do you mean?
- parasubvert 14y ago
  I was on the Internet regularly 25 years ago. "Simple network games" did not exist, they had incredibly complex protocols and failure conditions (remember setting up Netrek?). Chat services also incredibly difficult to run correctly over the Internet that there was no proliferation, there was... IRC. Which had its own major messes (recalling EFnet netsplits almost hourly in the early 90s). Or let's talk about BBS'. So, you could do ANSI art fairly easily, but let's recall the hassle of handling multiple users on the software of the day. You usually didn't. BBS games (Tradewars, Legend of the Red Dragon, etc.) were turn based - someone dialed in, played their turn for the day, and waited for everyone else to dial in and play their turn. Email and Fidonet EchoGroups came in daily, or maybe twice a day, when you dialed into your upstream provider. The only way you could run a multitasking BBS with multiple phone lines was mostly DESQview, OS/2, or the BBS software itself had its own multi-threading. The Internet didn't replace IRC and BBS'... the Web did. Not that they're gone completely, just no where near as important as they once were. Network games are OTOH are still as complex as Netrek because they don't fit a Hypermedia architecture. But ultimately I think you have nostalgia for a better world that never existed. Which is fine if you want inspiration for new ideas but... it is important to understand why the Web won: for many cases, it was better than what we had.

by lukifer 14y ago

jacquesm 14y ago

When it comes to technology messy is not a feature but a drawback. It precludes a very important thing from manifesting itself, reliability. The difference between the backbone of the internet (TCP/IP) compared to the maze that is web development is simply astounding. The amount of hoops you have to jump through to do stuff that was child's play on any computer 20+ years ago just because it is on the web completely baffles me. People are actually proud of being able to make simple games or chat services using a browser. That is because it is so terribly difficult to do such simple things using the web as a delivery device. - HTML - JavaScript - CSS - Server side code (pick your flavor) - HTTP - websockets - some real time extension (node or whatever) - a persistence layer And all that for the basic functionality of tying a few people on graphics terminals to each other. Oh, and to make it more interesting we're shipping actual code from one location to another so you have a few security nightmares extra.

zevyoura 14y ago
I think you're underestimating the complexity of native apps. To duplicate functionality of a web app, you're still going to need to know your networking layer, whatever it is, and you still need to write a server and persistence layer; the only difference is on the client, where instead of HTML/CSS/JS you're building in one language... plus probably a GUI framework (which are not exactly known for their simplicity or ease of use). And there are security issues related to distributing native binaries too. When you say there are tons of extra 'hoops' to jump through, what do you mean?
parasubvert 14y ago
I was on the Internet regularly 25 years ago. "Simple network games" did not exist, they had incredibly complex protocols and failure conditions (remember setting up Netrek?). Chat services also incredibly difficult to run correctly over the Internet that there was no proliferation, there was... IRC. Which had its own major messes (recalling EFnet netsplits almost hourly in the early 90s). Or let's talk about BBS'. So, you could do ANSI art fairly easily, but let's recall the hassle of handling multiple users on the software of the day. You usually didn't. BBS games (Tradewars, Legend of the Red Dragon, etc.) were turn based - someone dialed in, played their turn for the day, and waited for everyone else to dial in and play their turn. Email and Fidonet EchoGroups came in daily, or maybe twice a day, when you dialed into your upstream provider. The only way you could run a multitasking BBS with multiple phone lines was mostly DESQview, OS/2, or the BBS software itself had its own multi-threading. The Internet didn't replace IRC and BBS'... the Web did. Not that they're gone completely, just no where near as important as they once were. Network games are OTOH are still as complex as Netrek because they don't fit a Hypermedia architecture. But ultimately I think you have nostalgia for a better world that never existed. Which is fine if you want inspiration for new ideas but... it is important to understand why the Web won: for many cases, it was better than what we had.