Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

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> Does this comment have to come up every time someone builds a browser chrome with an existing [browser]

Only when they claim it's their own web browser, because that's a claim that deserves ridicule. Experimenting with the chrome on browsers is a praiseworthy and worthwhile activity, just different from writing new browsers.

> The chrome is what makes it a “browser” — ya know the tooling that’s lets you browse web pages with a url bar, keyboard shortcuts, tabs, windows. The thing that people have extremely strong preferences about and are what constitutes almost the entire identity of a web browser.

I don't think so, no. Some interesting differences between browsers might include:

1. Is it compatible with Slack?

2. How many megs of RAM does it need to run Slack?

3. Does it pass the ACID test? (Substitute modern equivalents.)

4. Does it support current ECMAScript, or does it require me to recompile my code to an older version?

5. Is it vulnerable to Google inserting malicious code into the next version to remove functionality I depend on?

6. Does it include the vulnerable code in the CVE that was just disclosed in WebKit, or am I safe without risking an upgrade?

7. Can I run it in a terminal?

8. Can I recompile it for the 68000?

9. Does it have new, possibly experimental features like freezing the execution of a page to save battery, WebAssembly, the Tcl/Tk plugin, PDF rendering, TeX rendering, or SQLite access?

10. How fast is it?

11. How well is it protected from cross-site cookies and paywalls?

12. Can it archive the version I'm looking at of this page, or am I vulnerable to the New York Times silently editing their article after the fact?

13. What protocols can it access data over — can it do Gopher, dat:, or BitTorrent?

All of these except #13 have everything to do with the browser engine and nothing to do with what the URL bar looks like. There must be some people whose preferences about their browser's keyboard shortcuts are stronger than their preferences about things like whether it runs the web apps they need to use, but I haven't met any of them.

> Only when they claim it's a web browser, because that's a claim that deserves ridicule.

It is a web browser! The name Google Chrome is play on the fact that it used to be "Google's chrome on WebKit."

The actual UI for the browser is where all the interaction is! Saying that the chrome for a web browser is "what the URL bar looks like" is absurd. All of the differentiating features of web browsers are in the chrome -- bookmarks, extensions, shortcuts, sync, profiles, container tabs, sidebars, application windows, developer tools, search.

It's true that those minor details are the things that distinguish different bits of chrome stuck to the same browser, but that isn't where all the interaction is; almost all of the interaction is with the DOM of a web page. That's why Google Chrome is called "Chrome": not because it was Google's chrome on WebKit, but because the conception was that the browser (any browser), and for that matter the operating system, was really just chrome around a web application.

It's not true that those minor details are the things that distinguish actually different web browsers, such as Gecko (to clarify that I'm not talking about iOS "Firefox"), IE7, IE8, IE9, WebKit, Blink, Konqueror, Lynx, Links, Dillo, Netscape 3, Netscape 4, and so on. Yes, there's a fuzzy line: were early versions of Chrome "the same browser" as Safari (because they used WebKit) or "different browsers" (because they had their own JS engine)? Different browsers, I think, but it's debatable. Were Firefox 3 and Firefox 45 "the same browser" or "different browsers"? The same browser, I would say. But the existence of gray areas like that doesn't mean that there are no black and white cases, like this one.

Did I mention I'm an accomplished musician, capable of playing world-class music in many different styles? My favorite instrument is the CD player, although sometimes I also play the MP3.

If you give a Chrome user Chrome but with Gecko for rendering almost nobody would notice, most tech folks probably wouldn't even notice. But swap that around and give a Chrome user Firefox but using Webkit for rendering, everyone single user would notice.

The average user does not care one bit about the rendering engine, and likely doesn't even conceive of their browser having that moving part. That's the whole reason why "browser" and "rendering engine" are not the same thing, because one is the application and the other is just a single component of a larger application. If Firefox switched to Servo but left everything else the same, nobody is going to demand they rename the browser, because only a single component was changed. The entire rest of the browser would be intact and still identical in form and function.

The amount of conflation of rendering engine and browser application in this HN thread is unbelievable.

1. Lots of people empirically don't notice the difference between using Linux and using Microsoft Windows. That doesn't mean they're the same operating system.

2. Chrome users will definitely notice if you give them Chrome but with Elinks or Dillo for rendering. Also, upthread I listed 12 differences Chrome users might notice with Gecko; although they might not, for example, understand why their browser was using so much less RAM, they would definitely notice the difference.

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