Re: A successor to framesets

>From my first post:

> Despite the flaws (mostly not being content-first), at least servers
> were emitting reasonably simple HTML including real hyperlinks and
> forms.

In the video (about 6:35) there is a comparison of documentation-sets
implemented with framesets and with AngularJS.

The video also looks "under the hood" (at about 8:20) and shows how
frameset sites are implemented as several HTML-pages stuck together.
The consequence of this is that the separate pages are viewable
without the frameset, and even usable (after a fashion) without the
frameset.

"Under the hood", the Angular documentation defines the
table-of-contents in Javascript (not viewable in the browser, no
clickable links) and the content in "partial HTML" files which don't
even have valid links. It is barely doing anything more than framesets
but it has no fallback if *JS fails*.

Many people say it isn't fair to ask what if JS fails. In the video
(starting at about 3:55) I go through several failure conditions
(focussing on AngularJS, but *all* JS frameworks are susceptible):
- AngularJS isn't supporting older browsers, e.g. IE8
- It does support IE9, but (on their doc site) the site-specific code
threw because it assumed `window.console` would be defined.
- It does support Chrome but relied on a different server of JS
libraries and the other server was blocked

Naturally, HyperFrameset framework would also be susceptible to these
failure modes. And if (in fantasy-land) some browsers implemented a
successor to framesets then you would still want usable web-sites in
other browsers.

But the pages that make up frameset sites are usually pretty close.
Framesets compelled sites to look something like a WebAPI with HTML
content-type. That should be the goal of a successor to framesets -
sites that are simple but fully-functional without JS and delegate
completely the UI to the client.

> It's about URLs and semantic HTML and servers emitting simpler markup.

regards,
Sean


On Fri, Apr 3, 2015 at 3:25 AM, Andrea Rendine
<master.skywalker.88@gmail.com> wrote:
> I can't answer for Eihab Ibrahim, but I guess that a message with that
> subject line would have received the very same greeting in any period of the
> year.
> However, I don't really understand the point of this message.
> So, HF is a Javascript framework allowing authors to declare part of the
> page content itself and let the script embedd the remaining parts in the
> page. Moreover, it allows to "partially navigate" the page.
> This is wonderful indeed, lightweightedness of scripts should be evaluated
> but it looks like a good thing also for search engines.
> But... why proposing it here?
>
> 2015-04-02 7:44 GMT+02:00 Sean Hogan <shogun70@gmail.com>:
>>
>> Hi Eihab,
>>
>> Are you saying that if I had posted this on, say, the 2nd April then
>> you would have given it proper consideration instead of just
>> responding to the Subject: line?
>>
>> regards,
>> Sean
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Apr 1, 2015 at 6:53 PM, Eihab Ibrahim <eihabibrahim@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> > Hi Sean,
>> >
>> > It's a bit too early in the US for April fools' jokes, and I do not
>> > think this is an appropriate platform for it.
>> >
>> > Respectfully,
>> >
>> > Eihab
>> >
>> > On Mar 31, 2015, at 10:56 PM, Sean Hogan <shogun70@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > HTML framesets were the original single-page-application.
>> >
>> > Despite the flaws (mostly not being content-first), at least servers
>> > were emitting reasonably simple HTML including real hyperlinks and
>> > forms.
>> >
>> > What would framesets be like if we designed them today?
>> >
>> > In the linked video I make the case for a successor to framesets.
>> > It is 25 minutes but that is unavoidable.
>> >
>> >    https://youtu.be/qVdAc8_ppao
>> >
>> > The first half illustrates *why* this is important / better than
>> > alternatives,
>> > with actual demonstrations (which you should try for yourself to
>> > ensure I'm not cheating).
>> >
>> > The second half provides some insight into how I've approached this,
>> > again with demonstrations.
>> >
>> > I'll continue later with details of the differences / enhancements
>> > required to make the frameset concept live up to today's expectations.
>> >
>> > regards,
>> > Sean
>> >
>> >
>>
>

Received on Thursday, 2 April 2015 20:48:24 UTC