Forget Rendering Engines, Browsers Need To Focus on Features and Usability!

Another 6 months have passed, and we are seeing another round of the the same old stories -- e.g. "Our Browser Renders Web Pages With a .0001ms Increase and it is the Best Browser!".  Some examples are last week's announcement from the Konqueror team that discussed how the webkit rendering engine (the same engine used by Chrome and Safari) will give it a speed boost past Firefox, and Mozilla's announcement this week about how Firefox 4 will be one generation ahead of other browsers, in terms of Javascript rendering speed.

Don't get me wrong, this type of innovation is great, and rendering speeds for pages should continue to improve (especially as pages are becoming more and more encumbered with javascript -- ahem -- I mean more featured filled).  But, how much of this really matters to end users?  All web users (except the Slowskys) want pages to load at near instant speed, but is chopping off a few milliseconds on Javascript rendering enough to convince the average user to switch (or switch back) to a particular browser?  My guess is no.

Looking forward the next few years, the real differentiator for browsers will be feature set.  By this I mean, two things:  1) Creating a superior GUI environment for browsing the web, and 2) Providing developers an extensible platform that will spark another round of innovation for browser-based apps (note that I don't use the term extension).  Chrome has shown that creating a more snazzy UI, will pull users from their current browser of choice, and as cloud services become more prevalent in daily computing, browsers will be the platform for new apps.

For the most part, Mozilla, Google, and everyone else understands this, but it really begs the question:  Do multiple rendering engines for browsers make sense anymore?  Again, I say no.

If browsers standardized on one rendering engine, engineers could pour their innovations into one experience that is fast and renders exactly the same on all screens.  Web developers can save time and money by forgoing testing on multiple browsers, and users win by not having to see antiquated "My awesome website only works in IE6, LOL!" messages.  It also forces browsers to compete on what really matters to users, a rich and innovative experience on the web.

Posted: Aug 18, 2010