Like if Firefox didn't want to implement WebUSB, Safari didn't want to implement WebPush, or Lynx didn't want to implement Canvas is that outrageous?
The web (and open standardisation in general) has pioneered an ecosystem where the primary differentiation between browser is in user-facing UX & features (and ancillary factors such as performance, etc.), rather than developer-facing web-tech support.
This is quite different to a lot of other commercial "competitive" spaces as it substitutes vendor lock-in on patents & trade-secrets for actual innovation in the user-facing space. It's not all rosy: competing browsers still stray from this on the regular, but the ideal is one of the primary selling points of the web as a platform.
Browsers differentiating themselves on user features while maintaining cross-competitor consistency on web standards is the dream that differentiates the web, so seeing its erosion is something to call out.
> Like if Firefox didn't want to implement WebUSB, Safari didn't want to implement WebPush, or Lynx didn't want to implement Canvas is that outrageous?
What's particularly different here is that this isn't about the addition of a feature. The ticket opened is about adding XPath2 support but the quoted line is about removing existing XML support.
This may sound a bit like I'm supporting Microsoft's old "don't break the web" adage, but the big difference here is MS was reluctant to remove features competitors didn't have for fear of breaking IE-only websites (that had relied on them due to IE's dominance). This is about Chrome removing standardised features that browsers, servers, and applications of all varieties have supported interoperably for decades.
> Deprecate, and consider removing, XSLT
> The consensus last time we considered this was that xml and xslt are too important for enterprise and we cannot remove them from the platform. Closing this bug to match that reality. We'll open a new bug if we ever decide to do this. [1] (Feb 22, 2019)
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24767500
[1] https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=514995
Today's browsers are just trying to keep up with whatever Chrome decides to adopt.
[0]: https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-r... [1]: https://www.engadget.com/2014-05-14-mozilla-bends-on-drm.htm...
Allowed? Sure, why not?
Desirable? Hell, no.
Think about it. If you are developing a web application and you need ensure it runs on all supported platforms then you either:
a) use standard APIs that are provided by all platforms,
b) use platform-specific APIs and watch the number of platform-specific tests to grow exponentially along with development and maintenance effort,
c) drop platforms.
Suffice to say, option a) is far more desirable.