On Sep 27, 2009, at 12:23 PM, Boris Zbarsky wrote:
On 9/27/09 3:30 AM, Brendan Eich wrote:
I believe we could get rid of custom deleters from the Web
platform if
Firefox and IE remove support for custom deleters in LocalStorage,
refuse to add it back, and refuse to implement it for
DOMStringMap. If
that happened, I'm sure other browsers and the spec would follow
suit.
I don't think I can convince my colleagues to remove the behavior
from
WebKit if Gecko and Trident continue to support it.
I'll see what the relevant Mozilla WebAPI hackers think, if they're
not
reading this thread. At this point I suspect it is "too late", in the
sense that we'd be taking risks with plaform compatibility we don't
accept in our release version/compatibility plan.
Well, that depends on what we mean by "remove". Probably not
removable in Gecko 1.9.1.x security updates. Probably removable (in
my opinion) in Gecko 1.9.3. Possibly in Gecko 1.9.2 if the decision
is made soon.
What I don't have is data on how much the syntax is used, or how
likely Trident is to remove it too. If we remove it and Trident
doesn't and that means Webkit keeps shipping it and the spec doesn't
change as a result (which sounds to me like what Maciej is saying
will be the outcome in this situation; the spec part is my guess
based on the .tags experience) then from our point of view it's just
wasted effort and web developers being pissed off at us for not
implementing The Spec (without understanding that it's an early
draft) and then we'd end up just having to put deleters back in but
lose a bunch of goodwill. That's a strictly losing proposition for
us.
If Webkit commits to removing if we remove and the editor commits to
removing from the spec in that circumstance, then I think we could
make the removal stick no matter what Trident does...
I could probably go along with that plan, if we are really motivated
to do this. It would be good to have Microsoft's input as well. I
would also find data about use of this syntax useful, if anyone has any.
P.S. I _am_ ccing es-discuss on this as on my other mails, but of
course that list bounces all mail from me, since I'm not a member.
If someone cares about letting that list's membership know that
they're missing part of the discussion and is able to do so, please
go for it.
Regards,
Maciej
