Technology

I just ran into a real world example of Safari's failure to implement web standards that I wanted to share with you so you can understand that web developers are not just mad about spending a few minutes testing in another browser. Because my company's user base is not the most affluent, we have to support older versions of Safari. Some of our users are currently experiencing errors because Safari <= 12 iOS does not support a feature that became supported by every major browser in early 2020.

Because of Apple's decision to not only delay adding support of new web standards (by months or even years), but also to lock the browser version to the OS version, the only browser I see throwing errors about this out of dozens that we get traffic from is Safari iOS. It is worth noting that I routinely see in our logs lots of Android models that were made up to 10 years ago. None of those have issues supporting this (or basically any other modern) feature.

The reason other browsers have no trouble with basic shit like this is that they get updates (usually automatically) on a regular basis. For other browsers, this is a standard part of how the web ecosystem works, even if the user has, say, a 7 year old OS version. But not Safari iOS. You have to update the entire OS or you necessarily get an outdated web experience. Users learned years ago that OS updates might render their perfectly functional device worse off than before, so those who can't afford to buy new devices opt not to install updates. Afraid to update to iOS 17? Well you get a web experience that is at least a year old.

You have no idea how maddening it is to have to frequently debug code that should've worked fine 4 years ago, in a single browser because of shitty monopoly's choice to avoid making the web "too good". You also don't seem to understand how frustrating it would be to be poor and unable to use a website because some random error is happening. Also, btw, these simple "feature not supported" issues are the easiest to deal with. What is even worse are things like their decision to totally hijack how html5 video works on iPhone, deviating from several completely standard ways of operating in every other browser. A video player I have to support has often had no issues in any browser except some particular version of Safari iOS, in which a weird indecipherable race condition is occurring in which some event fires at an unexpected time, which even varies from one version of Safari to the next. Trying to support that shit is so frustrating I've almost quit an otherwise cushy job.

None of this is "what the open web is all about". It is entirely what "retaining profits and market dominance at the expense of an open web" is all about.

Wowwwww, you are accepting what apple forced to happen as the only way things could be.

Safari is by farrrr worse than Firefox and the only reason firefox share is so low is because of (largely Apple's) anti-competitive monopolistic practices that specifically are about increasing app store revenue. Apple is a huge anti-open-web force like no other company has been before. Even Google, who is horrifically fucking the ecosystem up, lets you install any browser you want, and even though they are a controlling asshole force on the w3c, they don't completely flout or oppose standards like apple does.

web devs also hate it but requiring they put in the effort to support Safari is what an open web is all about.

I haven't read a statement this wrong in a while. Fuck no it isn't. Supporting other browsers, mobile or desktop, is never as difficult as supporting Safari is. There are two reasons for this, both rooted in apple being a blight on the history of the web.

One is that they literally make a conscious choice to make the web worse. Their worst nightmare is for users to be able to replace app store apps with web apps they make no money from, so they intentionally never have adopted most pwa features. They also choose to implement new standards years after everyone else for the same reason. Gotta keep users in the mindset that the web is lacking and not a great solution for anything an app can do. Even if they have to strongarm and brainwash their users to keep that attitude popular.

The other reason would be forgivable, if they weren't a TRILLION DOLLAR COMPANY: incompetence. I don't believe Safari is so buggy by choice. They just aren't great at making a web browser. People love to crow that safari is so fast and light on battery, but only web developers are uniquely qualified to understand how much of a mess it is. For example, try supporting a video player on Safari iOS. Absolute nightmare. Nothing works completely as expected. It is a dumpster fire of bugs.

What the open web is all about is creating web browsers that consistently are all interoperable with websites in the same way. But somehow you've shifted that burden to web devs, saying it's good and necessary for us to toy for weeks with sketchy workarounds for Safari that are not needed by Firefox or chrome. Firefox demonstrates that you don't need a trillion dollars to make a web browser that isn't full on garbage and conforms to standards. You just need a team of smart people and literally just to care about the web vs care about keeping it worse.

Even if apple wanted to care about the web, their business model requires them not to. So they will continue to make the web worse until the EU drags them kicking and screaming toward a better business model. And they'll fight it for years. To spin all of this as apple being the last bastion for web freedom is absolutely cult-lke apologia and you should check yourself.