{"id":1627,"date":"2015-07-07T22:38:29","date_gmt":"2015-07-08T03:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cbateman.com\/blog\/?p=1627"},"modified":"2015-07-11T21:17:29","modified_gmt":"2015-07-12T02:17:29","slug":"apple-and-safari","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cbateman.com\/blog\/apple-and-safari\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple and Safari"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week, Nolan Lawson wrote Safari is the New IE<\/a> (and a follow-up<\/a>), and it received quite a lot of attention. Nolan admitted that the title is linkbaity, and several folks have pointed out how the comparison doesn’t really work. But the fact remains that the general sentiment resonates with web developers. Something about Safari just feels familiar.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Now, I want to be clear about a couple things. First:<\/strong> Safari is a great browser. For years it’s been the leader in performance and battery life on mobile (and desktop too). A few years ago I made a silly HTML canvas app, and while iOS Safari could run it at 60fps, a contemporary Android device struggled to hit double digits.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Second:<\/strong> the people that make Safari are really terrific. They love the web and they want to make it \u2014 and Safari \u2014 great. They’ve probably had a discouraging week, and they don’t deserve it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

The problem doesn’t lie with the WebKit and Safari engineers; the problem lies with Apple. I think there are two primary issues.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

Communication<\/h2>\r\n\r\n

Apple prohibits WebKit\/Safari devs from talking about their plans.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

I’ve found that WebKit\/Safari devs are very helpful and responsive when it comes to talking about what’s happening in WebKit. And don’t forget – WebKit is open source<\/a>, so you can see exactly what’s happening.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

However<\/strong>, just because a feature is in WebKit, that doesn’t mean it’s available or enabled in Safari. Remember wondering if WebGL<\/i> would ever be enabled on iOS?<\/p>\r\n\r\n

For a current example, consider Web Notifications<\/i> and the Fullscreen API<\/i>. Both of these specifications have been available in desktop Safari for at least three years now. Will they ever come to iOS Safari? Are they being worked on, but just aren’t ready yet? Are they even on the table? Should I plan on these things being dead forever to the cross-browser websites I build? Did a higher-up at Apple nix these native-encroaching featues?<\/p>\r\n\r\n

We’ll never know, because when you ask about future plans for something other than pure WebKit (and sometimes even then), the answer is always the same: “Sorry, Apple doesn’t<\/a> comment<\/a> on future<\/a> releases<\/a>.”\r\n\r\n

I don’t think this policy makes sense for the developer-facing features of a web browser<\/em>, but Apple certainly doesn’t care what I think. We can only hope that things change in the future. I’m hopeful:<\/p>\r\n\r\n

@batemanchris<\/a> @b_sted<\/a> Yes, we know that is needed. Stay tuned.<\/p>— Timothy Hatcher (@xeenon) July 1, 2015<\/a><\/blockquote>\r\n