

Should browsers have an expiration date? - cool-RR
http://blog.garlicsim.org/post/763077773/should-browsers-have-an-expiration-date

======
xenophanes
Unfortunately this is an anti-feature: no one will choose a browser for
himself b/c he wants it, and some ppl might avoid browsers with it.

I guess the only way it could be good for market share is I might want to
install a browser like this for someone else, so they'll end up upgrading
eventually even if I'm not around anymore. I'd be happy to mass install it at
a big company if I could get away with it. Then even if I'm not there later,
something good will happen.

~~~
cool-RR
I think that you are overrating the thinking process that users have. Most
users are not like you. They don't carefully consider the pros and cons of the
software they install.

Most users are like, "It's shiny, let's install it!" Okay, I'm exaggerating,
but I'm saying that the _vast_ majority of users would still download and
install Firefox/Chrome even if they had an expiration date.

~~~
xenophanes
Why do people like that download FF/Chrome at all? They already have IE 8 I
imagine.

~~~
Pheter
I know a lot of non-technical people who install, and even recommend, Chrome
because it is "the fasted browser ever". They have no idea about web standards
but still have an incentive to try a new browser.

------
zweben
I would love this as much as any other web designer or developer, but sadly,
it's just not feasible.

The biggest problem with upgrades is that lots of companies rely on specific
versions of specific browsers for in-house websites and web apps. Expiration
dates essentially amount to browser makers saying 'too bad, fix your
software'. This would be amusing, but realistically, Microsoft would never do
such a thing, and without Microsoft on board, not much will change.

The best compromise I can think of is for browser vendors to decouple updates
of web-technology support (HTML, CSS, JS, Canvas, etc.) from updates of user-
facing features, the things that get advertised when an full point upgrade is
released, and start pushing out HTML, CSS and JS upgrades automatically, in
the background. Once the first round of such browsers were widely adopted,
browser upgrades would cease to be an issue at all. Upgrade averse users could
keep their old versions with familiar interfaces and still have cutting edge
standards support.

This leaves the problem of getting the first round of upgrades through, but
that could be solved by building in backwards compatibility for all currently
popular version of a browser. This would be a pain, but would only have to
happen once. If Microsoft, for example, gave IE9 full backwards compatibility
with IE8, 7 and 6, and made future rendering updates automatic, there would be
very little excuse left for any company to stick with an older version of IE.

~~~
devicenull
I don't think it's the UI that breaks legacy applications.. it's the rendering
engine. Automatically pushing out upgrades to the rendering engine would be as
bad as forcing upgrades from IE6->IE8.

~~~
zweben
I think you misread what I wrote. I was suggesting separate updates for the
rendering engine to solve the problem of upgrade-averse users. Legacy
applications would be accommodated by keeping older rendering engines running
beside a newer, automatically updating engine. The idea is to remove
roadblocks to getting everyone to upgrade, and then make it so that upgrading
the browser version is no longer necessary to maintain current standards
support.

------
gmurphy
This is why Chrome has built-in silent autoupdate - the vast majority of our
users are on the a new version within a week of releasing it.

See graphs: <http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/#slide38.0>

The shallow curve is our development and beta channel users, the steep part of
the curve is when we release a stable version. Previous slides show known
update rates for other browsers.

~~~
albertzeyer
Here is the graph. The site sucks pretty bad (seems to require a very high
resolution and has disabled scrollbars).

[http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/chrome_version_migra...](http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/chrome_version_migration.png)
[http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/firefox_version_migr...](http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/firefox_version_migration.png)
[http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/ie_version_migration...](http://www.belshe.com/test/velocity2010/ie_version_migration.png)

------
antichaos
Shouldn't all software have a clearly labelled expiration date like dairy
products do?

~~~
sliverstorm
Last year I used a computer that actually had a 486 cpu, whose only method of
data transfer was floppy, and would have choked on anything other than the DOS
it was loaded with. It had a power ROCKER, not a power button. It was probably
about 20 years old.

It did it's job admirably- load EEPROM chips with it's paired, equally archaic
EEPROM burner.

There is really no reason to replace it, besides saving you the annoyance of
using floppies.

So, in a word what I am saying is computers that are _tools_ need not have an
expiration date. Their software does not need to be updated, because there is
nothing wrong with it. Do you upgrade your 1970's corded drill just because
it's old? No. It may not be pretty, but it does the job.

~~~
phn
I could not agree more, if I download a software, I am the one who decides
when and for what purpose I use it.

I agree that people should be strongly recommended to update, or (as in Google
Chrome) update automatically if possible, but refusing to boot is just plain
wrong.

------
whirlycott1
You know, we effectively had this back in 1995 or 1996 when Netscape would
release betas. Each version would expire and require you to upgrade a few
months afterwards. The Web was very different back then, but I think that this
could possibly work for browsers like Safari where there aren't a bunch of
folks with plugins. But breaking my favorite Firefox plug because the plugin
creator was on vacation for six months and missed a browser upgrade would be
not so cool.

------
Dilpil
Many corporate IT departments run old browsers because they make use of
proprietary intranet web applications and don't feel like developing them on
multiple platforms. To them, this system would seem pretty stupid, and indeed,
would prevent them from ever upgrading into new expiring browser versions.

------
joejohnson
It wouldn't bode well for public relations between the browser designer and
the user. I see the reasoning this guy has, but this proposal is literally
planned obsolescence. That's a scary notion to a user (or consumer).

------
petercooper
_Could the big browser makers all agree to set expiration dates on all their
browsers?_

They could! It'd be as much a runaway success as software expiration was for
eradicating piracy, and I doubt anyone is competent enough to roll out cracks
or patches to "fix" people's broken browsers.

~~~
wmf
I think the situation is different. If your browser expired, would you (A)
search for a crack or (B) click the "update to latest version" link?

------
albertzeyer
I prefer silent updates.

~~~
cool-RR
Silent updates should definitely be done, but they will not work under all
scenarios. (e.g. computers that reinitialize themselves on every reboot like
in some universities, computers that aren't connected to the Internet like in
some paranoid companies, etc.)

~~~
mattw
In these situations the expiration date idea wouldn't work either because they
would either find a workaround or refuse to install your software at all,
knowing that it forces them to go through the upgrade process in the future
(and on your timeframe instead of theirs to boot).

------
fleitz
How do you download a new browser when your old one is expired?

~~~
cool-RR
The expiration dialog will download one for you.

------
fleitz
The issue is that doing this is forcing the issues of a few people on to a
much larger set. If someone doesn't want to write code for that browser just
don't. If they're feeling really nice, pop an error message telling them that
their browser is expired.

Oh, whats that? now the site isn't going to bring in as much revenue? Now they
have a choice, whether the revenue is worth more to them than writing the
code.

~~~
cool-RR
Those "few people", a.k.a. web developers, are those that are responsible for
progress and innovation on the Internet. If they have a problem, the Internet
has a problem.

------
apop
silly idea

~~~
cool-RR
You're on HN; You are expected to be slightly more articulate in your
criticism.

