# I am the Watcher. I am your guide through this vast new twtiverse.
# 
# Usage:
#     https://watcher.sour.is/api/plain/users              View list of users and latest twt date.
#     https://watcher.sour.is/api/plain/twt                View all twts.
#     https://watcher.sour.is/api/plain/mentions?uri=:uri  View all mentions for uri.
#     https://watcher.sour.is/api/plain/conv/:hash         View all twts for a conversation subject.
# 
# Options:
#     uri     Filter to show a specific users twts.
#     offset  Start index for quey.
#     limit   Count of items to return (going back in time).
# 
# twt range = 1 7
# self = https://watcher.sour.is/conv/nh42sfq
prologic
twtxt.net
View Thread
@novaburst I'm curious though... If it's all so terrible (which I don't necessarily disagree), what's an alternative better approach? Gemini? Gopher? -- Or put another way, what "problems" were being solved by a piece of software (Browser) that has Cookie, Javascript, Local Storage, CSS, HTML rendering, a DOM, Extensions, Web RTC, Web Assembly, Notifications, Camera access, Filesystem access, Forms, a HTTP client,an AJAZ client, a Fetch API, ... Should I go on? 😂
prologic
twtxt.net
View Thread
@novaburst I'm curious though... If it's all so terrible (which I don't necessarily disagree), what's an alternative better approach? Gemini? Gopher? -- Or put another way, what "problems" were being solved by a piece of software (Browser) that has Cookie, Javascript, Local Storage, CSS, HTML rendering, a DOM, Extensions, Web RTC, Web Assembly, Notifications, Camera access, Filesystem access, Forms, a HTTP client,an AJAZ client, a Fetch API, ... Should I go on? 😂
movq
www.uninformativ.de
View Thread
@prologic Haha, good point, this really is a rabbit hole. 😅

> If it's all so terrible (which I don't necessarily disagree), what's an alternative better approach? Gemini? Gopher?

We could go down the Gemini route: Only serve *documents*, not *applications*. That would make browsers much more simple.

However:

The browsers that we have today allowed us to move from native programs to “web apps”, so basically the browser is the operating system now. And that means things like: I can easily run Google Meet on Linux these days, because it runs in Chromium or Firefox. 25 years ago, this would have meant that “Google Meet” was a native Windows program which had to be ported to Mac and Linux and FreeBSD and what not. So I think our software world became *a lot* more platform independent. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to use exclusively Linux if it wasn’t for modern web apps.

Then the question becomes: Are browsers the only way to achieve that goal? Certainly not, just look at Java, which has been just as platform-independent for a long time. Is that any different, though? Nope, Java is a VM just like the browser is today, so the complexity just shifts. So maybe C with GTK as a toolkit – but then you’d have to provide binaries for all the OSes again.

When you look at the whole browser situation from the perspective of “let’s try to be platform-independent”, then, well, browsers just one of many possible solutions. I like to rant about browsers a lot, but they do have advantages.

Then of course, you could say that being platform-independent never was the goal of Google to begin with, they just want to control the market and push everybody else out. Platform-independent software was just a happy side effect.

There are so many aspects to this, technological and political. (And I lost my train of thought while trying to keep this reply “short”. 🤣)
movq
www.uninformativ.de
View Thread
@prologic Haha, good point, this really is a rabbit hole. 😅

> If it's all so terrible (which I don't necessarily disagree), what's an alternative better approach? Gemini? Gopher?

We could go down the Gemini route: Only serve *documents*, not *applications*. That would make browsers much more simple.

However:

The browsers that we have today allowed us to move from native programs to “web apps”, so basically the browser is the operating system now. And that means things like: I can easily run Google Meet on Linux these days, because it runs in Chromium or Firefox. 25 years ago, this would have meant that “Google Meet” was a native Windows program which had to be ported to Mac and Linux and FreeBSD and what not. So I think our software world became *a lot* more platform independent. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to use exclusively Linux if it wasn’t for modern web apps.

Then the question becomes: Are browsers the only way to achieve that goal? Certainly not, just look at Java, which has been just as platform-independent for a long time. Is that any different, though? Nope, Java is a VM just like the browser is today, so the complexity just shifts. So maybe C with GTK as a toolkit – but then you’d have to provide binaries for all the OSes again.

When you look at the whole browser situation from the perspective of “let’s try to be platform-independent”, then, well, browsers just one of many possible solutions. I like to rant about browsers a lot, but they do have advantages.

Then of course, you could say that being platform-independent never was the goal of Google to begin with, they just want to control the market and push everybody else out. Platform-independent software was just a happy side effect.

There are so many aspects to this, technological and political. (And I lost my train of thought while trying to keep this reply “short”. 🤣)
movq
www.uninformativ.de
View Thread
@prologic Haha, good point, this really is a rabbit hole. 😅

> If it's all so terrible (which I don't necessarily disagree), what's an alternative better approach? Gemini? Gopher?

We could go down the Gemini route: Only serve *documents*, not *applications*. That would make browsers much more simple.

However:

The browsers that we have today allowed us to move from native programs to “web apps”, so basically the browser is the operating system now. And that means things like: I can easily run Google Meet on Linux these days, because it runs in Chromium or Firefox. 25 years ago, this would have meant that “Google Meet” was a native Windows program which had to be ported to Mac and Linux and FreeBSD and what not. So I think our software world became *a lot* more platform independent. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to use exclusively Linux if it wasn’t for modern web apps.

Then the question becomes: Are browsers the only way to achieve that goal? Certainly not, just look at Java, which has been just as platform-independent for a long time. Is that any different, though? Nope, Java is a VM just like the browser is today, so the complexity just shifts. So maybe C with GTK as a toolkit – but then you’d have to provide binaries for all the OSes again.

When you look at the whole browser situation from the perspective of “let’s try to be platform-independent”, then, well, browsers just one of many possible solutions. I like to rant about browsers a lot, but they do have advantages.

Then of course, you could say that being platform-independent never was the goal of Google to begin with, they just want to control the market and push everybody else out. Platform-independent software was just a happy side effect.

There are so many aspects to this, technological and political. (And I lost my train of thought while trying to keep this reply “short”. 🤣)
prologic
twtxt.net
View Thread
@movq You are absolutely spot on here. This is why I don't necessarily _think_ the Browser as a whole is "bad" per se, yes there are companies, corporations and governments that do "bad" things with all the things we run atop of them, but a Web Browser is really just a collection of APIs with a VM that lets you run "programs".

Now that being said, I'm actually quite excited by the prospects of Gio UI and Go because I _believe_ this is currently the best way to write cross-platform Desktop and Mobile apps, which alleviates the need to write "Web Apps" which as we all know has its own perils and inconsistency. *cough* Apple™ PWA(s) not supporting Web Push (yet?) *cough*
prologic
twtxt.net
View Thread
@movq You are absolutely spot on here. This is why I don't necessarily _think_ the Browser as a whole is "bad" per se, yes there are companies, corporations and governments that do "bad" things with all the things we run atop of them, but a Web Browser is really just a collection of APIs with a VM that lets you run "programs".

Now that being said, I'm actually quite excited by the prospects of Gio UI and Go because I _believe_ this is currently the best way to write cross-platform Desktop and Mobile apps, which alleviates the need to write "Web Apps" which as we all know has its own perils and inconsistency. *cough* Apple™ PWA(s) not supporting Web Push (yet?) *cough*