On Wed, Aug 31, 2005 at 07:28:18AM +0200, Jan Danielsson wrote: > Sure. I didn't like the "Web app. boom" during -95, and I don't like > it now. HTTP/WWW wasn't made for certain kinds of applications, and I > don't agree with writing hacks to make other kinds of applications work, > such as a timed redirection to a page to fake "live updates" (I have > even seen a web clock which did this, and it's terribly annoying). If > the browser should be handling downloading, then it should be done > properly, via XUL et.al., but this also is bad, imho, for other reasons.
So it's a kludge for websites to expose large files via HTTP? Or it's a kludge for Freenet to expose an API for downloading large files which doesn't just stream them to the browser (which we can't do because we don't want to download blocks in order)? And I don't see what the problem with updates is... a big splitfile download will probably take many hours, so you don't need instant updates. > > I have two Firefox profiles, one for Freenet and one for "normal" > browsing. If I would like to browse freenet, begin a download, and then > browse the web, I'd have to switch profiles - thus not being able to do > them at the same time. You will have to switch profiles if you want to go from browsing Freenet to browsing the Web, yes. So? You have to do this anyway. Oh, I see what your problem is. You think fproxy will be streaming 700MB files to the browser, and therefore you need to keep the browser open for the entire duration of the download. That truly would suck, but the default has been for a long time to download to the freenet-downloads directory ON DISK. Have you USED fproxy lately? Obviously not, or you would know this. How DO you download big files from freesites? Copy the URL into FUQID? Do I need to explain why that sucks? Or do you simply never download big files from freesites? > > Also, there are bugs in Firefox which causes it to not free memory > properly when you close tabs. So if I were to begin a download, browse > freesites using tabs, realize that my browsing has eaten all available > ram (this happens frequently, and I use memory only cache for Freenet) > and that the system is swapping like mad, I close the tabs.. Then the > system would still be in a horrible state while it's downloading. I > would have to shut down the browser and restart it again. Then it just > feels flakey. (Granted, it's a problem in Firefox). I don't see what the problem is if not the above. > > Finally, I don't like the idea of a download tool depending on a > browser because it feels like a can-opener which depending on a car. > (And in this case, with a horrible interface that connects them). The download tool does not depend on the browser remaining open. We merely provide an interface to the global download queue. This means: - Other apps can provide prettier interfaces. - You can add a file to the queue from within fproxy. - You can download files out of the box, without us having to bundle GUI code. -- Matthew J Toseland - toad at amphibian.dyndns.org Freenet Project Official Codemonkey - http://freenetproject.org/ ICTHUS - Nothing is impossible. Our Boss says so. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: <https://emu.freenetproject.org/pipermail/devl/attachments/20050831/5728a247/attachment.pgp>
