Ask HN: What will future browser be like? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What will future browser be like?

11 pointschinmays8 comments

Be it web browser user or web developer, modern browsers definitely don't have everything we hoped for. What will the future browsers look like, be it look wise or functionality wise? Do we need to rethink the way we perceive browsers?

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My hope is for more diversity and experimentation in rethinking the browser paradigm.

An example that comes to mind is Beaker Browser (https://beakerbrowser.com/), that simplifies exploring and publishing on a peer-to-peer web.

Another example, that I just came across today, is Polarized (https://getpolarized.io/). It seems to embed (or integrate with) a web browser as a feature in a larger personal knowledge base system.

How far future are we talking here?

In the very, very distant future, I'm guessing we'll see browsers with VR functionality accessed through a headset or something. Maybe with websites actually resembling 3D worlds akin to the 'cyberspace' fiction of yore.

Something involving AR functionality seems plausible too. Not sure how it'd work, but maybe the sites you're seeing would be like dioramas projected into the real world, akin to Pokemon GO.

But that's probably a while off. Coding VR/AR setups as web apps is still pretty complicated as of right now, and the possibilities for a browser that really depends on them haven't been explored all that much yet.

For the short term... It'll probably be pretty boring by comparison. Typical features from mobile apps and desktop programs will keep making their way into web development (I'm guessing screen snapshots, ambient light mode, more stuff involving the camera and gyro sensors in devices, etc) and eventually the web will start seeing them integrated into the mainstream more and more.

How about the ability for users to build and exchange "distros" of interface, information filtering and content discovery. Like themes but besides changing the layout of (a more interactive) browser it also changes how content is viewed/discovered.

Eg. the "grandad" browser with large text, football results & commentary, civic information and communications tools all lined up and easy to use. The "Kids" flavours with varying levels of helicopter parenting. And a bazillion no-JS software dev versions :P.

Perhaps even with modules. Eg. the "Im going on holidays" module displays a curated list of tools (skyscanner/wikitravel etc) to assist with that. The "Im learning to ride a motorbike" motorbike displays curated youtube content (or pre-trained models that reduce spammy search results) in addition to specialised apps to keep track of progress etc.

James Mickens at Microsoft Research presents Atlantis, which I definitely think this still the most forward-looking browser architecture out there: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uflg7LDmzI

Ideas from this effort are going to be trickling into browsers for years to come. For example, if you squint a bit, you might see a conceptual resemblance between the Syphon interpreter in Atlantis and WASM in shipping browsers.

Even slower and even more vendor locked... to Google. As a developer we don't a crap as long as we support "the latest versions of Chrome" but as a user, you can't really use any browser but Chrome these days if you want the site to actually load.

Vendor locking is real. Chrome and Google are a threat to the free and open internet.

I use Firefox and have no problems with website compatibility. Be the change you want to see.

With Web Assembly being supported in all major browsers, it will be an interesting future.

Huge performance gains in Web Assembly could introduce a new age (Web 4.0 or 5.0?). They could become more like an OS perhaps.

As a web developer, browsers dont have everything I hoped for, but Im pretty satisfied as a web browser user. What is missing as a web browser user for you?

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