Jim Lawrence
accessd at shaw.ca
Mon Feb 18 11:31:04 CST 2013
Hi Guys: I was reading the following article a few days ago and it was posted as a objective view to webkit. It may be an appropriate time to post it here: http://robertnyman.com/2013/02/14/webkit-an-objective-view/ As discussed in the article, Webkit is far from stable or standardized and it might as easily fork one direction or the other at any time. The interesting thing to note is that no one owns webkit. In fact it is a completely Open Source project in which many companies and individuals contribute. Aside: It can be noted that Microsoft has contributed resources, at least in the past and some programmers who either work or have worked for MS are working on the project now. OSS is the driving force of the computer industries' creative advancement and proprietary software companies' resources keep OSS flourishing. IMHO it is all part of the over-all uneasy alliance between the world proprietary software and OSS world. One can not grow without the other. Jim -----Original Message----- From: dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com [mailto:dba-tech-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Salakhetdinov Shamil Sent: Monday, February 18, 2013 12:17 AM To: Discussion of Hardware and Software issues Subject: Re: [dba-Tech] FYI: Moving to "nirvana": if Microsoft were to shift to WebKit, you can thank Opera. Hi Hans -- Thank you for your notes. Does cURL or any other "automation" tools are able to handle web pages, which mainly use AJAX not web forms POSTs? <<< But, even so, I find the concept that such a small subset of users should be able to hold back the progress of technology, especially in an area where interoperability and standards are important. >>> What (tools/technologies) are currently holding back and is it good or bad to have WebKit "monoculture" - opinions differ: "The Pros And Cons Of A WebKit Monoculture" ( http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/17/the-pros-and-cons-of-a-webkit-monoculture/ ) <<< ... then they should just fork IE into two versions: IE and IE Classic and let the dinosaurs continue using the old version... >>>> They could be busy doing that currently. BTW, have you even seen the sources of any large C/C++ COM projects? - from what I have seen/handled such projects are very tightly coupled with COM interfaces and other COM "technology artifacts and tricks" - so the process of decoupling could take quite some time, but MS engineers could definitely do that... <<< After all, it seems MS is already killing extensions like ActiveX in IE 10 ( http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ie/hh920753 (v=vs.85).aspx). >>> Yes, I see - that's done AFAIU to better conform to HTML5 standards. But IE Web Browser Automation is currently an integral part of IE components, not an extension. Thank you. -- Shamil Воскресенье, 17 февраля 2013, 13:22 -08:00 от Hans-Christian Andersen <hans.andersen at phulse.com>: >Hi Shamil, > >I am not the least bit concerned about testing suites like Selenium. They have to maintain their own web driver for multiple browsers anyhow, so there is no reason they can't port their web driver from Chrome/Safari across, since they are also WebKit browsers. > >It seems you are also suggesting that some businesses outside automated test suites have been using this feature for scraping and what not. My first impression is that this was a bad decision. There are far better tools for doing said job (ie. curl) which are just as simple to use. But, even so, I find the concept that such a small subset of users should be able to hold back the progress of technology, especially in an area where interoperability and standards are important. And I can't imagine that Microsoft should care. If they really can't provide a compatibility layer, then they should just fork IE into two versions: IE and IE Classic and let the dinosaurs continue using the old version. After all, it seems MS is already killing extensions like ActiveX in IE 10 ( http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ie/hh920753 (v=vs.85).aspx). > >Smart move. Now they just need to upgrade to WebKit. > >- Hans > > >On 2013-02-14, at 3:26 AM, Salakhetdinov Shamil < mcp2004 at mail.ru > wrote: > >> Hi Hans -- >> >> <<< >> This is interesting. Could you possibly provide a few examples of where it is used in a manner that is important in some way? >>>>> >> To Automate web applications testing: http://watin.org/documentation/ ( http://www.screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cXeloE2gh ) >> >> To Automate repetitive tasks when web browsing is a part of a larger desktop application, e.g. >> >> " Efficient data entry through browser automation" >> >> http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/338036/BrowserAutomationCrawler >> >> " Microsoft Web Browser Automation using C#" >> >> http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/5452/Microsoft-Web-Browser-Automation-us ing-C >> >> The above is just a generic example - for that case Google API can be used of course but there could be many other cases when there is no any web API and (as I noted above) web browsing functionality is a part of a larger desktop application. >> >> In the past (no web services/no web APIs) Microsoft Web Browser Automation was used in (VB6/VBA) apps for web crawling/scraping.... >> >> To see more examples browse: http://www.codeproject.com/search.aspx?q=web+browser+automation&x=0&y=0&sbo= kw&pgnum=5 >> >> or google by "microsoft web browser automation". >> >> -- Shamil >> >> P.S. I guess Microsoft Web Browser Automation is also used in Selenium ( http://docs.seleniumhq.org/docs/index.jsp ) for IE testing automation... >> >> Четверг, 14 февраля 2013, 1:36 -08:00 от Hans-Christian Andersen < hans.andersen at phulse.com >: >>> >>>> AFAIK Web Browser Automation is widely used. >>> >>> This is interesting. Could you possibly provide a few examples of where it is used in a manner that is important in some way? >>> >>> - Hans >>> > _______________________________________________ dba-Tech mailing list dba-Tech at databaseadvisors.com http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/dba-tech Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com