[riho]

Perhaps a controversial take, but I would be happy to see alerts removed altogether. I'm sure someone can point to a few legitimate uses of them, but in the grand scheme of things, they're usually terrible for user experience, as they block everything else (which is the point). This is also often used as a way to scam less computer literate people with "microsort security" alerts, that keep getting reopened when closed.

I get that there are lots of JS tutorials out there that use it as a way to show simple interactions, but that's a very weak argument for keeping an API that is potentially harmful.

[phpnode]

You're underestimating the level of breakage here, it's not just a few tutorial sites it's tens of millions of websites, many unmaintained. Like them or not alert(), confirm() and prompt() are key pieces of functionality depended on for literally decades now. I'm trying to imagine the economic cost of this change and it's just enormous.

[riho]

I understand that. But that was the case with popups as well. Remember when we needed popup blockers? Straight up removing the functionality is of course a drastic measure, so realistically I could see something like what we did with popups, where the browser first asks you if you'd like to allow alerts on the page, and only allow them to be shown if the user explicitly chooses so.

[pineconewarrior]

This is the fix. Deprecate alerts gracefully in favor of the native dialogue element!

[pjmlp]

I still see them everywhere.

[user5994461]

It's only blocking when inside an iframe.

There may be millions of sites using these functions legitimately, but not inside an iframe.

[asddubs]

it's not like you couldn't do the exact same microsort security alerts with a position:absolute overlay. Google can just make the alert window explicitly stay within the viewport instead of breaking the internet.

[shikoba]

Correct problem. Incorrect solution. Like always.

[remus]

When there are billions of users and millions of websites I think it's very rare that you'll have 'correct' solutions, just different trade offs.

[hulitu]

I do not see any added value for alerts. They only interfere with normal work. "Site wants to send you alerts". No thanks. They have most of the issues behind a paywall so they just want to serve more ads. If I need something, i will look for it. The newspaper sites are the worst offenders. No i do not need propaganda alerts.

[asddubs]

I think you're thinking of push notifications