Google developer Mason Freed posed the question: “Should we remove XSLT from the web platform?” on the WHATWG GitHub repo. I use XSLT to style my RSS feed.
This topic blew up and the conversation was eventually locked with many comments hidden as “off-topic”. This public discussion wasn’t actually intended to solicit public commentary.
Freed’s later comment drew ire (emphasis mine):
[…] we are strongly convinced that this would not be the right way to spend our limited resources. Doing so would reduce our ability to work on other platform features where there is measurable developer impact and interest, and which drive the…
Google developer Mason Freed posed the question: “Should we remove XSLT from the web platform?” on the WHATWG GitHub repo. I use XSLT to style my RSS feed.
This topic blew up and the conversation was eventually locked with many comments hidden as “off-topic”. This public discussion wasn’t actually intended to solicit public commentary.
Freed’s later comment drew ire (emphasis mine):
[…] we are strongly convinced that this would not be the right way to spend our limited resources. Doing so would reduce our ability to work on other platform features where there is measurable developer impact and interest, and which drive the web forward.
#3189298594 - @mfreed7
The phrase “limited resources” was a poor choice. This is Google remember; trillion dollar market cap.
I think Freed’s question is a reasonable one to ask to be fair. It was just asked by the wrong person. Unfortunately for Freed, one must always assume Google has an ulterior motive. Google has a history of playing the standards game because it looks good when they get approval. If not, they’ll happily plough forward. Remember when they rebranded FLoC? Google will remove XSLT from Chrome if they want to after the uproar settles.
Update: this post was misdated as Tuesday 19th! It’s currently Monday 18th and the post was published Friday 15th. Anyway, as Terence Eden on Mastodon notes, Google has already ignored feedback has begun purging XSLT.