Apple’s Safari and WebKit team has asked for feedback on Twitter amid criticisms – “Safari is the worst” – of the browser’s bugs.
Hartley Charlton for MacRumors:
Jen Simmons, an Apple Evangelist and developer advocate on the Web Developer Experience team for Safari and WebKit, Tweeted that “Everyone in my mentions [is] saying Safari is the worst, it’s the new IE.” This led her to ask users for feedback, preferably highlighting specific bugs and instances of missing support that inhibits websites and apps.
Everyone in my mentions saying Safari is the worst, it’s the new IE… Can you point to specific bugs & missing support that frustrate you, inhibit you making websites/apps. Bonus points for links to tickets.
Specifics we can fix. Vague hate is honestly super counterproductive.
— Jen Simmons (@jensimmons) February 8, 2022
Safari has been met with complaints from some users in recent years over the browser’s bugs, user experience, and website compatibility. The problems reached fever pitch last year when Apple unveiled a substantial redesign for Safari at WWDC, which was met with widespread criticism that accused the changes of being “counterintuitive.” After months of tweaking the ambitious redesign in response to feedback, Apple eventually gave up on the changes just before the public release of iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey, reverting to the previous Safari design by default.
Apple has also been criticized for demanding apps that browse the web to use the WebKit framework and WebKit Javascript on iOS and iPadOS, a policy that effectively bans non-WebKit based browsers.
Gosh. Catching up with tech Twitter this morning and there seems to be an angry pocket of men who really want Safari to just go away.
Do we really want to live in a 95% Chromium browser world? That would be a horrible future for the web. We need more voices, not fewer.
— Jen Simmons (@jensimmons) February 7, 2022
MacDailyNews Take: Blaming “an angry pocket of men” seems like a tell.
Here’s some feedback: Competent evangelists don’t hand out PR-disaster headline blurbs — “Safari is the worst, it’s the new IE” — in their public calls for unpaid help in identifying bugs that their team are getting paid to find and fix, purportedly; and, then, go on to blame “an angry pocket of men” because their product is poorly received by some on Twitter.
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I’ve found that Google products don’t always work well on Safari. I suspect they are either sandbagging Safari or putting special sauce into Chrome. When something doesn’t work on Safari I’ve gotten very accustomed to trying again on Chrome… and it usually works. Also, I have an old MacBook Pro (2010) which still works great, but for some reason I’ve been blocked from upgrading beyond Safari 13.1.2. The latest build is Safari 15.2. So my Safari is old, outdated, and insecure. But guess what–I can download the latest build of Chrome.
I began noticing Safari being erratic and memory hogging (even though I have a 32GB memory machine). I do not remember when I start noticing but perhaps since 6 months ago or so? Safari has been somewhat finicky for a long time anyway. So, I was testing the latest Chrome, Firefox & Duck etc., and so far Chrome is most responsive, tool bar is well laid out and display is accurate etc. At the moment, I made Chrome as my default browser. Safari’s difficulties are easy to detect and feel. Perhaps the quality of Aple engineers are going downhill these days, or Apple is just downright lazy, having to solicit feedback from users.
The REAL question is, “When Safari does not perform properly do you in an error ticket into Apples system?” If not, how do you expect Apple to know about and fix anything?
If you really want to get Apple to fix Safari and make it the best browser out there, put in those tickets. Otherwise all you’re doing is whining.
It’s not my job to fix your software.
Amen…
Yes, I am just whining…for now. Now that I am certain that many share the same or similar opinion, this was the good chance for me to look around. I do not feel too guilty about just whining, LOL
“So my Safari is old, outdated, and ‘insecure'”….”But guess what–I can download the latest build of Chrome”.
Unfortunately most of the world lives in this comical ignorance”. Chrome is the least secure browser out there but it makes up for that by being, by a 100 miles, the most tracking of everything you do. Everything the comically ignorant say to this afterwards will not change these facts.
Btw, I actually use Safari exclusively for my personal use on my actual full Apple eco of devices. Somehow I am able to get functionality on the Internet.
“Try again in Chrome” is the new “Reboot and see if that fixes it.”
To be fair, most trolls ARE a bunch of pissed-off men. Pretty sure most women (and most men, for that matter) have better things to do with their lives…
To actually be fair:
Imagine a male Apple evangelist lashing out at “an angry pocket of women” on Twitter.
He’d. Be. Fired. Already.
There’s a bunch of pissed off women too. Why call out a specific gender?
Apple’s hiring standards have really declined in recent years.
An Apple “evangelist” asks for people to do her overpaid teams’ jobs, for free, and then lashes out at “angry men.”
Imagine a male Apple evangelist lashing out at “an angry pocket of women” on Twitter.
He’d. Be. Fired. Already.
Is
JenHen Simmons really the best Apple can do for an “evangelist?”Worry about trolls on Twitter? funny. Lashing out at Angry men? Too funny.
Perhaps she really means “a pocket of angry men”?
Sorry madame but your baby is ugly, and it will grow up to be a very ugly person. You must find it an evangelist to save its eternal soul…
Give us a break cheerleaders.
Siri, Safari and Spell Ck…all things for Apple to work on. Frankly, Siri seems like the most strategic fix, as she/he provides Apple-specific experience. Safari isn’t my primary browser, but I can’t say when I use it I curse–like Siri and Spell Ck. Security is primary…Brave is my browser.
Spell Ck is often inexplicable. Some words are clearly NOT words and there’s no “alert” and some others that are noted as misspelled, there’s no suggestion..even with relatively familiar/common words. The nail in the coffin is then taking the word(s) to Google and they are comprehended and corrected word is presented immediately. The experience isn’t even close.
Yes, Google kicks Apple’s ass in spell check, browsers, voice assistants and light years more reliable in maps. Apple has become big, fat and sloppy…
“Angry pocket of men” is a complete tell. Who would look for gender in comments about what sucks about a web browser? In this case, this jaded women – she just missed “white” in her comment. Seriously, “an angry kitchen of women” would never come into play with her mentality. Ever. If this is her public comments, ack, she’s gotta go.
Riddle me this:
– Do a large percentage of men use Safari?
Yes.
– Do they use it and some of them think it sucks and want it fixed?
Yes.
This isn’t an angry man problem, this is a browser that sucks problem and Apple needs to fix it. Figure out why Chrome is mowing you over and fix Safari.
Evidently it’s easier to blame “angry pockets of men” instead of fixing Safari problems…
Simply spending so much time delineating btwn M & F is lulu.
Another characteristic of our time that’s been pushed along by those calling themselves “progressives,” but digressives is more fitting.
Group A = good. Group B = bad. (I’m obviously in Group A says he/her)
Safari works great for me…
I think this woman is missing the point entirely. The people complaining are most likely the biggest fans of Safari and want it to succeed. I for one damn well don’t want to live in a Chrome world but unless Safari finds a way to deal with the tremendous growth of Chrome, we will.
“Angry pocket of men.” Wow. That tells you so much about Apple culture.
Psssst… Try the Brave browser.
You know brave uses chromium, right?
It doesn’t matter if chrome takes over, or if chromium does… google still effectively controls the web “standards”
Yeah, but without Google looking over your shoulder.
I once surfed the web on Atari
It was no good, unlike my Safari
Once you surf on a Mac
You will never to back
To eating Chrome/Edge calamari
I first heard the phrase “Safari is the new IE” from a woman. Web designers know it.
I have installed a second browser for the first time since 2003. I think they really need to listen.
Google Chrome is the new IE6 and is slowly destroying the open and compatible World Wide Web.
Here is a good read on this touchy subject https://drewdevault.com/2020/03/18/Reckless-limitless-scope.html
Safari on my iPad Pro 10.5 is always freezing and locking up. Drives me nuts. Switch to Chrome and the same sites work fine.
It’s simple- Safari won’t open Webpages but Firefox and Chrome will every time! Bottom line Safari is an annoying POS.
Safari is indeed the IE of the present day. Safari is a memory hog. It offers poor user options and very few extensions, which make Firefox substantially better.
Chrome sucks too. Some web browser developers (namely Chrome and all the re-hashed versions of it) believe that the ad industry (Google, Facebook, et al) are the customers. They would contend that the users of these browsers, who expect the tool they use to be free, are the product to be datamined by unscrupulous Big Tech companies. As Apple becomes increasingly bloated and complacent, it’s inevitable that some users will stray into Google’s net. That’s sad.
If Apple had the ability to develop superior software and guarantee privacy and security, AND MAINTAIN THE SOFTWARE OVER TIME, then Apple could have another profit center. Smart people are happy to pay for reliable top performing products. It is ironic that Apple forgot that on the software front. Apple gives away its freebieware because right now, that’s about how much it’s worth.