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socalgal2 15 hours ago [-]
The problem here is all the OS features are discarded. Can't insert password from password manager because to do so the page would need to access to passwords. Can't use the user dictionary because to do so would be a privacy issue. Doesn't support CJK and other languages that require an input method editor. etc....
It also means a platform's features are not duplicated so your app's behavior sticks out as having a different experience from everything else the user does making it frustrating.
That said, if you want see an app in WebGL/WASM where the browser is rendering everything there's https://earth.google.com as a high end example. It has most of the issues just mentioned as well as the fact that nothing is selectable by default. Want to copy a name so you can paste it into your search engine of choice. NO! Want to right click on a foreign name to find out how to pronounce it? NO! etc....
bennett_dev 6 hours ago [-]
This is also the first thing I noticed. Cannot copy with CTRL-C, cannot swipe left to get back (though that might just be a event listener problem), right click menu doesn't show any of my usual options, etc.
Also I feel first open time is super slow in my browser
onion2k 11 hours ago [-]
What this needs is a demo of something that you can't do natively in a browser. Recreating HN is great, but it shows why it's not as good as HTML+CSS (slower, bigger, no native browser features). This sort of project has the potential to really demonstrate the power of WASM and WebGPU, but in something that's not a game.
You say frameworks "inherit the limitations of HTML/CSS", so show something that can be done when you don't have those limits.
ale42 7 hours ago [-]
Why doing something that looks like a web page... inside a web browser that can do it natively? I guess that seeing the same this as a standalone application would be much more impressive (if I understand well, that's what it is supposed to do?). As a demo in a browser I'd rather expect a "regular" GUI with buttons, fields, scrollable sections, radio buttons, etc.
This said, not sure why, but loading it takes ages.
pmkary 14 hours ago [-]
I have been dreaming about this for ages, ditching the DOM and building everything in WASM for example. This is insanely great.
bschwindHN 11 hours ago [-]
It seems insanely...bad to me. I loaded the HN demo. I can literally see the rows of items loading as if I'm on dial-up.
I can't select any of the text on the homepage demo. In the comments page, text selection doesn't behave like I would expect, in too many ways to describe here.
I right click and can't do anything, unless I right click on an item. And then my only options are "Open", "Open in New Tab", and "Copy Link".
The scrolling on the page doesn't have the normal rebound that you get when you try to scroll past the extents of the page on a trackpad.
Pinch to zoom doesn't work.
Cool that it's handwritten and that you can hot reload and write it on a phone, but as an end user I would _hate_ if I was asked to use an application built on this.
Rohansi 7 hours ago [-]
> I can literally see the rows of items loading as if I'm on dial-up.
I noticed this too. I think it's actually just that whatever they are doing for layout is not stable on the first frame.
The comments load differently than HN for whatever reason too so you end up seeing suspense placeholders.
Both are bad UX.
olmo23 7 hours ago [-]
What about accessibility tho?
pjmlp 5 hours ago [-]
This is back to Flash.
anilgulecha 12 hours ago [-]
This is a good experiment. What does it take to have a wasm powered corss platform architecture for apps. So far tauri had done something, but requires a humongous backend (system webview).
If we can reach this goal in under 1mb or 2, this is a massive improvement to the SoTA. Experiments such as these are what get is there. kudos.
Tepix 12 hours ago [-]
Cool hack. But taking a step back:
Why did you write a layout and rendering engine to run on a browser, which is a layout and rendering engine already? As socalgal2 points out, you’re losing many important features.
mkl 14 hours ago [-]
The name seems very un-searchable and already overused (I found several other web Uniforms while testing searching for yours, which I didn't find). The demo seemed low framerate or something on Chrome Android, and apparently my main, Firefox Android, doesn't support WebGPU by default.
9 hours ago [-]
feverzsj 14 hours ago [-]
That's exactly what companies want: truly closed-source website.
idle_zealot 11 hours ago [-]
Surely you could ask Claude to decomp the WASM blob it sends you (lol).
andreapaiola 11 hours ago [-]
Firefox on Android... Not supported
small_scombrus 10 hours ago [-]
Firefox in general I think because same on Linux
7 hours ago [-]
3 hours ago [-]
yuvalt1 6 hours ago [-]
Very nice demo! I love these type of optimizations
xeonax 11 hours ago [-]
This is the future for ads. no inspect element to zap an ad.
Tepix 6 hours ago [-]
This ability can and will be added for wasm as well
xeonax 6 hours ago [-]
Would be difficult, every implementation will need a different approach to tackle. Think of it. how do you block certain pixels in a stream of pixels
It also means a platform's features are not duplicated so your app's behavior sticks out as having a different experience from everything else the user does making it frustrating.
That said, if you want see an app in WebGL/WASM where the browser is rendering everything there's https://earth.google.com as a high end example. It has most of the issues just mentioned as well as the fact that nothing is selectable by default. Want to copy a name so you can paste it into your search engine of choice. NO! Want to right click on a foreign name to find out how to pronounce it? NO! etc....
Also I feel first open time is super slow in my browser
You say frameworks "inherit the limitations of HTML/CSS", so show something that can be done when you don't have those limits.
This said, not sure why, but loading it takes ages.
I can't select any of the text on the homepage demo. In the comments page, text selection doesn't behave like I would expect, in too many ways to describe here.
I right click and can't do anything, unless I right click on an item. And then my only options are "Open", "Open in New Tab", and "Copy Link".
The scrolling on the page doesn't have the normal rebound that you get when you try to scroll past the extents of the page on a trackpad.
Pinch to zoom doesn't work.
Cool that it's handwritten and that you can hot reload and write it on a phone, but as an end user I would _hate_ if I was asked to use an application built on this.
I noticed this too. I think it's actually just that whatever they are doing for layout is not stable on the first frame.
The comments load differently than HN for whatever reason too so you end up seeing suspense placeholders.
Both are bad UX.
If we can reach this goal in under 1mb or 2, this is a massive improvement to the SoTA. Experiments such as these are what get is there. kudos.
Why did you write a layout and rendering engine to run on a browser, which is a layout and rendering engine already? As socalgal2 points out, you’re losing many important features.