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0 pointskjkjadksj1y ago0 comments

Somehow open source browsers still get made without a $600 million “rich uncle.” Mozilla is pretty bloated. This can buy like 1200 good engineers. People make browsers with a couple people sometimes.

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zamadatix1y ago

Most open source browsers are a reskin of actual open source browser development. E.g. Brave and Vivaldi are skins on top of the actual Chromium project, librewolf and others on Firefox's components, and Orion and others on Safari's components. Only a rare few browsers e.g. Dillo or Ladybird are actually independent and it shows in that those browsers are nearly unusably slow, compatibility limited, and insecure (that's not a diss on them, they are still awesome projects for their own reasons).

camkego1y ago

It’s possible to repackage Chromium with a couple people. It’s not possible to build a browser from the ground up with a couple people.

kjkjadksjOP1y ago

Using existing code is fine, that's how most software is built anyhow. Only masochists build from complete scratch.

EDIT: I've been getting a lot of down votes for this stance, surprisingly. Why not share your position if you don't agree? There must be a bunch of hardcore people on here who are writing directly on the metal in machine code. Short of that, you are in fact using someone else's code in all your projects.

JohnFen1y ago

This seems to conflate two entirely different ways of "using existing code". Using tools written by others is technically "using existing code", but that's an entirely different thing than incorporating existing code into your projects.

I think that when most devs hear "using existing code", they're thinking of the latter, not the former.

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Vinnl1y ago

It's the classic "building on Chrome cedes control of what the web can do to Google". But I think most people aren't interested in rehashing that discussion here - a search for "independent browser engine" should turn up plenty of arguments if you're interested in other positions.

marginalia_nu1y ago

Why not? Ladybird seems like it is coming along very well.

zamadatix1y ago

Ladybird is frickin awesome but give it 10 more years and it still won't be an equivalent to 2024 Safari/Firefox/Chrome without a lot more funding than it's already getting (~100-200k/year in sponsorships).

mead54321y ago

Sorry - was looking at an older version of the page and didn’t realize there were already a bunch of the same comment. My bad.

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Will they though? Maybe some toy ones but the distribution of other browsers are largely built on chromium with a few on Firefox and one or two on WebKit.

Beyond that, there’s Arc that’s made a splash with the HN crowd but IIRC, it’s VC funded so a whole different set of concerns.

There will be other browsers but almost the entire browser market is essentially funded by Google.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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zamadatix1y ago

camkego1y ago

It’s possible to repackage Chromium with a couple people. It’s not possible to build a browser from the ground up with a couple people.

kjkjadksjOP1y ago

Using existing code is fine, that's how most software is built anyhow. Only masochists build from complete scratch.

JohnFen1y ago

I think that when most devs hear "using existing code", they're thinking of the latter, not the former.

1 more reply

Vinnl1y ago

marginalia_nu1y ago

Why not? Ladybird seems like it is coming along very well.

zamadatix1y ago

mead54321y ago

Sorry - was looking at an older version of the page and didn’t realize there were already a bunch of the same comment. My bad.

———

Will they though? Maybe some toy ones but the distribution of other browsers are largely built on chromium with a few on Firefox and one or two on WebKit.

Beyond that, there’s Arc that’s made a splash with the HN crowd but IIRC, it’s VC funded so a whole different set of concerns.

There will be other browsers but almost the entire browser market is essentially funded by Google.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse