Is Chrome the New IE? (2023)

Just to (mostly) preempt this because the exact same discussion is had every time this sentiment comes up: Isn't safari the new IE?

Answer: They both are like IE, for different reasons:

Chrome: Pushes proprietary extensions onto the web, which due to their absolute dominance others are somewhat forced to adopt, people develop for it and don't test in any other browser, just like IE

Safari: is coupled to operating system version, lags behind on implementing new features, thus single handedly slowing down when everyone can use new features. Has weird quirks that other browsers don't, just like IE (though not nearly as bad as IE)

So which is like IE? It just depends on what you mean when you say "like IE", the label applies to both because IE was bad for more than one reason

If I understand - Chrome is like IE for pushing proprietary extensions, and Safari is like IE for not implementing those proprietary extensions?

Safari is like IE for not implementing standards everyone else has agreed on and implemented.

War is Peace

Did “everyone” agree on and implement them, or did Google implement them and force everyone else in the WHATWG to play catch-up since they’re dominant?

Such as?

Safari updates are released for the two macOS releases before the current.

Here's a breakdown: https://caniuse.com/?compare=chrome+131,safari+18.1&compareC...

Maybe there are specific examples of that? But I can't think of any, and it certainly doesn't strike me as common. Random example:

https://caniuse.com/input-inputmode

Firefox: 2013

Chrome: 2017

Safari: Any decade now, I'm sure of it

not on iOS which is more relevant since you can't even install other engines

Where "everyone else" means Google used Chrome to make it the standard.

I'm actually far more concerned with the other thing I mentioned, just like on old versions of windows, safari updates are coupled to iOS updates. So if your phone doesn't get any more updates, or you just don't want them, your browser engine is out of date, giving years old safari versions significant market shares. And this impacts stuff like being able to use "gap" for flexbox, which I don't think qualifies as a proprietary chrome feature

Safari states their position on standards here: https://webkit.org/standards-positions/

IMO they have good reasons for opposing most of the standards

What are these proprietary extensions?

Just because Google implements something does not make it a standard.

They don't even implement the standards that they have agreed to properly.

Some of those unimplemented “standards” are to protect user privacy. I know this is not universally the case, but it’s worth calling out.

You can fingerprint a browser to > 99.9% accuracy because of Google's lax approach to privacy and security when adding new features.

Of course this benefits the advertising side of the business immensely.

I searched that page and their github repo for "inputmode" (my example from before you posted) and couldn't find anything.

https://github.com/WebKit/standards-positions/issues?q=input...

I'd love to find out if anyone on the webkit project is aware of that part of the standard, and if so, the project's official position on it. I can't imagine why they'd oppose it.

if you want a really old example, pnacl. If you want a slightly recent one, FLoC. Not saying those are the best examples, they are just what comes to my head first. I don't really keep up super closely.

So, things that are either impossible (touch events or vibration) or ridiculous (why would I want a website to know my battery level or directly access system hardware?)

I'd guess for the same reason we want native apps to be able to do that.

Neither of these are proprietary.

Who said that we want native apps to be able to do that?

There are some use cases for those permissions but we (some) would like more control into that. I can't fight most of the websites as a user (they will tell me to use chrome) but it is for them hard to tell me if you want the service (along a billion other user) then move to android. Apple for a better or worse have much more sway than individual user.

One thing missing: Safari is like a worse IE, because not only does it not run on any other OS, like IE, but it doesn’t even run on most hardware.

Both are.

Your own link says it’s supported on Safari for iOS, for years now. It’s obviously not supported on MacOS because that attribute only applies to onscreen keyboards.

No, not only those, also actually legitimate web standards.

What makes you think onscreen keyboards are not useful in macOS if at least for accessibility reasons?

I’d love to see these comments about Safari lagging give specific examples. Every time I’ve seen specifics, it’s either only interesting to progressive web apps, or blatantly user hostile tracking/nagging “features”. In my personal experience as a web dev, Safari is often the first to implement new features, and otherwise lags literally just a few months behind, according to their release cycle. WEBP was the exception that was both a real feature and very delayed, but now with JPEG XL it’s Safari first by a mile and Chrome holding everyone back.

The browser feature under discussion is clearly intended for small screen mobile devices.

Accessibility keyboards are just keyboards from the web page’s perspective

It's clearly NOT intended only for small screen mobile devices.

There's no reason to restrict suggesting input types to mobile browsers only.

That's exactly why desktop Chrome and Firefox has support it for a long time now.

Looks like it is already supported by Safari/WebKit for a number of versions: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Global_att...

pnacl was an example of Google throwing away their homebrewed solution in favour of a common standard (Web Assembly). That seems like a strong argument that they don't push proprietary extensions.

well apparently Apple disagrees

it was an example of them pushing proprietary extensions and eventually removing them again. If I start beating you and then eventually someone calms down and I stop, it's not an example of me not beating you

I'm pretty sure you can do that now.

yeah, as usual. That's exactly the point