Voices From The HTML5 Trenches: Browser Wars IVMar 15, 2011 at 5:00 PM
The term HTML5 now refers to the much-hyped kitchen sink of the web. It covers *everything* including things not officially part of the HTML5 specification. Yet "HTML5" is now the catch phrase to describe the new wave of platform competition on the web, and browser vendors vie to outdo... http://schedule.sxsw.com/events/event_IAP7286
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They pulled out the big guns from IE, Opera, Chrome and Firefox to do battle #browserwars #SXSW
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:04 PM | |
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 http://yfrog.com/gzdxzaej |
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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arun: John - IE9 is great stuff, and really advances the web. What about IE6, IE7, IE8 and Windows XP?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:05 PM | |
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john: Windows XP is our IE6.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:05 PM | |
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john: if you take the other browsers and put them on XP with older hardware, it doesn't perform as well. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:06 PM | |
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arun: Alex, you're making a wincing gesture. Alex: other browsers are doing HW acceleration on these platforms. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:07 PM | |
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Though all browser vendors suffer from WinXP. #browserwars Everyone else has to create their own soln, but MSFT just rests on 7/Vista OS api
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:08 PM | |
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alex: you can do JIT, even if you can't HW-accel webGL or 3D transforms (although we do) - it's a spectrum. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:08 PM | |
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arun: what does Microsoft think of Chrome Frame? John: ... #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:08 PM | |
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. @hrvats IE6 is your IE6. Don't you think you have a responsibility to upgrade everyone, whether they're on XP or not? #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:08 PM | |
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it's apple's decision though to not partake in the discussion and be open / dev friendly #browserwars #sxsw /cc @jamespearce
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:08 PM | |
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arun: we know that in other countries, XP may last much longer. What do you think of these plug-in renderers. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:09 PM | |
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john: I think ChromeFrame devalues the UI and what you expect from the browser. Security and privacy protections aren't there, e.g.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:10 PM | |
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alex: but MSHTML is a rendering component. It has UI stuff around it. These can be improved separately. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:11 PM | |
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brendan: "I like Chrome Frame."
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:12 PM | |
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Alex and John are arguing over whether pluggable renderers are truly feasible. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:12 PM | |
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arun: Wired mag thinks the web is dead, that we are in a world where you download Apps. Two of our panelists come from...
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:13 PM | |
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...companies that have apps too. Brendan: I thought Wired was dead... #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:13 PM | |
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Delighted to see @arun is a fantastic moderator. Thank you for respecting our time. #browserwars #sxswi
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:14 PM | |
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Brendan: Mozilla is doing open app experiments; they work in multiple browsers. Developers should be able to put apps in multiple stores.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:15 PM | |
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The web is dead.?
Brenden Eich: "I thought Wired was dead." #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:15 PM | |
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Arun: web apps are HTML5 running in your browser with enhanced privileges. IE9 has pinned sites, Chrome has apps, Opera?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:16 PM | |
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Arun Ranganthan is asking absolutely fabulous questions regarding IE. Alex is brilliant as usual. #browserwars #SXSW
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:16 PM | |
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Lars: we've had widget technology for a while now, with traction in the mobile & TV markets. "apps" are great to easily get at information.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:16 PM | |
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Death in the #browserwars ? Wired says browser is dead. Panelist - Wired is dead. But there web apps now. Is browser a LT delivery medium?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:16 PM | |
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A useful definition: "Web apps are websites with enhanced browser privileges running on HTML5, CSS and JS." -@arun #browserwars #sxswi
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:17 PM | |
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Lars: it would have been cool if some of these efforts could have been based on existing standards - the Widgets spec.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:17 PM | |
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Brendan: you can use Javascript to implement widgets - and manifests are a dime a dozen. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:18 PM | |
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alex: one question is how, as a user, do I get back to my app? These affordances are critical. #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:19 PM | |
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alex: and please don't use the word affordance - it's a terrible word, sorry.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:19 PM | |
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LEB "it would have been cool [for other browsers] to use the w3c widget spec rather than incompatible implementations" #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:19 PM | |
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:20 PM | |
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alex: having URLs that let you get back to particular places in an app, etc. are critical.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:20 PM | |
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MS Program Manager at #browserwars "Windows XP is our IE6". Considering Mozilla & Google develop for it just fine, you get no sympathy.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:20 PM | |
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HTML5 apis now give non-URL visible navigation. Does the mean more apps then sites. Deep linking to be a victim in #browserwars ?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:21 PM | |
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John: deep linking is pretty critical; if you can't link inside an app, that would make it not as good as the web.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:21 PM | |
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Why can't we use good old hash for URLs inside a web app? #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:21 PM | |
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John: when we looked at user studies for pinned sites, we found it increases engagement.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:21 PM | |
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@ppk we can - not everyone does.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:22 PM | |
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Great panel discussion at #browserwars session. Hard questions, no dodging allowed. #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:22 PM | |
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Alex Russell coins the term "URL-ification" at #BrowserWars #SXSW
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:22 PM | |
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Brendan: if you have apps, you shouldn't have them separated in the sea of the operating system - should be able to be used as components
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:23 PM | |
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arun: one of the reasons people use Flash is video. HTML5 holds the promise of one video codec, but it's not quite reconciled.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:24 PM | |
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John: HTML5 has the promise of plug-in-free video; that's why we took the industry standard for H.264 video and put it in HTML5 video.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:24 PM | |
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We are doomed to spend the next 20 minutes talking about video codecs. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:25 PM | |
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John: we also built plugins for Firefox and Chrome to play H.264.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:25 PM | |
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Lars: the problem with H.264 is that it's not royalty-free; we'd have to pay a pretty large fee to support it.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:25 PM | |
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arun: the goal of having HTML5 video was to have a royalty-free codec. (is was????)
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:26 PM | |
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John: we cover the royalties for Windows customers.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:26 PM | |
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Goal is to be royalty-free codecs for HTML5 video, but not the reality. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:27 PM | |
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alex: also not a lawyer. Where we are and where we want to be are pretty different - Google and others are working hard to make WebM viable
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:27 PM | |
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alex: the codec should be free on the creation and consumption side.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:27 PM | |
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Brendan: you can't prove that there isn't a submarine patent somewhere; but it is free today. Props to Google for pushing WebM.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:28 PM | |
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brendan: you can use the hardware to accelerate WebM too.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:29 PM | |
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Arun: how successful is ChromeFrame? Alex: no numbers, but big sites like GMail are starting to lean on it.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:29 PM | |
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Goal is to be royalty-free #codecs for #HTML5 video, but not the reality. #browserwars #sxswi #webvideo (HT @lannadelarosa)
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:30 PM | |
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We're moving onto Chrome Frame. Alex can't say how popular it is, but says that GMail is starting to pimp it heavily. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:30 PM | |
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brendan: it's interesting that H.264 HTML5 video is in iOS, but not Flash. The web moves forward.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:30 PM | |
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HTML5 #browserwars is worked out in two places: W3C and WHATWG cuz in 2004 people got sick of W3C's claim that XML obviates need for mo HTML
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:33 PM | |
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"#html5 is the best sausage you ever had. it has chocolate and bacon in it" brendan eich #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:34 PM | |
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There is no HTML5. HTML is constantly developing. Version numbers are gone and dead. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:35 PM | |
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brendan: we don't want to go back to just throwing things at each other in our products.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:36 PM | |
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john: I agree with Brendan; I think it's good that the WHATWG got things started; I think it's a great time to look at the benefits of ...
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:37 PM | |
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...the consensus-driven approach from the W3C, with test-case-building, ... arun: contrasted with WHATWG? John: yes.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:38 PM | |
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Brendan: we do this in TC39; we propose things, we try them out in our nightlies, but we talk about it with each other and discuss it.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:39 PM | |
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[IE] is now working closer [with the W3C/other browsers] than ever before. #browserwars #SXSW
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:39 PM | |
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#sxsw @BrendanEich: there is a lot of stuff going in the HTML world, and you can lose track, but dining togetehr is good #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:39 PM | |
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Brendan: Easy to iterate on new HTML features when you've got nightly builds and can show iterative progress. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:40 PM | |
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Arun: this is the 40-minute mark, so it's time for audience participation.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:40 PM | |
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John Morrison: how does Google reconcile removing H.264 with building Flash into the browser?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:41 PM | |
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#sxsw q: how does Google reconcile h264 omission from <video> but including Flash? #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:41 PM | |
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Alex: ?1: where is the market for HTML5 video right now, and ?2: how are we enabling video today.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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ah, the "chrome dropped h.264 but kept flash" red herring from audience #browserwars #sxsw
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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alex: Mozilla, e.g., is never going to ship H.264.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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So glad they touched on the codec side of html5 video compatibility. Thats one a lot don't talk about being browser advocates. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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#sxsw @slightlylate: if we shipped a browser without Flash, a lot of the web would be missing. Moz is never going to ship h264 #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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#browserwars Q&A time- to google: why discontinue H.264 but bundle Flash in Chrome? Cuz its about pragmatism and giving good experience 2day
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:42 PM | |
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And don't forget that the switch of H.264 to Flash on mobile was the Android team's decision; not the Chrome team's. I think. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:43 PM | |
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#sxsw @slightlylate: how do we get to free unencumbered video on the open web, we need format, codec, drm that are open #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:43 PM | |
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alex: we're laying the groundwork for what we want to exist, while recognizing the reality today.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:43 PM | |
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? from floor: I admire the fast deployment model from Chrome (And now Mozilla) - I think that's really powerful. I'm worried about IE.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:44 PM | |
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:44 PM | |
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#browserwars Chrome does a good job of pushing latest. Others in the middle ground. But what about IE? MSFT reply starts with "ship cycle."
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:44 PM | |
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.@SlexAxton wants a faster release cycle from IE. Me too. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:45 PM | |
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John: it's impossible to choose an ideal ship cycle length (someone stage-whispers "six weeks") - but then evey six weeks, you'd have ...
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:45 PM | |
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...test against five new browsers.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:45 PM | |
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Alex: another important question is the half-life of old browers - e.g. when Chrome 11 comes out in six weeks, how long until Chrome 10 dies
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:46 PM | |
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#sxsw @slightlylate: if chrome 11 comes out in 6 weeks, when is chrome 10 gone? For us it's < 6 weeks #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:46 PM | |
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arun: I've seen users concerned about the fact that Chrome autoupdaters
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:46 PM | |
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Alex: vote with your feet. A vibrant browser market is good for everyone.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:46 PM | |
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@sxsw intense audience lineup: @slexaxton of yayQuery/Modernizr @jashkenas of coffeescript/backbone, @jamespearce of sencha. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:47 PM | |
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alex: for the vast majority of users, auto-updating is good - e.g. for security updates.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:47 PM | |
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john: that's the danger of combining security updates and new features.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:48 PM | |
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Alex Russell of the Chrome team is my favourite person here #SXSW #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:48 PM | |
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question: why should there be four separate rendering engines instead of just one open-source one?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:48 PM | |
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#sxsw @BrendanEich: we're (Mozilla) lifting the fast deployment idea straight from Chrome, it's great #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:49 PM | |
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Good to hear the panel reaffirm that the world, in general, isn't ready for html5. It's a specialized market kind of deal. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:49 PM | |
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Chrome's Alex Russell / @slightlylate is a great speaker - even though I boo'ed his last answer. 'Don't like us, go elsewhere.' #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:49 PM | |
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brendan: I looked at webkit at one point; we'd have had to take two years out to switch. But we don't need to; this is good for the market.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:49 PM | |
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Does Chrome have option for turning off auto-update? Where is it? Sought it for two years. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:49 PM | |
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@ppk no - Alex is saying "then use another browser".
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:50 PM | |
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brendan: it's not clear in the long run that one Webkit is going to work for Google and Apple. I think it's critical to have good tests.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:50 PM | |
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#browserwars Why many rendering engines? Moz says switching to webkit wouldn't have helped anyone. +Goog and Appl prob can't share codebase.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:50 PM | |
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#sxsw @BrendanEich: theres a benefit to good specs with good tests so that we can have multiple implementations #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:51 PM | |
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#browserwars automatic browser updating is not a bad thing. #Google #Chrome is all about moving forward. Kudos to them-we're huge fans!
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:51 PM | |
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Alex: there are two open source projects represented here. you can see what's coming. Getting more of that transparency would be good.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:51 PM | |
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#sxsw #browserwars Russell "If you don't have current software, you get owned."
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:52 PM | |
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John: that's why we started doing platform previews every 8 weeks.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:52 PM | |
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Safari and Chrome are still pretty close to each other, but I have the feeling the number of differences is slowly growing. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:53 PM | |
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Mobile question - recently IE said they're going to try to achieve rendering parity with IE9 on WinPhone. Can you comment?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:53 PM | |
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#sxsw #browserwars Eich "At Mozilla, we will never switch to webkit."
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:53 PM | |
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John: historically, mobile was a separate codebase. For IE9, we made a big investment in fixing that - one codebase across mobile and Win.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:54 PM | |
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Amazing that the most compelling, relevant panel for web professionals is at the last hour of the last day of #SXSW. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:54 PM | |
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John: we're also trying to pull the cycles closer together. We;re trying to make the gap between desktop and mobile as small as possible.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:54 PM | |
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Why is IE9 such a huge jump forward? Because of mobile. Desktop is an afterthought. #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:54 PM | |
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#sxsw @hrvats: we're investing so that the ie9 codebase is released on desktop and mobile closely together #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:55 PM | |
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alex: to @ppk's point - what features can you count on in mobile? How long does it take to get the old browsers out? Mobile user update...
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:55 PM | |
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...cycle is when people replace their phones.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:55 PM | |
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[room]: Android webkit is awful at rendering gradients, safari mobile isn't.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:56 PM | |
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arun: 5-minute warning. I'm curious about Microsoft's stance in the 3D world.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:56 PM | |
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arun: you won't join the WebGL WG?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:56 PM | |
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John: 3D on the web is going to be amazing.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:57 PM | |
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john: webgl is fundamentally different than the IE9 hardware acceleration of HTML5. WebGL takes system-level 3D apis and exposes them.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:57 PM | |
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#sxsw @hrvats: 3D on the web will be amazing; WebGL makes OS apis there for web. Customers want a faster web, not apis #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:57 PM | |
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Well there is no browser parity in the next few years at least. We are going to be busy. Keep testing. #browserWars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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john: what did in IE9 is focus on making today's web faster. 3D has a future; but we thought this is a better place to start.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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Could somebody in the #browserwars panel acknowledge the fact that auto update is disabled in corporate environments.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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brendan: but there's no other option than WebGL. Would you start a new effort, or do you have plans you can talk about?
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:58 PM | |
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john: no.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 5:59 PM | |
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last question on separation of presentation and semantics.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:00 PM | |
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brendan: I don't believe in pure separation. alex: bits like microformats slang are great, but I don't think there's a clean separation...
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:01 PM | |
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"Microformats are UrbanDictionary for HTML." #browserwars
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:01 PM | |
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last question: I wanted to ask the AUDIO codec question. answer: file a bug.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:02 PM | |
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I love that Chrome's Russell is wearing a 'haters gonna hate' tshirt on the #browserwars panel. Nice.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:03 PM | |
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Shoot, I should have gone to sxsw afterall. Sounds like the #browserwars session was amazing (for nerds). Next year (I say that every year)
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:32 PM | |
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Fierce & entertaining battle between @slightlylate and @hrvats at #browserwars, w @BrendanEich emerging as the clear winner. Humour FTW :)
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 6:49 PM | |
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This year's #browserwars was an awesome experience. Thank you @slightlylate, @brendaneich, @hrvats, @lebol.
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| Mar 15, 2011 at 7:39 PM | |
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