What feature would improve the web?

Yehuda Katz and I recently asked this question on Twitter.

What is the one browser bug you could fix or feature you could add to significantly improve what you could build on the web?
— wycats (@wycats) October 4, 2011

We’re very interested in seeing web browsers advance and implement the interests of web developers.

We got a great response (230+ responses). After a triage of the responses, we narrowed down things to a hitlist that jumped out as having no immediate solution and would be great for the platform:

flash capturing keyboard events, cursor
WYSIWYG form element
inset text shadow
css blend modes
- usecase: image i want to tint on hover
Why CORS requires a preflight with cookies disabled
being able to verify the content sent was the content delivered. Probably via headers & apis useful when deploying for mobile/roaming use or in corporate networks when behind proxies.
Text Flow or caret(Position/Range)FromPoint
A unified and publicized set of selectors for styling the shadow dom of input/select/etc. elements
a way to manipulate asset request urls with js on the client before they go out (for serving responsive imgs, etc).
- or media query attributes on image tags
UIKit for Javascript.
- Native UI bindings to JS that remove overhead and layers of HTML+DOM in the way. Sony’s Trilithium did this by binding HW accelerated scene graph, ala Core Animation. see also playstation webapp
render a DOM element to canvas, webgl
DirectWrite in all browsers on all platforms.
simulate keyboard and CLICK events
a base tag for CSS
Filesystem API limitation: IDE cant save files back to disk in original location
XHR2
fragment.innerHTML

There are a lot more where that came from. A few people wanted to see all the responses… So.. here you are. :)

~~Right now they are partially categorized. I’d love your help with that..~~Thank you SO much to rworth and evan, who organized this list. Awesome :)

Broad and Sweeping

a fundamental rethinking of the DOM would be a good start. ~blrandel
Get rid of HTML. Make web JavaScript/CSS driven. ~nextinterfaces
the standards process ~sethladd
Browsers suck. Give us a VM that lets us not care about the browser. ~rxgx
the “feature” that allows browsers to render bad/poorly formed HTML. I want that fixed please. ~durple
In a perfect world I’d say ditch the DOM and give me a real displaylist-style interface, with a consistent composite architecture. ~awebneck
consistent implementation of standards across browsers. ~BrettBearce
performance ~mislav
Should be ilegal to release a browser that doesn’t accomplish all the w3c standards ~FedePaterno
web page cloud pre render. Then pipe one asset to the browser. :-) ~halfcube
create something that makes ads suck less and do not blocking my page ~jaydson

Just Everything, all of it, and then some

all HTML5 features supported by all browsers. ~chrisreister
full html5/css3 support cross browser and signed off specs! #inaperfectworld ~Japhex
Better support for html5 and css3 (all browsers and platforms) = less hacks, less vendor prefixes, less js = happier life :) ~rodrigonoales

IE & Mixed Browser Support

Can I say “IE”? Or is that joke too overdone already? ~coreyschram
as usual, IE is holding everything up. I’d like wide support for SVG today. ~nathan_vaughn
other browsers to keep up the speed of Chrome’s implementation of standards and to auto-update to latest version ~illyriad
force update IE. ~Fallion
An alternative to animated gifs (apng)! FOR GOD’S SAKE!! ~TechBobOmb
fast upgrade cycle for IE comparable to Chrome’s excellent model, and the dropping of compatibility modes going forwards ~ffub
Add support for data:image/png;base64, … to IE6/7. ~ndorfin
sorry, release schedule != update strategy; the latter is what I meant to say. Resubmitting… ~jswartwood
IE’s update strategy. Most important feature to add to the Web is an ability to use feature X in reasonable time. ~jswartwood
how many people answered with IE? ~omarqureshi
Legacy Internet Explorers. Patch them all to autoupdate to IE9+ or a third party engine. ~joegaffey
i’d fix the ‘Microsoft having a browser’ bug ~shanecarmody
oh yeah ie7,8,9 ~negrond
ie6 ~negrond
Advanced CSS3 selectors in IE7 and 8. If I had to choose one it would be nth-child. ~Chris_Krammer
if I had the chance to fix one it would be to get rid of IE. :) ~markbates
IE ~samullen
One browser bug? It’s the one people refer to as “Internet Explorer.” It’s a notorious bug. Evil bug. ~rerouse
the IE self destruct button! ~jeremywoertink
the complete removal of ie 6 and upgrade of everybody to modern browsers ~Mark_Kellett
IE6-8 ~manufaktor
am I allowed to classify everything < IE 10 as a bug? ~chrisdarroch
Can the bug be ie? ~bbommarito
legacy browsers! And all browsers which don’t auto update ~stefanpenner
And of course a forceful auto-update of all IE installations to version 9 :) ~craigpatik
frequent & transparent update for all browsers like Chrome, more coherence on supported features across browsers ~xeppelin
the one browser bug would be to eliminate all versions of IE. ~stash_tray
Internet Explorer. ‘nuff said. ~aviraldg
Auto upgrade for every browser. ~ojohnnyo
regular silent automatic delta updates. ~simbolo
Bug fix: Android browser. ~kylebarrow
automatic Chrome-like updates (along with actual updates) for IE…? #nevergonnahappen ~alexrussell101
Does killing all IE below 8 count? ;) ~ryanolson
I’d add a feature to Chrome that “accidentally” detects IE as a virus and deletes it from the user’s machine. ~wmbenedetto
chrome! ~JomGapuz
That’s easy … it’s called Internet Explorer #abug ~trymbill
An easier way to communicate with databases? and microsoft deprecate IE6 & 7. ~Tsouloftas
Internet Explorer retroactively updating itself ~MyHeroDevon
automatic updates for all browsers (ie like chrome). rate of innovation would skyrocket ~smartalec43
a browser on Android that auto-updates ~boblet
Browser bug to fix? I’d say, make every browser with out-of-date rendering instantly bitch-slap the user until they upgrade. ~J6M8
to that end, mobile web browsers have terrible documentation on what features they support/don’t support. ~bcardarella
Silent auto updates for IE. If only there were a way to cut that half life… #webdeveloperheaven ~josiahsprague
I suppose IE is the main reason For not improving my websites. ~gerherz
Desktop, the bug I’d like fixed is “IE” ~ljharb
Crossbrowsing for christ sick! I wish I can see one day all browsers rendering the sites in the exactly same way once for all! ~FedePaterno
I would fix IE6 so it would automatically crash itself as soon as anyone decided to open it. ~adamholwerda
Can Internet Explorer be considered a bug or feature I’d like to improve… aka eliminate? ~JtheBruce
Android is woefully behind desktop Chrome. ~andybastable
“the one browser bug” = Android. ~danmux
Decent HW rendering in Android please ~danmux

Authentication / Identity / Crypto

identity. I hate having to create a username and password. ~sethladd
Integrated browser authentication. When’s the last time you logged in to a native app? ~madeofcode
Identity, in a way that’s comprehensible and controllable by the user. ~johnjoseph
And w3.org/2011/identity-… will be a great advance too ~cbullokles
I wish I didn’t have to handle identity and SSL. Let my users sign in with existing credentials, and an assurance of encryption. ~abackstrom
a full crypto & authentication stack ~jarrednicholls
Add SSL over HTTP (instead of HTTP over SSL) to handle Certificate-based authentication in the application instead of the web server ~genezys
secure storage for things like OAuth keys (no more proxies needed) ~manuel

Browser Testing

A better way to test across browsers and browser versions. ~jacelevine

Development tools

Better memory debugging tools. Like YourKit for JavaScript ~sethladd
i’d say a built-in vim-style code editor w/ git hooks. maybe… ~csanz
saving changes (js,html,css) made thru google chrome dev tool/firebug directly back into the codebase would be cool. ~4mo1
an ssh client integrated into google chrome ~travisglines
ability to debug CoffeeScript in the browser would have high impact (ideally with IDE/editor integration during debugging) ~ltackmann
Merge firebug’s realtime CSS editor with chrome developer tools ~danielcgold
combine the IDE and the browser. ~jwaltonmedia
Summary of my position — improved native development experience over features that I haven’t imagined yet :) ~justinfrench
I’ve been making use of the 3D CSS3 box model inspector in Dev Tools for a heavy interactive site. Godsend. Thank you dude ~joecritchley
a better developer tools for IE, remote debugging for iPad ~mohsen__
something that will fill in a form while I’m testing client side validation, checkout, etc. ~jwaltonmedia
UIKit for JavaScript. ~sandofsky
And a built-in bandwidth throttler / slow-mo mode. ~kpk

Languages

I want a new client language. I’d love to see browsers switch to bytecode that we can compile other languages down to. ~michael_tomer
Browsers that can be scripted in languages other than Javascript. (I know, Native Client is attempting this). ~suranyami
The “Browser VM” should allow us to have multiple language implementations. An expressive bytecode, not minimized JavaScript. ~twcrone
a VM one layer below JS (ex, LLVM).. to allow us to start innovating languages that run in the browser. JS is not the end all. ~igrigorik
JavaScript always, everywhere. Whatever extra security browsers need to release, so devs can rely on JS always being there. ~webandy
the lack of multiple mature programming language inside the browser environment. ~trek
Ruby as a scripting language ~elado
Sass and Coffeescript built into a browser ~anthonyshort

Language Features

a way to know if a JavaScript function is actually meant to return something even if this return value is ‘undefined’. ~_sebastienp
would love if all browsers supported noSuchMethod for some elegant script solutions. ~KaptajnKold
If we could actually use some of the new Javascript features… ~nicobrevin
Garbage collection. ~jayarjo
operator overloading in #js would ease peoples’ lives when working on gfx stuff ~philogb
Actually fixing altering any built in object’s .prototype in general doesn’t do horrible things, notably DOM objects. ~Rory_O
Fixing Object.prototype erik.eae.net/archives/2005/… ~Rory_O
Support for Javascript versions > 1.5 in Chrome and Safari. Specifically: I want to use generators and iterators. ~jonemo
decoupling JS parsing from load ~derSchepp

Media

Have the ability to pause/mute all media in all other tabs. ex: Mute google music/pandora tab when I hit play on a youtube vid. ~JoeSloth
a solid audio api especially on mobile browsers would be great. Esp. for gaming :) ~wemakedotcoms
Easily HTML5 Video and Audio at the moment. ~webfella
audio and video input and encoding. ~dshaw
more audio/video codecs built in ~masterkain
i’ll go with html5 audio and video also… ~rguarilha
also being able to know how many simultaneous HTML5 Audio objects you support in the current platform would be great. ~Fokker680
If talking about Chrome, video masking with overflow hidden. ~gerherz
the state of video delivery in and across the browsers is still quite sad. but not an individual browser issue per se. ~jerememonteau
Good audio support for mobile browsers. ~andybastable

HTML5 Forms

universal support for styleable input types (date/time/range/etc) ~franksvalli
A rock solid native WYSIWYG form element. With so much content dev being done online, this is an area that seems really behind. ~reinink
file uploads need rethinking. ~sikander

DOM

a “Create” event launched when a new dom node is inserted ~JohnHackworth
Quietly fail and move on when calling a method on a non-existent object : doc.getElementById(“does-not-exist”).innerHTML = … ~craigpatik

Keyboard

Consistent handling of keypress/keydown events across browsers and OSes would be killer. ~pyrolupus

Mouse / Touch

gesture events like swipes and flicks built-in as DOM events ~manuel
doing touch without listening to three events for each gesture ~mohsen__
now that comes from a cat avatar: an element that catches the mouse would be awesome for games or panorama viewer ~Flexi23

Device input

Media Capture API! 21st century, and we are still limited to the text-only input on the web! ~matas_petrikas
Access to the FS, to the devices (camera, sensors, readers, scaners…), direct access to the GPU (3D and complex calculations) ~gandazgul
Device APIs. Accelerometer, camera, contacts, etc. ~filmaj
Access to device capabilities from a website. gps, gyro,etc. ~ivanmarcin
it will never happen, but support for more native functionality like file system, camera, etc… on mobile ~bcardarella
Safe, sandboxed way to communicate with user’s hardware (GPU, filesystem, camera, etc.)—but that’s already on the way. ~valueof
<input type="voice"> and <input type="webcam"> ~TimoKissing
oh, also, device access! shouldn’t need flash to get to the camera and mic. ~jerememonteau
device api, the use cases increases significantly on mobile . ~vivianli
w3.org/2009/dap/ ~jamespearce
Device APIs. ~jamespearce
Mobile, file inputs = camera access ~ljharb

Flash

Inconsistent keyboard trap issues, often by Flash content. Causes accessibility issues and annoys me no end - when in a YouTube video in Firefox, ctrl+t\ctrl+w no longer work for closing\creating tabs, and focus gets stuck in player ~joechidzik

CSS

Ah, forgot something veeeery important: @viewport! ~derSchepp
if CSS could do math. Ex) height: 100% - 20px; ~justindross
I’d like css files to have a ‘root’ variable where you could set the home directory. ~davidrhoden
Implementation of CSS Paged Media. To me this seems to be the missing link of modern technology. ~Rene_Kriest
a way to disable, or set the device orientation. PLEASE. We need that. ~Fokker680
background image rendering in firefox. I dislike how it needs either a or text to start rendering the image. ~joshsager
CSS Filters ~derSchepp
an adaptive image file format. ~derSchepp
media queries attrs on base/img tags. Will enable downloading smaller images for smaller screens. ~yoavweiss
a way to manipulate asset request urls with js on the client before they go out (for serving responsive imgs, etc). …which already worked until a couple months ago when browser img prefetching became more aggressive. ~scottjehl
The one annoying me at the moment is the landscape rotation bug in Mobile Safari: tinyurl.com/5sr7qkm ~Pipsqueaks

Styling

CSS blendmodes. div{blendmode:’overlay’} but also div{background:’multiply’ rgba(0,0,0,.3)} + for div{color:’add’ #fff} ~mknol
css blend modes ~waynethebrain
blending modes. Like multiply/overlay/etc in PS. ~gb
Full support for @ page w3.org/TR/CSS2/page.h… ~sanbeiji
I’d fix pixel overflow & underflow in IE Chrome & Safari. ~jon_neal
this would for me be to not use curvycorners js hacks to get rounded borders to work in IE ~Iclevettdesigns
multiple background images. ~Iclevettdesigns
A unified and publicized set of selectors for styling the shadow dom of input/select/etc. elements ~JasonWyatt
I’d like CSS to have an inherit:none feature, especially helpful when you’re inheriting from styles you have no control over. ~JayDWhiting

Text

text-stretch. :) ~jonas_lund
Proper text anti-aliasing on Chrome. Large type looks awful. Note: IE and FF have this already. ~andybastable
Text Flow or caret(Position/Range)FromPoint. I’ve spent weeks on columns, text flow, and non-contenteditable wysiwyg, etc. ~grayrest
Give me inset text-shadows in all browsers and proper edge antialiasing in Chrome and I’m all yours. ~matthewmorek
There is some small bug with text sometimes (become lighter a bit, when canvas is loaded to that page). ~slobodan_
Kerning and consistent type anti-aliasing across all platforms :) ~endtwist
DirectWrite in all browsers on all platforms. ~H_FJ

Layout

absolute centering of images etc in a given div would be one ~yemster
I want rock solid layout. Like flexbox/ms-grid including vertical alignment. Basically, table-layout without the tables. ~b4nn0n
Strong finalized layout system. Strong forms support for real apps. HTML CSS JS unreachable for the user. No way to modify pages ~fpiat
better CSS layouts. I know it’s coming, not fast enough ~sethladd
A real layout system :) ~natecavanaugh
it shouldn’t be so difficult to build columns and vertically center things. Seriously why are these still problematic. ~nathan_vaughn
layout. hands down. ~boblet
Add sane CSS-based layouts to all browsers. ~jon_neal
flexbox everywhere ~mislav
Have css3 column-count and width work in all browsers, but revert to a stack in resolutions below multi-column width. ~J_Grimm_
position:fixed and overflow:scroll on all desktop and mobile browsers would make my day ~prundin
Vertical and “middle” float. I want to be able to put elements in the middle of other elements, horizontally and vertically. ~iliadraznin
My #1 is a simply a better layout system. Flexbox = meh. ~roblifford
a box model that programatically closer to an AS3 sprite ~darrownet
display:table in IE6 ~SubtleGradient
Mobile, position: fixed. ~ljharb

WYSIWYG / Native rich-text editor

All contenteditable related madness: commands, generated HTML, and selection API ~jpscaletti
more consistent and improved implementation of contenteditable. That would really improve and slim down web based editors. ~DannySorensen

Animation

Broader hardware-acceleration coverage for the display layer. The richness of native mobile/flash is driven by unflinching 60fps. ~teej_m
I want to stop repainting from flickering and screwing with my animations. ~tdreyno
Bugfix: Hardware-accelerated DOM manipulation using translate3d on Android Browser. ~bniswe
(smooth) #CSS3 animations for ALL browsers! ~AndrewHenderson
transition/animate pseudo-elements! ~jacobdubail
On Android. Hardware Accelerated CSS Transforms. ~edwk
CSS transitions (they’re just slow and outclassed by javascript in terms of speed) ~thijsjacobs
Decent HW rendering in Android please ~danmux

2d graphics / Canvas / SVG

Acceleration/performance on SVG. Also think I found a leak with SVG in Chrome when tabs are hidden (but no repro yet). ~notmatt
Faster drawing with 2d canvas context. ~monteslu
There is some small bug with text sometimes (become lighter a bit, when canvas is loaded to that page). ~slobodan_
Good Canvas support for mobile browsers. ~andybastable
canvas.drawWindow. Don’t even see why it should be restricted to extensions (except in the case of cross domain content) ~bgrins
Sony’s Trilithium did this by binding HW accelerated scene graph, ala Core Animation. satine.org/archives/2011/… ~charlietuna

3d graphics / WebGL

compressed textures for webgl, and everything else people already said. ~sethladd
WebGL support in IE would change a lot when it comes to browser games. For 3D as well as 2D. ~ippalix
Good WebGL support for mobile browsers. ~andybastable

Web Storage

Making localStorage infinite size ~nikolatankovic
Web storage and offline use is a huge mess, even on latest gecko/webkit ~alexbosworth

History

full acceptance of the History API & Ajax. It’s all about user experience. ~Scottblew
Make browsers understand previous states so that Ajax and back-btn & bookmaring can be implemented easier/seamlessly. ~vmasto

File API

Not easy but (until we’re all cloud based), a rich and safe way to write webapps to handle local files too crbug.com/47416 That would let us write webapps to replace all sorts of things that currently have to be desktop apps ~schmerg
all browsers need stable and consistent support of the JS File API ~MeltingIce
integration with the desktop and OS (file API is one of the first things) ~dnagir

File Uploads

resumable, managed, async browser based file uploads ~tilsammans

Offline / App Cache

a better app cache API (with improved debugging) stevesouders.com/blog/2011/10/0… ~alex_gibson
Web storage and offline use is a huge mess, even on latest gecko/webkit ~alexbosworth
app cache that doesn’t suck. ~miketaylr
Fix network-connection JS events:we have online/offline for hardware but what about netonline/netoffline for Inet traffic tests? ~adamrmcd
I’m going to +1 application cache. @SlexAxton @miketaylr & @julio_ody ~benschwarz
that the offline HTML5 API would give a lot more control over the cache. Not sure that’s what you asked though ~julio_ody
Firefoxes app cache permission requester ~derSchepp

Communication and Web Sockets

I’d vote for some way to do P2P connections, or at least some way of opening arbitrary ports in some secure, sandboxed way. ~rakesh314
Websockets… ~okinsey
Secure websockets on all browsers will make creating web apps easier. That is a dream right now. ~chrisreister
Uniform websocket support across all browsers. ~clofresh
Cross domain xhr (as a new session, without the cookies of the original site) ~elado
cross domain xhr, but creating a new session and not sending the original cookies. could save jsonp/proxies. ~elado
universal support of push notifications without the browser being open. ~ChrisLove
not The Single Bug, but here’s one: being able to verify the content sent was the content delivered. Probably via headers & apis. Useful when deploying for mobile/roaming use or in corporate networks when behind proxies. ~rem
better support for XHR-2 on mobile. iOS partially supports but barely. in the case of the XHR-2 stuff it replaces the API, with a much less functional API on iOS :( PhoneGap is making the effort, but it needs to act as a polyfill and not a replacement API ~bcardarella
cross domain xhr, but creating a new session and not sending the original cookies. could save jsonp/proxies. ~elado
if could ask for my last gift to the three wise men I’d like peer to peer communication, with WebRTC is close to be here ~cbullokles

Desktop / OS Integration

more OS integrations (like file upload from iOS, access to camera, cross-platform dragdrop files) ~mislav
fullscreen maybe ~slobodan_
integration with the desktop and OS (file API is one of the first things) ~dnagir
On the desktop: Intents (cross app integration). ~edwk

Widgets

Begin supporting the W3C Widget spec. ~mwbrooks
I really like the support to w3c widgets included in opera. It helps to package web applications as normal apps ~cbullokles
Greater steps towards W3C Widgets ~mwbrooks
better encapsulation similar to Mozillas XUL widgets seems like a big one. ~blrandel

Browser Extensions

also actual cross-browser extensions APIs and packaging while you’re handing out unicorn lollipops. ~miketaylr

Browser UI (App-land)

Modifying native context menu. ~JanKuca
Access to system-level elements. Buttons, contextual menu, etc. Why can my web app look more like a desktop app? ~sternmeyer
Firefox’s rogue input styling that differs from all other browsers. Inability to style input elements in general in Firefox. ~taitems

Browser UI (User-land)

I usually close browser tabs with shortcuts, the “x”, is actually a hazard for me. Thankfullly there’s command-shift-T to reopen. ~ckundo
Showing which of the 30 tabs I have open just started playing that song everyone hates, with some kind of icon/colour change? ~josscrowcroft
an option to freeze all non-active tabs and browser instances to gain performance and a disruption free browsing experience ~tuskali

Browser features (out of scope)

a bit late but still, id include in every browser a feature like “safari reader” (not as extension) and make width resizeable ~askoth
not having web inspector’s CSS panel jump to the top of the declaration every time I double-click a rule to make a live change. ~mklickman
file:/// in Chrome. But it would never get accepted :p ~me1000
better bookmarking. Implement thematic and context sensitive trails the way Vannevar Bush envisioned. ~mik3cap
And a built-in bandwidth throttler / slow-mo mode. ~kpk

Ummmm

is this a trick question? ~webandy
a troll fix ~mynameiscolin
sprinkles! ~jeanniev
counterweights to balance out the missing goats ~anthonydispezio
I would like Backbone.js to be built-in. Just kidding. ~julio_ody
Is this question partially inspired by nczonline.net/blog/2011/10/0…? ~roblifford
A feature that allows browsers to detect duplicate @wycats tweets. ~jamespearce

Paul Irish

Making the www great

What Feature Would Improve the Web?