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UC Browser is now holding the web back by not adopting new standards like css-grid and flexbox. No version of UC supports these standards and with the rise of U

UC Browser is now holding the web back by not adopting new standards like css-grid and flexbox. No version of UC supports these standards and with the rise of UC globally, developers are hesitant to use these standards as millions of users especially in India and China are left out. I know there are ways to configure fallback, but still.

aceofspad3s 9y ago
Good thing about this is that those users are poor so most developers are free to ignore them.
- Feniks 9y ago
  Funny how people said that about China in the 70s. Those who are last will later be first.
EKLM-ZK88 9y ago
Why do these markets use these browsers and not chrome or firefox, or even the built in browsers on their phones?
- taobility 9y ago
  The question is like why those users do not use iPhone or Samsung Galaxy 7
  - saagarjha 9y ago
    You’re being disingenuous: people don’t use iPhones or Galaxies because they’re expensive. Browsers are free and it doesn’t cost money to change them.
    - cwyers 9y ago
      And the people who author mobile Chrome all use iPhones or Galaxies or Pixels. It's about the dogfooding -- the people who write UC Browser use it on the same phones, mobile networks and websites that the users of UC Browser use, so it's written with their needs in mind.
      - EKLM-ZK88 9y ago
        I guess that's what i dont understand, what are the needs of the people in this market and what about chrome or firefox fails to meet that need? It doesn't have flexbox support, and i would imagine that would break a ton of modern websites. It isn't like these markets have their own version of html/css, everyone's on the same web, so why go for a browser with worse support for modern standards?
        lurenjia 9y ago
        Users don't know/care about flexbox at all. It's developers concern. Also UC has much more features and builtin contents than chrome. Maybe UC can provide better user experience to new internet users that think typing urls on phones to see news and videos weird. Not everyone likes minimalism.
        addicted 9y ago
        Your last sentence is very important. At least Chinese markets (and possibly Indian and others as well)do not seem to have the disdain for feature loading American markets do. Weibo is one of the most popular apps in the markwt (if not most) and it’s practically an operating system of its own. I suspect it would have gotten nowhere in US markets because people would have complained about it being not focused and having a bad UI.
      - saagarjha 9y ago
        Which is a roundabout way of saying mobile Chrome doesn’t work well on lower end devices, which is why many users switch to it. This is the reason why I (and a distant parent, I’d assume) was looking for.
  - pmontra 9y ago
    One less zero in the price tag looks like a pretty good reason. The article is explicitly about low end phones.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- addicted 9y ago
  They mention why in the article. Data compression in markets where data is slow and expensive. As well as a small storage footprint leading to more space on their phones for other stuff (which possibly also means a lower memory footprint so it may work better as well).
- abhishek0318 9y ago
  Chrome and Firefox consume more memory. UC browser is faster. It can act as replacement of sports, news and Facebook app.
dictum 9y ago
As soon as I read the headline on the frontpage, I came here to search for a mention of flexbox. It's the only non-deprecated browser that only supports the first draft of the flexbox spec. There's no workaround for the lack of flex-wrap — you have to assume it's a small mobile device and arrange items on a single axis.
- superkuh 9y ago
  >you have to assume it's a small mobile device and arrange items on a single axis. Is there really no other way to detect if it's desktop? It seems like screen aspect ratio would be easy. Mobile sites look terrible on desktop browsers if they work at all. The one I encounter all the time is Firefox's add-on site. Just because I don't have css-grid it forces mobile which makes things worse. I know people like myself are a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of users but we exist.
andrewmcwatters 9y ago
Sounds more to me like other mobile browsers are holding the web back by not paying more attention to the needs of the many. Users don't care about standards, just that things work.
- jeremiep 9y ago
  And how are things ever going to work without standards? Standards aren't meant for end-users, they're meant for the engineers building the freaking software end-users are using. Imagine every electrical device in your home having its own distinct power cable. Every device requiring a different voltage (110V is a standard, who needs that?) and plug type. You'd be spending a lot more (as the end user) in converters and adapters and whatnot; the only end result is that you pay much more for much less.
  - andrewmcwatters 9y ago
    What standards? WHATWG publishes a living document, that's not a standard. Wake up, vendors control the web. If you wanted to make a competing browser today, you'd be utterly fucked because you'd never be able to implement the entire catalog of web features that exist today, and those feature sets change too rapidly. There are no web standards. There are browsers and people who use them and developers who target those browsers.
    - jeremiep 9y ago
      So you're saying we should drop whatever unification WHATWG brings and leave everyone to do their own thing? That's certainly going to end well. Saying "wake up" is a very dangerous statement; usually hints at ignorance more than anything else. Who do you think sits on the board of WHATWG? Its the very people building web browsers. There's a reason making web apps doesn't suck nearly as much in 2018 as it did years ago, mostly because APIs are starting to be consistent across browsers. Thats standards for you, even living ones. (Its a living standard, not a living document, by the way.) I'm very curious as to how you'll make a website that works in all browsers if they're all free to implement radically different interfaces to HTML/CSS/JS. Don't even think about web apps, or having 3D stuff. Lets all go back to using glue libraries like jQuery like its 2010 again. That sounds fun.

aceofspad3s 9y ago

Good thing about this is that those users are poor so most developers are free to ignore them.

Feniks 9y ago
Funny how people said that about China in the 70s. Those who are last will later be first.

EKLM-ZK88 9y ago

Why do these markets use these browsers and not chrome or firefox, or even the built in browsers on their phones?

taobility 9y ago
The question is like why those users do not use iPhone or Samsung Galaxy 7
- saagarjha 9y ago
  You’re being disingenuous: people don’t use iPhones or Galaxies because they’re expensive. Browsers are free and it doesn’t cost money to change them.
  - cwyers 9y ago
    And the people who author mobile Chrome all use iPhones or Galaxies or Pixels. It's about the dogfooding -- the people who write UC Browser use it on the same phones, mobile networks and websites that the users of UC Browser use, so it's written with their needs in mind.
    - EKLM-ZK88 9y ago
      I guess that's what i dont understand, what are the needs of the people in this market and what about chrome or firefox fails to meet that need? It doesn't have flexbox support, and i would imagine that would break a ton of modern websites. It isn't like these markets have their own version of html/css, everyone's on the same web, so why go for a browser with worse support for modern standards?
      - lurenjia 9y ago
        Users don't know/care about flexbox at all. It's developers concern. Also UC has much more features and builtin contents than chrome. Maybe UC can provide better user experience to new internet users that think typing urls on phones to see news and videos weird. Not everyone likes minimalism.
        addicted 9y ago
        Your last sentence is very important. At least Chinese markets (and possibly Indian and others as well)do not seem to have the disdain for feature loading American markets do. Weibo is one of the most popular apps in the markwt (if not most) and it’s practically an operating system of its own. I suspect it would have gotten nowhere in US markets because people would have complained about it being not focused and having a bad UI.
    - saagarjha 9y ago
      Which is a roundabout way of saying mobile Chrome doesn’t work well on lower end devices, which is why many users switch to it. This is the reason why I (and a distant parent, I’d assume) was looking for.
- pmontra 9y ago
  One less zero in the price tag looks like a pretty good reason. The article is explicitly about low end phones.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
addicted 9y ago
They mention why in the article. Data compression in markets where data is slow and expensive. As well as a small storage footprint leading to more space on their phones for other stuff (which possibly also means a lower memory footprint so it may work better as well).
abhishek0318 9y ago
Chrome and Firefox consume more memory. UC browser is faster. It can act as replacement of sports, news and Facebook app.

dictum 9y ago

As soon as I read the headline on the frontpage, I came here to search for a mention of flexbox. It's the only non-deprecated browser that only supports the first draft of the flexbox spec. There's no workaround for the lack of flex-wrap — you have to assume it's a small mobile device and arrange items on a single axis.

superkuh 9y ago
>you have to assume it's a small mobile device and arrange items on a single axis. Is there really no other way to detect if it's desktop? It seems like screen aspect ratio would be easy. Mobile sites look terrible on desktop browsers if they work at all. The one I encounter all the time is Firefox's add-on site. Just because I don't have css-grid it forces mobile which makes things worse. I know people like myself are a tiny fraction of a tiny fraction of users but we exist.

andrewmcwatters 9y ago

Sounds more to me like other mobile browsers are holding the web back by not paying more attention to the needs of the many. Users don't care about standards, just that things work.

jeremiep 9y ago
And how are things ever going to work without standards? Standards aren't meant for end-users, they're meant for the engineers building the freaking software end-users are using. Imagine every electrical device in your home having its own distinct power cable. Every device requiring a different voltage (110V is a standard, who needs that?) and plug type. You'd be spending a lot more (as the end user) in converters and adapters and whatnot; the only end result is that you pay much more for much less.
- andrewmcwatters 9y ago
  What standards? WHATWG publishes a living document, that's not a standard. Wake up, vendors control the web. If you wanted to make a competing browser today, you'd be utterly fucked because you'd never be able to implement the entire catalog of web features that exist today, and those feature sets change too rapidly. There are no web standards. There are browsers and people who use them and developers who target those browsers.
  - jeremiep 9y ago
    So you're saying we should drop whatever unification WHATWG brings and leave everyone to do their own thing? That's certainly going to end well. Saying "wake up" is a very dangerous statement; usually hints at ignorance more than anything else. Who do you think sits on the board of WHATWG? Its the very people building web browsers. There's a reason making web apps doesn't suck nearly as much in 2018 as it did years ago, mostly because APIs are starting to be consistent across browsers. Thats standards for you, even living ones. (Its a living standard, not a living document, by the way.) I'm very curious as to how you'll make a website that works in all browsers if they're all free to implement radically different interfaces to HTML/CSS/JS. Don't even think about web apps, or having 3D stuff. Lets all go back to using glue libraries like jQuery like its 2010 again. That sounds fun.