• @[email protected]OP
      link
      fedilink
      313 months ago

      Why is Swift bad?

      Also, I noticed the project has taken donations from mostly non-foss companies. Let’s hope they stand by their principles

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        15
        edit-2
        3 months ago

        Welp, I haven’t seen anyone learn Swift other than for Apple stuff these days. So I wonder how many can actually contribute to the code. It’s also made by Apple, so yeah. It would have been more performant and secure (both of which are pretty important in a browser) if it was written in a more low level language. For example Rust.

        • Norah - She/They
          link
          fedilink
          English
          12
          edit-2
          2 months ago

          It’s also made by Apple, so yeah.

          It’s also open-source? Like, Microsoft created C# and Typescript. Google created Go. Those get used without people bringing up their origins. Hell, Rust Javascript* was created by a homophobe. What, do you think the license lets Apple close-source everyone’s code if they choose or something?

          Sorry, I’m just really tired of these low-effort comments. The only thing that should matter is the language and if it hits the goals the project needs.

          • kate
            link
            fedilink
            English
            3
            edit-2
            3 months ago

            Rust was created by a homophobe

            javascript, too

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            -1
            edit-2
            3 months ago

            Sure. It is open source, but the development is done by Apple engineers. I also would like to state that Go has trackers in it. I also don’t really care what the creator of a language is. Homophobe, sexist, racist or other similar stuff, I couldn’t care less as long as the language is good.

            • Norah - She/They
              link
              fedilink
              English
              2
              edit-2
              3 months ago

              You couldn’t care, as long as the language is good, but you care when it’s Apple?

              You’re wrong btw. Sure, Apple engineers developed it originally. But it is now in the hands of the open source community, with over 1,000 contributors on github: https://github.com/swiftlang/swift

              Edit: To be clear, unlike something like Chromium, Apple doesn’t even own the repositories anymore. It’s fully independent.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          23 months ago

          “More performant” citation needed. Very well written Rust might be extremely fast, yes, but Rust is also a hard language to get right. Swift is far from a slow language and I would not be surprised if the average rust programmer barely if at all manages to beat out the average swift programmer in terms of speed. As for the amount of programmers interested, hard to tell, but given the sheer amount of Swift devs I’d not be surprised if there were quite a few interested ones and I am unconvinced Rust programmers are statistically more likely to be interested in Browser development.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              -2
              edit-2
              3 months ago

              Benchmarks mean nothing. These aren’t the results of code written by an average programmer. Edit: and as a general note I would also like to point out the relative inconsistency of the results in terms of factor, only further reinforcing my point. I like Rust and all but we do need to admit it doesn’t magically solve all our problems.

              • Evening Newbs
                link
                fedilink
                English
                23 months ago

                Benchmarks mean nothing.

                You’re free to suggest another method of comparing the two languages’ performance. This is the best we’re have, and Rust wins in every single benchmark shown there.

                These aren’t the results of code written by an average programmer.

                Citation needed.

                I like Rust and all but we do need to admit it doesn’t magically solve all our problems.

                I never said it did. I simply pointed out that it’s demonstrably faster than Swift.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          113 months ago

          It is currently written in C++. They are looking to switch to Swift.

          They looked into Rust but decided that GUI work was a pain and that they wanted something more object-oriented.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          53 months ago

          While Rust would probably have been a good choice for implementing a new browser, I don’t think Swift deserves the criticism it’s getting in this thread:

          • Swift was created by the same person who created Rust, and has many of the same nice traits
          • Swift is a modern language that is easy for plenty of developers to pick up; I’d place it in the same family as Rust and Kotlin
          • Swift grants access to a large pool of native iOS/Mac developers
      • TerkErJerbs
        link
        fedilink
        95
        edit-2
        3 months ago

        Shopify (i.e. Shittify) being their top donor already has me looking sideways at this project. They’ll invest in anything they think they can get an edge with and if something starts to happen they’ll fuck it up and wallstreet-ify it as fast as possible if they can.

        Their (Shopify’s) guru founder Tobi made a huge NFT play that went absolutely nowhere while I still worked there. They spent a lot of time and money on it, right before they laid several thousand people off.

          • TerkErJerbs
            link
            fedilink
            163 months ago

            I mean I hope Ladybird devs do a great build and go their own way without being corrupted by their donors and all that, don’t get me wrong. But whenever I see that dumb shopping bag logo I get the no feelings.

            You can also read up on how the vast majority of Mozilla’s funding has been coming from Google for a very long time, and draw your own conclusions from that fact.

            • TerkErJerbs
              link
              fedilink
              83 months ago

              You may have misunderstood. It was Shopify who did the big NFT play on their platform. I don’t know much about the Ladybird team, I’m not trying to throw shade on them.

        • Aatube
          link
          fedilink
          73 months ago

          I agree that it’s not ideal, but hey, it’s open source, and the Louis Rossmann cult is the only other top-tier donor, so I’m sure they’ll be fine.

        • Joël de Bruijn
          link
          fedilink
          43 months ago

          Also I’m very much cautious about them on anything browsing related. Discovered (after others also) they let their search-pages-in-a-shop get indexed.

          Meaning I could go to Caterpillar, search for “Wabtec is better” and then this search url (with 0 products) would turn up in Google searches and that URL persisted. Text and all.

          Basically one could spray-paint and tag sites with this graffiti. Shop admins didn’t even have means to remove it.

          Problem ignored and stayed this way for months.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          33 months ago

          Do you have a source for that? I’m trying to look for donors but don’t really find anything.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              23 months ago

              How could I have missed that, lol. Thanks.

              Anyways, I don’t think it’s too weird. It might even be to simply have their name up there. We’ll have to see.

              • TerkErJerbs
                link
                fedilink
                23 months ago

                I read somewhere awhile back their platinum donors gave a certain tier (10k or 100k or whatever it was). To be clear I’m more than open to being surprised here, I want Ladybird to succeed. I just resent Shopify being involved in any way, I’m a little bit petty after slogging it out at that company awhile because I know what they’re all about.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          113 months ago

          While I agree shopify has a kind of “mierda touch”, I still see it as if it goes sideways with them someone will just fork the code.