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<font face="Calibri">I see localStorage and sessionStorage as a chance
to fix things that weren't so good with cookies. So I'd be interested
to know what factors actively promote the failure to come up with a
common browser-independent interface for localStorage. Do browser
builders actually have something to gain by resisting interoperability
here?<br>
<br>
I'd also be interested to see some actual data on how often people
switch browsers. Much of my own browser-switching experiences have to
do, not with web development, but with online courseware that was
designed to run on a particular browser - and then I follow links on
whatever browser I'm on at the moment, so that the same sites often
turn up on both browsers. I also know nontechnical people who just like
downloading and playing with stuff, including browsers.<br>
<br>
Also, yes, one could use the file system API in place of cookies or
other local storage, but that tends to interrupt the user's flow of
thought, so I'd prefer to avoid such heavy-handedness without having a
good reason.<br>
</font><br>
Tab Atkins Jr. wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:AANLkTikkf8W6Z4ZrysbuKT8nOXQG+fYxLsGGNcK0Cd9J@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">On Tue, Sep 14, 2010 at 4:52 AM, Jim Williams <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:jgwilliams@mindspring.com"><jgwilliams@mindspring.com></a> wrote:
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">I tried out local storage, used it to save the contents of a
content-editable passage. It worked great in Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and
MSIE. Only one problem: Every time I switched browsers, I had to start
over with the original unedited passage. So I have two requests.
1. I would like the browser vendors to all use the same implementation of
localStorage, as this will greatly facilitate browser-independent viewing
experiences. As it stands, I have no idea how to maintain continuity if a
user viewing my page in one browser switches to another browser. None.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap=""><!---->
Like cookies, all browser data will be dependent on the browser.
There's very little chance of this ever changing.
Users rarely switch browsers, in any case. We web developers are a
rare exception.
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">2. Kindly extend the specification so that other applications can make
constructive use of localStorage. Specifically, (a) establish a convention
for associating keys with particular files (e.g., by prepending the file's
path name to the key), and (b) allowing other applications to treat the file
and its associated local storage as a single entity. Doing this would allow
a user to e-mail the current state of a file to a friend, so that both will
have the same view of the file. This ability to share "current" views of a
file is useful for maintaining HTML's role as a communications vehicle.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap=""><!---->
The FileSystem API is designed for this use-case, so you can build a
file in javascript and ask the user to save it to their harddrive.
~TJ
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