Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

fastbook response on hacks?

174 views
Skip to first unread message

Luke Crouch

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 11:07:41 AM12/17/12
to engagement-developers
http://www.sencha.com/blog/the-making-of-fastbook-an-html5-love-story
seems like a story set to explode. But it needs a response/reminder that
HTML5 is more than just Webkit.

Fastbook doesn't work on Firefox OS, Firefox Mobile, nor Opera Mobile. I
wasn't able to check Windows Phone.

-L

John Karahalis

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 11:56:09 AM12/17/12
to Luke Crouch, engagement-developers
Very, very cool.

I would also love to see us engage with them. Wondering what Robert N. thinks...

--
John Karahalis
Mozilla
openjck.com

----- Original Message -----
> _______________________________________________
> engagement-developers mailing list
> engagement...@lists.mozilla.org
> https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/engagement-developers

Christian Heilmann

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 11:58:52 AM12/17/12
to John Karahalis, Luke Crouch, engagement-developers
How is them using the HTML5 brand to promote more webkit only solutions that aren't even tested in a webview very very cool?

John Karahalis

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 12:03:32 PM12/17/12
to Christian Heilmann, Luke Crouch, engagement-developers
Just speaking to their goal of proving -- in code -- that the open Web can be just as powerful as native applications. This could be much more powerful than any blog post correcting Zuckerberg.

Their choice to target WebKit only is obviously a problem, but one more reason to start a conversation with them.

--
John Karahalis
Mozilla
openjck.com

----- Original Message -----

Christian Heilmann

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 12:10:10 PM12/17/12
to John Karahalis, Luke Crouch, engagement-developers
We have conversations with them. most ended with "people use iPads, we concentrate on those". This is very aggressive marketing for their platform mostly. Much like the last post about their app wrapper: https://www.sencha.com/blog/creating-native-applications-with-sencha-desktop-packager/

Sounds awesome, open and driving HTML5, right? Until you do the math as in the first comment:

Desktop packager sounds great, but, only being available w/ Sencha Complete: Team, which is $2,195 per seat with 10 seat minimum puts it at $21,950 to use it… Seems awfully steep.

That said, it will be interesting to see the story unfold, let me check if they are up for an interview or some guest post.

Luke Crouch

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 12:10:35 PM12/17/12
to Christian Heilmann, engagement-developers, John Karahalis
I think on the whole spectrum, HTML5 > WebKit > Native.

I'll admit I started this thread hoping to provoke Christian to write a
blog post response about "webkit-only solutions that aren't even tested
in a webview" :)

-L

Christian Heilmann

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 12:16:23 PM12/17/12
to Luke Crouch, Brendan Eich, engagement-developers, John Karahalis
Getting the ball rolling...

http://prntscr.com/mg2la



----- Original Message -----
From: "Luke Crouch" <lcr...@mozilla.com>
To: "Christian Heilmann" <chei...@mozilla.com>

Christian Heilmann

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 1:08:46 PM12/17/12
to Luke Crouch, Brendan Eich, Robert Nyman, engagement-developers, John Karahalis
http://christianheilmann.com/2012/12/17/on-senchas-fastbook-html5-tech-demo/

Not a hacks topic yet, IMHO. But as conversations are sought, let's fix this for Firefox and make a great post then?

Robert Nyman

unread,
Dec 17, 2012, 5:25:04 PM12/17/12
to Christian Heilmann, Brendan Eich, John Karahalis, Luke Crouch, engagement-developers, Robert Nyman
I made a little noise about this early in the the day since I think it was an important thing:

https://twitter.com/robertnyman/status/280682494897037312

The reason is that with Facebook first moving to native on iOS and now Android, I believe it's very important to show that HTML5 can do it. Sure, it was webkit-only here, but that was of minor importance. It was a proof of concept and a way to get attention for Sencha - and used in the best manner, we can hopefully sway this into something good for the web, open technologies and Mozilla/Firefox.

After my tweet I was in a lot of discussions about it, and also with Sencha developer Robert Dougan (@rdougan).
One thing that I said to him - and that would be interesting to see - is to compare Facebook's current mobile web version and Sencha's implementation, analyze pros and cons and see how both of them could benefit from each other.

I think that would be the best starting point, and if/when more discussions have been had and it works in more web browsers than WebKit, then we could talk about it on Mozilla Hacks.


Best regards,
Robert

Gervase Markham

unread,
Dec 18, 2012, 9:14:52 AM12/18/12
to mozilla-engage...@lists.mozilla.org
On 17/12/12 22:25, Robert Nyman wrote:
> The reason is that with Facebook first moving to native on iOS and
> now Android, I believe it's very important to show that HTML5 can do
> it. Sure, it was webkit-only here, but that was of minor importance.

Well, yes and no. IMO, the "we can do it while Facebook can't" thing is
only valid if they take on the same challenge that Facebook took on. And
that includes multi-browser support - doesn't it?

Gerv

Robert Nyman

unread,
Dec 18, 2012, 1:53:24 PM12/18/12
to Gervase Markham, mozilla-engage...@lists.mozilla.org
> Well, yes and no. IMO, the "we can do it while Facebook can't" thing is only valid if they take on the same challenge that Facebook took on. And that includes multi-browser support - doesn't it?

No. Facebook mobile web is something different. This was compared to Facebook building webkit-only in WebViews on iOS respectively Android.
One of the problems overlooked here, though, is that Sencha did it in mobile web browsers, and part of the problem lies in, for example, iOS behavior in WebViews compared to the mobile browser.

So, not a 1:1 comparison, but at the same time, not something finished either. A good first step that hopefully leads to multiple web browser support, and that's a discussion to be had with them.


Best regards,
Robert


On Dec 18, 2012, at 15:14 , Gervase Markham <ge...@mozilla.org> wrote:

> On 17/12/12 22:25, Robert Nyman wrote:
>> The reason is that with Facebook first moving to native on iOS and
>> now Android, I believe it's very important to show that HTML5 can do
>> it. Sure, it was webkit-only here, but that was of minor importance.
>
> Well, yes and no. IMO, the "we can do it while Facebook can't" thing is only valid if they take on the same challenge that Facebook took on. And that includes multi-browser support - doesn't it?
>
> Gerv
>

Luke Crouch

unread,
Dec 18, 2012, 3:30:49 PM12/18/12
to Robert Nyman, mozilla-engage...@lists.mozilla.org, Gervase Markham
On 12/18/12 12:53 PM, Robert Nyman wrote:
> One of the problems overlooked here, though, is that Sencha did it in mobile web browsers, and part of the problem lies in, for example, iOS behavior in WebViews compared to the mobile browser.
WebViews are a big problem, and it shows developers that we should drop
this whole PhoneGap/App nonsense and go (back) to mobile web at simple
URL's.

PhoneGap is just that - a stop-gap. What's the point of wrapping your
HTML5 in PhoneGap considering 1. iOS and Android WebView hobble your
app's performance 2. the iOS and Android stores absolutely *suck* for
discover-ability.

The latter point is made almost comical by stuff like
https://plus.google.com/u/0/100372991266700326299/posts/NHZdE5YYDPw I
spent 5 minutes trying to get that crap to work. Why not just have a
card with incrediblepizza.com on it that does all that BS for me?

Or my personal favorite is a local highway billboard that says
"Available in the App store! Go to <url> for details." The whole app
packaging, distribution, and discover-ability situation is such a mess
that they send users to the web anyway.

IMO we should be hammering native apps on this BS, and it's probably
time to start moving away from the whole PhoneGap/Appcelerator approach
too. Mobile support for HTML5 is starting to catch up to the native
API's those libraries give dev's anyway.

-L

Robert Nyman

unread,
Dec 19, 2012, 3:34:28 AM12/19/12
to Luke Crouch, mozilla-engage...@lists.mozilla.org, Gervase Markham
> IMO we should be hammering native apps on this BS, and it's probably time to start moving away from the whole PhoneGap/Appcelerator approach too. Mobile support for HTML5 is starting to catch up to the native API's those libraries give dev's anyway.

I think we're getting there, but we're not there yet. It will be interesting to see if Apple etc get their WebViews together first, or if mobile web browsers will have enough capability rendering WebViews more or less useless for most scenarios.


Best regards,
Robert

Luke Crouch

unread,
Dec 20, 2012, 12:35:43 PM12/20/12
to Robert Nyman, mozilla-engage...@lists.mozilla.org, Gervase Markham
On 12/19/12 2:34 AM, Robert Nyman wrote:
> I think we're getting there, but we're not there yet. It will be interesting to see if Apple etc get their WebViews together first, or if mobile web browsers will have enough capability rendering WebViews more or less useless for most scenarios.
If I could wave a magic wand to control mobile platform vendors, I'd
make them work on their mobile browsers rather than their WebView
components.

I'm probably just building too-simple mobile apps to need all the API's,
but API support isn't even the main problem with WebViews - performance
and distribution/discovery is crap.

-L
0 new messages