3 ms·

I'm not sure "intrinsically superior" is the right way to think about this. It's fast enough. It's compatible with the existing web. It's platform independent.

I'm not sure "intrinsically superior" is the right way to think about this. It's fast enough. It's compatible with the existing web. It's platform independent. It runs in any standards-compliant web-browser. That's four wins right there. It's fundamentally superior. End of discussion. That said, the remaining 10% really do want something more. They want to write targetted architecture-specific assembly, perhaps. If they do, they can go do it somewhere which isn't the open web. When I use a web-browser, me and my devices aren't going to wait for you to fix your webpage to support the architecture I happen to be running. We're going to go somewhere else. Imagine how impossible it would have been for early Macs and ARM-devices to enter the market if the web was already entrenched in platform-specific Intel x86 code. How many of those websites out there do you think would have been "fixed" in order to work on other platforms, years after the authors abandoned them? I'm guessing a tiny fraction. They didn't have to though, because the web is cross-platform. This is by design. We should thoroughly ignore Google's best efforts to reverse this with their proprietary NaCl. Why on earth would we want to change the best quality of the web now that it has already proven its value?

haberman 13y ago
> Imagine how impossible it would have been for early Macs and ARM-devices to enter the market if the web was already entrenched in platform-specific Intel x86 code. Are you aware that NaCl (the platform-specific version) is only enabled for applications installed through the Chrome Web Store? Chrome will not load NaCl modules from the web. All that is supported for the web is PNaCl, which is platform-independent. See: https://developers.google.com/native-client/dev/nacl-and-pnacl https://developers.google.com/native-client/dev/nacl-and-pna... So your hypothetical is not in danger of happening.
- josteink 13y ago
  Ok. Fair enough. That said, that's not what the post I was replying to was suggesting. It was suggesting writing architecture-specific assembly code and putting it on the web. And citing that as a legitimate need which should be addressed by browser-vendors. Needless to say, as someone who supports an open, cross-platform web, I strongly oppose any such measure.
CmonDev 13y ago
"Why on earth would we want to change the best quality of the web now that it has already proven its value?" - lame outdated languages: JS, HTML etc.
- Ygg2 13y ago
  HTML is not a language, not unless you consider CSV and XML, programming languages. CSS on the other hand...
  - mhaymo 13y ago
    Hyper Text Markup Language. It's in the name. If you're going to be pedantic, at least be correct.
    - Ygg2 13y ago
      There is also a thing like context. Mentioning JS and HTML as languages in a news article about asm.js/PNaCl almost automatically means - "programming languages". So you are factually right, but a lot of people will go and say ah, yes - writing HTML is programming. Which is just untrue.

haberman 13y ago

> Imagine how impossible it would have been for early Macs and ARM-devices to enter the market if the web was already entrenched in platform-specific Intel x86 code. Are you aware that NaCl (the platform-specific version) is only enabled for applications installed through the Chrome Web Store? Chrome will not load NaCl modules from the web. All that is supported for the web is PNaCl, which is platform-independent. See: https://developers.google.com/native-client/dev/nacl-and-pnacl https://developers.google.com/native-client/dev/nacl-and-pna... So your hypothetical is not in danger of happening.

josteink 13y ago
Ok. Fair enough. That said, that's not what the post I was replying to was suggesting. It was suggesting writing architecture-specific assembly code and putting it on the web. And citing that as a legitimate need which should be addressed by browser-vendors. Needless to say, as someone who supports an open, cross-platform web, I strongly oppose any such measure.

CmonDev 13y ago

"Why on earth would we want to change the best quality of the web now that it has already proven its value?" - lame outdated languages: JS, HTML etc.

Ygg2 13y ago
HTML is not a language, not unless you consider CSV and XML, programming languages. CSS on the other hand...
- mhaymo 13y ago
  Hyper Text Markup Language. It's in the name. If you're going to be pedantic, at least be correct.
  - Ygg2 13y ago
    There is also a thing like context. Mentioning JS and HTML as languages in a news article about asm.js/PNaCl almost automatically means - "programming languages". So you are factually right, but a lot of people will go and say ah, yes - writing HTML is programming. Which is just untrue.