[kwlug-disc] DuckDuckGo.com -- an alternate search engine

[unsolicited]

Ralph Janke wrote, On 07/27/2010 4:51 PM:
> On 07/27/2010 04:38 PM, unsolicited wrote:
>> Ralph Janke wrote, On 07/27/2010 12:32 PM:
>>> I am not sure what the resistance against javascript in general is.
>>
>> Because it is a hidden black box that history has demonstrated can 
>> have nefarious elements. 'Nefarious' meaning different things to 
>> different people. (See Khalid's note.)
>>
> 
> Well.. Javascript is exactly not a black box. You can read all the 
> Javascript that is loaded. Furthermore, Javascript was designed from the 
> beginning to sandbox your browser (in clear distinction to ActiveX) from 
> the rest of the computer.

Think MUCH bigger.

In essence, your comment says that you think every user of every page 
should pre-review the code before actually displaying the page, to vet 
that it doesn't do anything nefarious, according to their own definition.

Not gonna happen.

Practically: This would be like knowing what temperature you like your 
toast toasted at, and measure the temperature the toaster puts out, 
adjusting the darkness dial until you get what you want - if you can. 
Instead, people choose a setting, toast a piece or two, adjust the 
setting, and eat the toast. Repeat until satisfied. Upon getting 
REALLY black toast, they toss it and try again (destructive testing) - 
on a web page, the act of going to a page also means it's too late.

There would seem to be two camps: I'll trust the world - (javascript 
globally enabled, including not even knowing what javascript is and 
that they can disable it) and they get bitten, and everyone looks at 
them like they're just stupid; I trust nobody - javascript disabled, 
for reasons Khalid has well laid out, and functionality decreases, 
perhaps even to the point wherein the purpose for going to that page 
can no longer be achieved. [Since I much prefer text only e-mail, no 
html, I guess I'm well in this latter camp.] And everyone thinks 
they're just paranoid (even if they're not wrong), and they're just 
stupid.

> Yes, I agree there are still some things that a problematic, but I would 
> challenge that with javascript (i.e greasemonkey) you can actually take 
> more control over
> your browsing including checking for some security issues by Javascript.

Arguably, if this thought was common, greasemonkey would be bundled 
with firefox.

>> And if you don't agree, you usually don't get the value for which you 
>> went to the page in the first place. (Thus Khalid's graceful 
>> degradation comment.)
>>
> Well.. if you don't agree to Javascript, some thing are just not possible.

But with search, we just want the text. Perhaps a picture or two. No 
ads, no refreshes, no anything else ... just GIVE ME THE ANSWER! If we 
knew they didn't have the answer, we wouldn't have gone there in the 
first place. And, somehow, not having the answer almost becomes the 
fault of the page creator. <sigh>