Re: [dev] Talk about sane web browsers

On Tue, Sep 8, 2009 at 3:13 AM, Pinocchio<cchinopio_AT_gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 07 Sep 2009 03:26:05 -0700, frederic <fdubois76_AT_gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 07 Sep 2009 11:51:46 +0200, Uriel <lost.goblin_AT_gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Mon, Sep 7, 2009 at 2:38 AM, Pinocchio<cchinopio_AT_gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> A few months ago lobobrowser.org caught my eye. Its a browser written in
>>>> java (hold on... don't kick me off the list... :) ) but the thing I
>>>> liked
>>>> about it was its support for alternative document formats. It supports
>>>> JavaFX out of the box and that's definitely a more suckless version of
>>>> document rendering / scripting than HTML + Javascript.
>>>
>>> You better kick yourself out of this universe. WTF are you smoking?
>>>
>>
>> So, the only way is to get rid of the whole "Web" stack and to rewrite a
>> "sane" one. This would mean:
>> * defining a protocol that would play the role of HTTP,
>
> I don't think that would be necessary. HTTP is okay. HTML + Javascript is
> the non-suckless part.

If you think HTTP is 'okay', you have *no fucking clue about HTTP*.

There is a reason the suckless.org http project never got anywhere:
writting an http server (or client) sucks because the protocol is
*insane*.

One could define a mostly sane subset of HTTP, which is my goal with
HTTP 0.2: http://http02.cat-v.org but it is not easy, because again
the protocol is such a huge mess and there are tons of implementations
out there all broken int heir own sick ways.

uriel

P.S.: People interested in working on HTTP 0.2 are welcome, I wont
have the time or stomach to do it for some time...

>
>> * defining a format for interactive documents and applications. The tricky
>> thing here is that this format should be convenient for both usages and
>> for "middle" cases.
>
> That's the whole idea. I believe that it is possible to get something usable
> without a lot of code bloat. The basics should be good so that "web" sites
> can get more complicated things done with their own code.
>
>>
>> Of course it has to be totally incompatible with the current "web stack",
>> browser included. It can be quite a problem for wide acceptance; the
>> majority of "web users" today are, I think, not computer literates.
>>
>
> It doesn't need wide acceptance. Dwm doesn't need wide acceptance as long as
> it works with most of the useful X11 applications. Dwm would do fine with a
> bunch of folks who care about a suckless window manager. This "new webstack"
> would be something similar. There are no hidden plans to conquer the world
> here :).
>
>> But maybe one may walkaround that by providing browser plugins to handle
>> that document format together with the actual platform.
>>
>>
>
> Yeah, that's definitely an option. However, I think I would favor a method
> where this document format could be changed on the server side to HTML +
> Javascript for the regular browsers. I am saying this because even after a
> lot of marketing muscle and commercial force, it has been hard for Adobe,
> Sun and Microsoft to push their rendering stacks over HTML + Javascript.
> Flash is the only thing which gained major adoption... and the picture might
> change once HTML 5 comes out.
>
> If you read my previous post again, I also mentioned why a new web document
> format is not an insane idea. Web frontend programmers don't directly
> program in HTML + Javascript. They use some middle-ware (GWT for eg.) which
> takes care of quirks between different browsers. If you think about browsers
> as a "machine" to run your applications, HTML + Javascript is literally the
> assembly of that machine.
>
> What I am suggesting is the following:
>        - Come up with a "suckless" document rendering / scripting format (a
> new RISC like assembly if you will... from the machine analogy above)
>        - Write a browser for that format
>        - Add a plugin to display HTML + Javascript (use an existing
> rendering framework like webkit)
>        - Write server side converters for the format to HTML + Javascript
>                - Regular browsers default to the HTML + Javascript format of
> the content
>                - Suckless browsers query for the "suckless" version of the
> content and use that.
>
> Benefits of going the suckless format:
>        - Concise, hacker friendly, open source implementation.
>                - Rapid evolution of the format to new usage scenarios.
>                - Platform support, acceleration
>        - Warm fuzzy feeling of using less RAM + CPU cycles for rendering web
> content.
>
> --
> Pinocchio
>
>
Received on Tue Sep 08 2009 - 02:08:23 UTC