The Double Edged Sword of the Web(ponyfoo.com)
ponyfoo.com
The Double Edged Sword of the Web
https://ponyfoo.com/articles/double-edged-sword-web?
47 comments
I have to agree on this one. I have lots of respect for Nicolás and his work, but I think this article shows a little bit of arrogance towards users who don't use Chrome as their primary user.
On top of that he disabled accessibility on Firefox entirely in favour of design preferences. Many developer might not care, but it's an attitude which needs to stop.
On top of that he disabled accessibility on Firefox entirely in favour of design preferences. Many developer might not care, but it's an attitude which needs to stop.
It's more than a little arrogance, it's a superiority complex. My jaw dropped when I read the following because it speaks volumes about his mindset.
> As such, visitors are mostly privileged web developers using macOS and Google Chrome.
> As such, visitors are mostly privileged web developers using macOS and Google Chrome.
Meet the new bullies. Same as the old bullies.
There's a lot of this going on in the tech community. Far cry from when <geeks|nerds|smart people> got pushed around... Now they're (we? I hope I'm not like this) the ones doing the pushing.
There's a lot of this going on in the tech community. Far cry from when <geeks|nerds|smart people> got pushed around... Now they're (we? I hope I'm not like this) the ones doing the pushing.
Meh. The nerds still get pushed around. Most web devs these days are not nerds in any traditional sense. Web dev has long since left the computer labs and entered the art and media departments. And with it has come the every increasing use of Apple products in web dev circles.
I'm not an artist, I came from a Computer Science background, and I still use Apple products. I don't think using Linux as a desktop environment is enjoyable. I don't get the Apple hate.
It's highly contextual. Macs gained a lot of popularity with OSX because of it's BSD underpinnings that allowed developers to go mobile and disconnected without having to run Linux Desktops. However Macs have always been popular with designers, artists, and creative nontechnical users because of their simplicity and intuitiveness.
A lot of the hate comes from having to deal with the later group, not the former.
A lot of the hate comes from having to deal with the later group, not the former.
And, crucially, OSX is the only real option for running both unixy programs and high-grade commercial software such as the Adobe Suite on the same machine without dual-booting
Define "real". Cygwin has been an option on Windows for a long time. It has its complications and issues, but isn't exactly "fake".
Besides that, Windows 10's Bash on Ubuntu on Windows is a very interesting step in this direction. It's going to increasingly be a "real" option.
ETA: Also, Virtual Machines and Remote Login are blurry edges of "real" that aren't dual-booting.
Besides that, Windows 10's Bash on Ubuntu on Windows is a very interesting step in this direction. It's going to increasingly be a "real" option.
ETA: Also, Virtual Machines and Remote Login are blurry edges of "real" that aren't dual-booting.
How about not half baked, incomplete, or restricted?
Lets be honest, Cygwin is a joke if you're doing *nix development.
Windows 10's Bash on Ubuntu is months old, we're talking historically on the order of 5-10 years.
VMs and remote systems are fraught with compromises.
Lets be honest, Cygwin is a joke if you're doing *nix development.
Windows 10's Bash on Ubuntu is months old, we're talking historically on the order of 5-10 years.
VMs and remote systems are fraught with compromises.
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> There's a lot of this going on in the tech community.
No. There's a lot of this going on in Silicon Valley and among its camp followers.
No. There's a lot of this going on in Silicon Valley and among its camp followers.
It happens everywhere. I'm based in Atlanta and we're primarily a Windows Desktop shop but our Marketing department is a bunch of Mac carrying hipsters with titles like "Director of User Experience" and "Mobile Experience Designer".
> My jaw dropped when I read the following because it speaks volumes about his mindset.
> > As such, visitors are mostly privileged web developers using macOS and Google Chrome.
Yeah, mine too. I wouldn't think of using macOS & Chrome as a privilege. A cost of doing business, perhaps, but not a privilege.
I'm privileged to have a job in which I'm running Linux and Firefox, and I really do count that as a privilege.
> > As such, visitors are mostly privileged web developers using macOS and Google Chrome.
Yeah, mine too. I wouldn't think of using macOS & Chrome as a privilege. A cost of doing business, perhaps, but not a privilege.
I'm privileged to have a job in which I'm running Linux and Firefox, and I really do count that as a privilege.
I don’t get it. Why is this arrogant?
He says that by virtue of that fact that his audience is mostly using Chrome and macOS, they are privileged. Therefore anyone who isn't is therefore underprivileged.
Additionally he refers to it as macOS which pedantic and yet incorrect unless the majority of his users are running a beta OS.
Additionally he refers to it as macOS which pedantic and yet incorrect unless the majority of his users are running a beta OS.
I think, the author meant that (most) web developers consider themselves privileged, in thinking that all developers should be using MacBook Pros and Chrome, and that there’s no need to test in anything else, when sharing demos and tools between themselves.
Using the term macOS is fine. It’s the new name, and we can start using it before the official release of the next version in the fall. I think you are being pedantic here.
Using the term macOS is fine. It’s the new name, and we can start using it before the official release of the next version in the fall. I think you are being pedantic here.
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The design he's so wedded too isn't exactly stellar either... I don't understand why he didn't just update his design instead of hacking his way to match the design in FF...
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I didn't get this at all from the article. He didn't say that other browsers are stupid, he said that they have bugs; the outline thing is a particularly nasty Firefox bug. It might also be a spec bug if the spec is not detailed enough on how to draw outlines; but it's also definitely a Firefox bug because it looks terrible. There's nothing wrong with calling a spade a spade.
I agree that calling out bugs, especially if they've been reported and ignored, is worthwhile.
That said, I think what the parent comment is saying is that Chrome too has bugs and a web developer who exclusively tests in Chrome forgives those bugs as "just the way HTML rendering works." This makes the developer effectively blind to Chrome's defects.
A developer who uses Firefox exclusively will have a similar feeling of privileged disdain for Chrome's bugs: "How can Google ship a browser with this problem? This is unacceptably broken!"
I know I felt that way for ages with Chrome's font rendering [1]. Chrome's font rendering was so poor compared to Firefox that it was difficult for me to use even for short bursts of testing. Although admittedly—and in a way confirming my point—those who used Chrome regularly were conditioned to its rendering and in some cases didn't even perceive the difference when comparing them side-by-side.
[1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=25541
That said, I think what the parent comment is saying is that Chrome too has bugs and a web developer who exclusively tests in Chrome forgives those bugs as "just the way HTML rendering works." This makes the developer effectively blind to Chrome's defects.
A developer who uses Firefox exclusively will have a similar feeling of privileged disdain for Chrome's bugs: "How can Google ship a browser with this problem? This is unacceptably broken!"
I know I felt that way for ages with Chrome's font rendering [1]. Chrome's font rendering was so poor compared to Firefox that it was difficult for me to use even for short bursts of testing. Although admittedly—and in a way confirming my point—those who used Chrome regularly were conditioned to its rendering and in some cases didn't even perceive the difference when comparing them side-by-side.
[1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=25541
> A developer who uses Firefox exclusively will have a similar feeling of privileged disdain for Chrome's bugs: "How can Google ship a browser with this problem? This is unacceptably broken!"
I don't know about its bugs, but that's pretty much how I feel about Chrome's address bar when I'm testing apps in it :)
I don't know about its bugs, but that's pretty much how I feel about Chrome's address bar when I'm testing apps in it :)
A quick search turns up that it is indeed a Firefox bug and not a bug in the spec[0]. Honestly it is very disappointing that such an obvious issue has been left open for so long. This is part of a very old spec and that any browser doesn't have compliance with this is surprising.
[0] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=266122
[0] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=266122
The best part is where you visit the site in Chrome and it still looks terrible. Really, you needed to put an opacity transition on the orange background of each of your comments?
Maybe if the site had a cleaner, simpler design it would be easier to make it work on all browsers.
Maybe if the site had a cleaner, simpler design it would be easier to make it work on all browsers.
I noticed this too... The site's design is terrible, and I don't get why he has fought so hard to persist a terrible design...
>....trying to tell us that other browsers are stupid because they don't have the same bugs as Chrome does.
It took me finding the bug on the Chrome bug tracker to convince my team that Firefox was rendering things correctly, but because we code/design on Chrome it "looked wrong" because it had been designed to look right in Chrome, which was actually wrong. I can no longer remember the exact bug it was unfortunately - had something to do with positioning elements and flexbox though.
Oh - and font rendering. Fonts are always "too thick" in Firefox because Chrome has a poor implementation of font rendering since like Version 21 (22?) and renders fonts thinner than they should be. :)
Also someone who will never switch to Chrome, but for different reasons. I hack the UI and UX of Firefox to be almost unrecognizable as Firefox and Chrome doesn't allow for that level of freedom. There is no userChrome.css to modify, addons are more limited in what they can modify, etc.
It took me finding the bug on the Chrome bug tracker to convince my team that Firefox was rendering things correctly, but because we code/design on Chrome it "looked wrong" because it had been designed to look right in Chrome, which was actually wrong. I can no longer remember the exact bug it was unfortunately - had something to do with positioning elements and flexbox though.
Oh - and font rendering. Fonts are always "too thick" in Firefox because Chrome has a poor implementation of font rendering since like Version 21 (22?) and renders fonts thinner than they should be. :)
Also someone who will never switch to Chrome, but for different reasons. I hack the UI and UX of Firefox to be almost unrecognizable as Firefox and Chrome doesn't allow for that level of freedom. There is no userChrome.css to modify, addons are more limited in what they can modify, etc.
Your criticism's may be true, but lets think about it from a web developer's perspective. Being standards compliant is great and all, but when you are creating a website you have to think about the way your users are going to experience it.
If a large majority of your visitors use chrome, you are going to have to prioritize their experience. While ideally you will make it work perfectly for every browser, sometimes you have to make compromises.
It isn't about thinking that Chrome is the world we all SHOULD live in, it is trying to design a web page for the world we DO live in.
If a large majority of your visitors use chrome, you are going to have to prioritize their experience. While ideally you will make it work perfectly for every browser, sometimes you have to make compromises.
It isn't about thinking that Chrome is the world we all SHOULD live in, it is trying to design a web page for the world we DO live in.
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Yup. There's an eery parallel with when Internet Explorer + ActiveX extensions where being pushed hard, to the detriment of us mac/linux/bsd users.
I’ve read the article yesterday (fully), and I didn’t get the impression that the author thinks that “other browsers are stupid”. (And I’m a loyal Firefox user, so I think I would have noticed.)
From what I’ve understood, the thesis is about the issue of browser inconsistencies, and how it sometimes may be sensible to resort to user agent detection and hacks.
From what I’ve understood, the thesis is about the issue of browser inconsistencies, and how it sometimes may be sensible to resort to user agent detection and hacks.
"Who is correct isn’t important. What should be important is that browsers put consistency across themselves first."
No way - The only way we'll end up with compatibility across browsers is to have unambiguous (as much as possible) specifications that define how they should behave and for browser users to insist their browser vendor aligns with the standard. I lived through that past and have no desire to repeat it.
If you think about it from a network theory perspective, each of the browsers is only trying to be compatible with one other party (the specification) in this mode. The alternative is that each browser is trying to be compatible with "n - 1" other parties where n is the number of browsers in the pool. And the total effort is the classic (n * (n - 1)) / 2 "connections", so the browser industry would be wasting a lot of effort.
Worse yet, there's no single release point. Consider that browser A makes changes to be compatible with browser B (because that behavior seems correct compared to browser C). Unbeknownst to them, browser B is about to change their behavior to be compatible with browser C. Now the A-team's work is either wasted or yet another incompatibility.
Browser-focused standards are the best thing that happened to the web in the last 10+ years.
- http://caniuse.com/
- http://html5readiness.com/ (now a bit dated)
No way - The only way we'll end up with compatibility across browsers is to have unambiguous (as much as possible) specifications that define how they should behave and for browser users to insist their browser vendor aligns with the standard. I lived through that past and have no desire to repeat it.
If you think about it from a network theory perspective, each of the browsers is only trying to be compatible with one other party (the specification) in this mode. The alternative is that each browser is trying to be compatible with "n - 1" other parties where n is the number of browsers in the pool. And the total effort is the classic (n * (n - 1)) / 2 "connections", so the browser industry would be wasting a lot of effort.
Worse yet, there's no single release point. Consider that browser A makes changes to be compatible with browser B (because that behavior seems correct compared to browser C). Unbeknownst to them, browser B is about to change their behavior to be compatible with browser C. Now the A-team's work is either wasted or yet another incompatibility.
Browser-focused standards are the best thing that happened to the web in the last 10+ years.
- http://caniuse.com/
- http://html5readiness.com/ (now a bit dated)
"Who is correct isn’t important. What should be important is that browsers put consistency across themselves first."
I saw that quote too, and thought that's a weird way to look at it. The other way to look at it, which makes quite a lot more sense to me, is that Chrome is creating the inconsistency by being flat out wrong...
I saw that quote too, and thought that's a weird way to look at it. The other way to look at it, which makes quite a lot more sense to me, is that Chrome is creating the inconsistency by being flat out wrong...
> If you think about it from a network theory perspective, each of the browsers is only trying to be compatible with one other party (the specification) in this mode.
Sadly, it's usually the predominant browser (i.e. Chrome these days) that they're trying to maintain compatibility with and not the specification.
Sadly, it's usually the predominant browser (i.e. Chrome these days) that they're trying to maintain compatibility with and not the specification.
The single release point is the specification which defines the behaviour in the first place.
Weird layout.
The article text on the far left, and the side column on the far right with a LOT of white space between. The white space in the middle is as wide as the article text itself.
BTW, I'm on a 2560 width screen, using Firefox.
And this is what it looks like:
http://i.imgur.com/bWwMuNH.png
If this is considered good web design, I'm going back to Lynx ...
The article text on the far left, and the side column on the far right with a LOT of white space between. The white space in the middle is as wide as the article text itself.
BTW, I'm on a 2560 width screen, using Firefox.
And this is what it looks like:
http://i.imgur.com/bWwMuNH.png
If this is considered good web design, I'm going back to Lynx ...
It's even more weird on a 40 inch 4K monitor. But it's tuned for a different kind of privileged web developer. The specific privilege that you and I are bringing (large, high resolution displays) evidently makes us not the target audience.
Jokes aside, virtually no sites are tuned for large displays, and there's widespread consensus that you shouldn't simply use the full width of the window for text because lines would be too wide to read comfortably. Still, I think my expectation is that most sites just end up centered within large windows.
The layout seen here, with columns anchored on the left and right sides, is unfamiliar and looks weird to my eye as well.
Jokes aside, virtually no sites are tuned for large displays, and there's widespread consensus that you shouldn't simply use the full width of the window for text because lines would be too wide to read comfortably. Still, I think my expectation is that most sites just end up centered within large windows.
The layout seen here, with columns anchored on the left and right sides, is unfamiliar and looks weird to my eye as well.
I don't know about the "widespread consensus", but forcing people to manually resizing their browser window to fit whatever they currently are reading is bad design in my book.
Most good sites, I think, (strangely not Hacker News though) have a width limiting, centered layout which makes it easy to read and browse.
Most good sites, I think, (strangely not Hacker News though) have a width limiting, centered layout which makes it easy to read and browse.
I'll be that odd person to point out that width limiting in a world of widescreens is a strange use of space. I'd personally like to see more love put into CSS3 multi-column support and gentle horizontal scrolling (a standard spec ready equivalent to -ms-scroll-translation, perhaps). I get the feeling I'm in a not very vocal minority of people that currently thinks horizontal scrolling could be a useful answer for an easier to read web on widescreen displays.
I find it strange how many sites seem to be more horizontal gutters than content space these days due their fixed width containers recreating a square virtual monitor inside my widescreen monitor. Admittedly it is good for ad space, I guess, because those gutters can be and often are filled with plenty of ads.
I find it strange how many sites seem to be more horizontal gutters than content space these days due their fixed width containers recreating a square virtual monitor inside my widescreen monitor. Admittedly it is good for ad space, I guess, because those gutters can be and often are filled with plenty of ads.
I might be crazy, but I think that the dotted version of the colored lines (from Firefox/Safari) looked better than the dashed ones he was so insistent on achieving.
Not crazy, I though the same, maybe apart from how the border ends with too much whitespace. But we would have to see how it looks in the overall design to properly judge that.
I definitely agree. He's clearly not a designer...
title should be "the hypocrisy of the so called web developers"
let's see. they blatantly ignore most browsers to focus on the one they use. and then cames up with excuses ("its over 50% of my visitors") just like IE6.
then they get confortable with things that browser does that are proprietary, just like with IE6.
then they blame all the other browsers in the word for not dropping everything else and go imitate the proprietary behaviour. they even points out that chrome is the only one not following the standard, and still gets praised, just like IE6.
"What should be important is that browsers put consistency across themselves first" is what they say on the article about other browsers not ignoring standards and following the proprietary browser they like.
google arrogance over standards and this developer lack of memory and abundance of hypocrisy will give us IE6 all over again.
damn you all
let's see. they blatantly ignore most browsers to focus on the one they use. and then cames up with excuses ("its over 50% of my visitors") just like IE6.
then they get confortable with things that browser does that are proprietary, just like with IE6.
then they blame all the other browsers in the word for not dropping everything else and go imitate the proprietary behaviour. they even points out that chrome is the only one not following the standard, and still gets praised, just like IE6.
"What should be important is that browsers put consistency across themselves first" is what they say on the article about other browsers not ignoring standards and following the proprietary browser they like.
google arrogance over standards and this developer lack of memory and abundance of hypocrisy will give us IE6 all over again.
damn you all
I don't necessarily agree with the article as a whole, but I do like this bit very much:
> Humans will seldom use different browsers. Unless there are gross differences across browsers, like using entirely different sets of font faces, humans are not going to care. We need to learn to let go.
Sometimes, the cost/benefit calculation comes out so squarely in the "let's just not" column that even though it may feel wrong to discriminate so blatantly, the economics are just not there. Important to consider whether this discrimination amounts to technical debt which proves costly over time, or whether they are in fact tailored experiences that makes sense to keep around. In any event I agree with the authors sentiment, that chasing the identical look everywhere unicorn often just isn't worth the bother.
> Humans will seldom use different browsers. Unless there are gross differences across browsers, like using entirely different sets of font faces, humans are not going to care. We need to learn to let go.
Sometimes, the cost/benefit calculation comes out so squarely in the "let's just not" column that even though it may feel wrong to discriminate so blatantly, the economics are just not there. Important to consider whether this discrimination amounts to technical debt which proves costly over time, or whether they are in fact tailored experiences that makes sense to keep around. In any event I agree with the authors sentiment, that chasing the identical look everywhere unicorn often just isn't worth the bother.
The bugs we have to deal with today are a gift from god compared to the bugs we had to deal with 15 years ago when CSS was just getting traction and then we went through 7-8 years of stagnation due to Microsoft trying to leverage their position to hold back the web. Frustrating as multiple engines is to deal with, it's a small price to pay for the benefits of a true open standard. I've been burned enough by WONTFIX bugs in proprietary software (Adobe Flash I'm looking at you) that I know which double-edged sword I'll put my weight behind.
The browser stats used as the foundation for the post is useless because he does not state how many total users was the sample based and what time frame was it taken at.
At the limit of this kind of "logic" I could equally say that 100% of google search visitors use TorBrowser (out of 1: me in a very precise time frame).
At the limit of this kind of "logic" I could equally say that 100% of google search visitors use TorBrowser (out of 1: me in a very precise time frame).
It's especially unnerving for me as a firefox user since these days I come across a lot more sites that make stupid mistakes that just works fine in their Chrome.
This mindset makes me angry. The same applies when developers think that if your browser blocks google tracking it is ok to just fuck up the whole website.
The web should be
- progressive
- standards-compliant.
Some years ago this was widely believed to be right way forward. Nowadays it seems that developers think that Chrome on OS X is the world we all should live in.
Loosely related: I am not going to switch to Chrome. I would never use a browser from an Ad Company like Google, as I don't trust them at all.