|
|
|
|
|
by 0points
569 days ago
|
|
I am not sure about your level of computer literacy, so sorry in advance if I give a a overly detailed response. Certainly a website is allowed to process files you upload to it and the javascript are allowed to XMLHttpRequest in that sandbox. This is outside the control of the user. While had it been an app running locally, I could restrict network access or other resources. Of course the web developer can chose to process the file client side only, but generally when you upload a file to a website, it gets uploaded and processed by their servers. Surely you can verify this yourself while using the website, but I am confident that most users of a website wouldn't do that and be none the wiser how their data is being processed. TLDR: I don't believe the average web user is capable of distinguishing a webapp that works in offline-only mode from a ordinary website. |
|
In technical discussions, this is what I call "The Move". It comes from a desire to position the person making The Move as more knowledgeable and experienced and therefore correct and the other person as relatively new, inexperienced, lacking in wisdom, and naive. It's extremely sophomoric and perversely favored by those who lack the attributes they're trying to project. Don't do it.
I know how browsers and web apps work. I'm a former Mozillian, and among other things, I wrote, edited, and maintained the JS docs on developer.mozilla.org.
Even aside from The Move, nothing else that you wrote out here is especially relevant. The central observation I made is that users have more reason to be circumspect of non-browser based programs that they download and run than they do of browser-based programs because any nefarious thing a browser-based app can do, a native executable can do, too—or worse.
Anyone who has a gut feeling to the contrary is doing exactly that: operating on vibes and intuition and trying to reason with their gut instead of using actual reason to do what is ultimately a straightforward calculation.
(And the thing is, you and everyone else in your camp already knows the truths I've written out here. If you disagree, then we'll set aside one day a year that we'll call Native App Day. For Native App Day, browsers will refuse to execute browser-based apps. Instead everyone who publishes a web app will agree to publish programs packaged in the native executable format for Mac, Windows, and Linux, and everyone who typically uses the web app will run these executables with the same alacrity they apply when they undertake to use the web app. This will be strictly enforced, and there will be no cheating by folks who just refuse to use the computer on Native App Day.)