Ask HN: Why the HN comment layout uses GIF elements? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why the HN comment layout uses GIF elements?

1 point_3ruj8 comments

I blocked all GIFs in uBlock Origin to save bandwidth (an exception filter at the bottom of this post):

    .gif$domain

Surprisingly the Hacker News creates the comment layout with GIF images (and of the visible icons, the vote arrows are GIFs) — why this format specifically continues to be used for HN?

---

    .gif$domain=~ycombinator.com|

View on HN

What's wrong with the icons being GIFs?

>What's wrong with the icons being GIFs?

Nothing necessarily in this case, I just assumed that a vector image format would be much smaller and obviously scales with the resolution (how much that matters for the arrows, I don't know).

The site also uses tables for layout. It's bare bones but it works.

You don't even need images — just use unicode arrow or triangle characters. e.g. ▲

>You don't even need images — just use unicode arrow or triangle characters. e.g. ▲

I see, personally I'd prefer this for aesthetic reasons as well!

HN has had the same layout and look for a very long time. It works and there has been no need to change it. Keeping up with trends is usually not a good reason to change something that is working perfectly for it's intended use case.

It's not working perfectly.

It works very well and is lightweight compared to most websites, but the layout code (nested tables, font tags, etc.) is still pretty inefficient for what it does.

On every device I consume HN from, Mobile (android), Desktop (Chrome and Firefox), from both high bandwidth wifi and as low as 3g mobile, it works to the extent that I literally do not notice load times, render glitches, or any issues at all. If I were maintaining this site I literally could not think of a single reason to change it other than "I'm bored".

Reply on news.ycombinator.com