This may be one of those questions that might expose my half-baked knowledge in this field, so I thank the experts patiently explaining this to me in advance.
- What is the fuss about web browser engines?
As I can see, there have been many web browser engines in the past; most defunct / unmaintained and the three: blink, gecko and webkit being the only ones actively developed and maintained today (I am aware of Goanna, but some articles online say it isn’t being developed anymore – I could be wrong). What is stopping someone; say the FSF or some other group championing libre software from coming up with their own web engine completely different from the incumbent engines? I understand that not all web features will work with every engine, but surely we need more diversity than just the existing three to spur more development, right? Many software including the Linux kernel had humble beginnings and if enough people find it to be a suitable alternative, they might slowly jump ship to this new hypothetical web engine that was built using GPL3 from scratch.
- What is stopping web developers from simply shunning Google’s Manifest V3?
I haven’t seen or heard of one single good thing about Manifest V3 from any web developer (at least the six that I know personally), and have only read articles on why it is either unnecessary, or that the proposed advantages can easily be done is a less disruptive manner. While I appreciate that the internet today runs a lot on Google’s infrastructure and services, surely if Web Devs tell them to go pound sand, or intentionally break the site when using Google Chrome, and put a message saying, “Go to Firefox / Safari for a better experience”, that will make Google backtrack.
Once again, I apologise for these basic / daft questions. I appreciate any insight that you may have for me.
The fourth most developed browser engine is Ladybird, spun off from the SerenityOS project. It's very active. And then you have Mozilla's Servo... kinda. And then Goanna is still maintained, but not too active.
Ladybird is still very early in development and is not even targeting an alpha release until 2026. There are no binaries currently available, so the only way to even test what currently exists is to compile the source code. I am excited to see a new competitor, but I also do not have high hopes given how difficult it is to meet all of the web standards. Given the increasing number of websites that have problems or limitations with Firefox, I do not foresee Ladybird ever getting to the point where it could be reliably used by average people. I would love to eventually be proven wrong about this though.
Servo also has nothing to do with Mozilla anymore. It has been a part of the Linux Foundation since Mozilla laid off all of the developers in 2020.
I'm fairly excited about Ladybird because it's already gotten 423 on html5test vs Firefox 128's 544. I do agree that they're currently pretty much alpha quality, though.
I wish more people would help NetSurf development instead of joining the Ladybird bandwagon. Ladybird is basically a less portable, less complete NetSurf.