

Mozilla's "modern browser" attack on IE overlooks Firefox shortcomings - abraham
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/02/mozillas-modern-browser-attack-on-ie-overlooks-firefox-shortcomings.ars

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dspillett
Not only do MS's figures show _their_ tests they _they_ created (so that 100%
means they met a self-defined project goal not that they match 100% of any
externally defined/agreed standard), they don't entirely compare like for
like. While they show how bad IE8 is compared to the other currently released
competition, they list there own "won't be released for a couple of months
yet" version but don't include other people's alpha/beta/RC versions.

It would be interesting to see how well FF4 and the current Opera and Chrome
pre-releases manage against this set of tests (probably not 100% as the tests
have a built-in bias, but I'm sure they'd do better.

~~~
kenjackson
All the tests have been given to the W3C. Once they've been added to the test
suite, you'll be able to compare them to whatever browser you like, whever you
like. The current W3C suite is here:
<http://test.w3.org/html/tests/reporting/report.htm>

More tests need to be added. If you have some tests, please submit. Please
help to make this suite robust. Otherwise its just inactive complaining.

~~~
dspillett
There are already other tests though, but MS didn't use them in this analysis.
Hence it is a good test to see if they've reached there project goal but not a
good test of general compatibility with the standards. If they are just using
their own tests and not the others, then raising more test cases is not going
to make any difference.

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bryanlarsen
AFAICT, his only attack against FF4 being a modern browser is that FF4 doesn't
do process isolation on tabs, which I would argue is unnecessary.

FF4 has process isolation for plugins, which is super important. Process
isolation for tabs protects against runaway Javascript, but you don't need
process isolation to do that since the javascript engine is part of Firefox.

~~~
wvenable
Process isolation is a great feature but it has nothing do with page
rendering. As a web developer, I'm concerned about how people will view and
interact with my sites. If their browser does that correctly and quickly,
that's what matters here.

If your browser has process isolation, a crazy bookmark system, skins, or an
extension system those are just features for the end user and don't affect web
applications running under it.

~~~
tolmasky
This is not necessarily 100% true. Process isolation affects your user's
experience in an indirect way. As web apps become heavier and heavier they
adversely affect each other more and more. Many times your sites perceived
lack of performance is due to another misbehaving tab. Its true that standards
support improves the singular experience of _your_ site, but process isolation
improves the combined experience of the _web_ as a whole and allows everyone
to do more impressive things.

~~~
bryanlarsen
A browser doesn't need process isolation to clamp down on misbehaving sites.
It might be easier than doing it in the scheduler in your javascript &
rendering engines, but process isolation is not necessary.

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beej71
Challenge to Microsoft and FF: swap and merge test sets!

~~~
kenjackson
MS has submitted theirs to the W3C. Mozilla (and everyone else) should do the
same.

~~~
beej71
Agreed. And there's no reason why FF shouldn't ace the IE test, and vice-
versa.

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frsandstone
Wait what? An attack on another company didn't involve finding faults in your
own company? Impossible.

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brudgers
Mozilla is accusing IE9 of not being a true Scotsman. It gains them some press
coverage for what would otherwise be of interest mainly to the faithful.

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barista
The "standards" that you are referring to here that IE does not comply with
yet are not really "standards" yet. With the specifications clearly in debate,
I don't know why anybody would expect them in the production version of a
browser. In supporting these standards the other browsers are getting ahead of
themselves.

Here's a quote from the article:

"Along those lines, some of the weak areas in IE9 relate to standards that are
still basically in flux and are implemented with vendor-prefixed flags in
other browsers"

"On that note, Doug Schepers of the W3C SVG working group recently dismissed
critics of Microsoft's SVG support in IE9 and lauded the company for
implementing a "very large, functional subset" of the standard" - Mozilla
didn't have this for quite some time.

~~~
wvenable
In the history of the web, most of the standards have simply codified what was
already in common usage. We've already seen problems with implementing large
standards after the fact: We had the box model problem in IE with CSS, for
example. Some of biggest failures, like XHTML, were from standards committees
and some of the biggest successes, like xmlHttpRequest (Ajax), just started
out as proprietary features.

In my opinion, the best way for the standards to emerge is early and often
implementation. It's best for everyone to be able to actually work with a
reference implementation. This already happened, for example, with CSS
gradients. It was a feature proposed by the WebKit team and Firefox took the
idea and implemented it differently. Web developers got a chance to use both
and weigh in on the pros and cons. Browser makers got to see how works in real
situations. And, in the end, WebKit changed their implementation because the
Firefox method turned out to be better and simpler. And now that has been put
in the standard to become part of HTML5.

Microsoft isn't even in the conversation.

~~~
kenjackson
_most of the standards have simply codified what was already in common usage._

But there's a BIG difference between saying, "OK, pretty much all of the top 5
browser manufacturers have implemented feature XYZ, and it is commonly used
today by many popular sites in a standard way. Lets codify this."

vs

"WebKit just added this cool new feature. Opera implemented it two weeks after
it shows up in WebKit. No one is really using it yet, but it's really cool.
Write up a draft of it and now lets say its part of the standard (in-
progress)".

That's not codifying common usage. That is some vendors in key positions in
the standards body taking advantange of their positions.

~~~
wvenable
I agree. It's dishonest to say that Microsoft isn't implementing HTML5. But
they've actually said something much more subjective: that IE is not a "modern
browser". The argument, which hasn't really been explicitly stated, is that a
modern browser attempts to implement these new draft features before they're
standardized.

In the past, Microsoft was not shy about implementing all kinds of new HTML
technology but since IE6 they've only been doing the minimum necessary.

You can't get around to codifying a commonly used feature if it never becomes
commonly used. And it's pretty clear that all these new HTML5 features will be
in common use everywhere else long before the HTML5 standard is finished. So
even though Microsoft is going to be releasing a new browser shortly, it'll be
obsolete almost immediately.

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u48998
No browser in the market are smart and there's not doubt about it. Browsers
don't grow with the users, they don't remember well, cannot spit the
information back on demand. Until and unless browser reacts or come close to
reacting like a human brain, they cannot claim to be smart or modern.

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sagarun
I will call IE a modern browser when both IE8 and IE9 don't crash on
<http://crashie8.com/>

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DjDarkman
Process isolation:

Run Chrome

Open a lot of tabs

Open one with a HTTP auth that brings up the native browser login dialog

Switch to another tab

Close the one with the dialog

Result: whole browser crashes.

Moral: process isolation does not mean better user experience.

Like I said a lot of times:

IE 6 is still officially supported

IE 9 is not available on XP

This is why Microsoft is still crippling the web.

~~~
julian37

      Moral: process isolation does not mean better user experience.
    

No, the moral is that process isolation isn't a magic bullet that somehow
prevents all types of browser crashes. But that doesn't mean it's not a useful
technique for reducing the impact of things like a buggy plugin.

~~~
DjDarkman
Like I said, it doesn't magically make all nuances go away all by itself, it
may make the programmer's job a lot easier but it does not directly impact
user experience.

That's why it's not appropriate to compare browsers based on whether they
implement this or not.

Last time I checked if I crashed one instance of Flash player in one tab, all
instances crashed in all tabs.

