Google’s developer version of the Chrome browser has made a significant change. In the URL the traditional first step, “http://” has been done away with.
Thom Holwerda, of OSNews, had an idea why.
“(T)he URL scheme bears little meaning to most people using a browser – they know it’s there and how to type it, but it doesn’t indicate anything to them. Since computing has been about abstracting away complexity for a while now, it was only a matter of time before browser makers started removing this piece of web history.”
There are problems with this change, as far as developers are concerned.
- The change itself was unclear. When developers started noticing it, they interpreted and reported it as a bug. It seems that Google perhaps did not converse with their developers prior to implementing this
- Although the http is hidden, it is not gone. So the change is a visual one, perhaps not a functional one.
- Some developers are worried about what will happen when working with the https or ftp protocols.
- This is not an agreed-upon move, industry-wide.
A moderator on Google’s Chrome code forum said, “we include “http:// when copying the URL to the clipboard, so it will still appear when pasted elsewhere.” This is a function that is apparently not in working order for a number of developers.
