Safari has quirks that you cannot experience without using Safari itself, which you still cannot run without a Mac. When you've wasted hours trying to track down one of these issues and realise it's a Safari quirk you'll understand my annoyance.
> It's not Apple's task to package it nicely for you.
I'm not sure where you get this idea from given that it contradicts the article: "Safari Technology Preview is a standalone application that can be used side-by-side with Safari or other web browsers... It’s a great way to test upcoming WebKit features and give feedback to the people building them when it’s most useful." I'm pointing out my opinion that they cannot meaningfully achieve that result without a Windows implementation.
It would be nice if they did release even a developer-focused version of Safari for Windows to help with testing for devs that prefer Windows.
However, this same problem exists outside of just web browsers. I help create native Android apps in Java. I wish every hardware manufacturer created a nice emulator for me to test the specific kinks out on their device. If Google enforced this policy, even better.
But that's not happening.
I guess the question is: should we expect / demand it to happen?
To make software that runs well on an Android device, my best bet is to have that device in my hand, just like having a Mac in hand (or one into which you can remote) is the situation today. It's not great, but it's not isolated to Apple and Safari.
Thankfully both mobile devices and browsers have services online where we can get screenshots of an app or website running on a real device or driver, without us laying out cash to buy them all.
I don't understand your comment. I was responding to the parent stating: "Apple's been taking a number of steps over the last few months to show that they take Safari/WebKit development seriously." I'm annoyed because there are Safari-specific issues that as a Windows user I cannot debug, thus my comment that I cannot take Safari seriously. Like it or not, Windows is the dominant desktop platform.
I think what the parent is getting at, is that you've got the same problem regarding IE on Mac. There are IE specific issues that I as a OS X developer cannot debug.
At least Microsoft offers free VM images for precisely this purpose. Meanwhile, OS X barely works in a VM due to the lack of graphics acceleration (plus, running such a VM on a non-Mac is illegal).
Cross-platform means you have to test on multiple machines. A company that's taking web development seriously also needs Mac, iOS, and Android devices to test on. Or borrow them every now and then, or sometimes virtual machines will work.
(I do often skip testing on Windows and iOS for hobbyist stuff since I don't normally use them, but I don't blame other people for it.)
While it was pretty bad, I remember Safari for Windows rendering text much nicer than any Windows browser (or app) at the time - particularly, the font smoothing. I recall using Win Safari to take "marketing" screenshots of an web app.
As an end user it was pretty bad (with all the libraries they were using). It mainly seemed to exist so Windows only shops could develop/test their websites on iPhones and iPads without having to own that hardware.
As iPhones and iPads became ubiquitous (as well as the popularity of Macs with developers) that didn't seem to be enough reason to keep it going.
I don't think Apple ever intended to win the browser war, I assume it was a means to an end. Maybe I'm wrong and someone was somewhat delusional. As a Mac lover who had a strong PC at the time it was quite pokey to try to use.
Yep Safari for Windows was released at WWDC 2007 (~2 weeks before the iPhone went on sale), and I'm sure part of the rationale was for Windows developers to be able to test their web sites with it.
Also note that Google Chrome wasn't released until September 2008, so there was a year+ where Safari was the most prominent WebKit-based browser on Windows.
Chrome was using WebKit a long time, Blink is a WebKit fork. Both run on Windows.