Apple introduces new WebKit features in latest Safari beta builds for OS X Mavericks, Mountain Lion

Posted:
in Mac Software edited July 2014
Apple on Thursday seeded to developers new builds of Safari for OS X 10.9 Mavericks and OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion featuring new WebKit modifications including WebGL tweaks, which should see wider adoption in OS X 10.10 Yosemite and iOS 8.




Safari 7.1 for Mavericks and Safari 6.2 for Mountain Lion brings WebGL-powered 3D rendering to Apple's browser, as well as other WebKit engine features like IndexedDB, JavaScript Promises and CSS Shapes and Compositing.

Apple is asking developers testing the latest seeds to concentrate on subpixel rendering, which is now on by default for all Web content. According to the release notes, websites with in-app Web views may render differently depending on design constraints.

Additionally, the company requests focus on extension compatibility.

As for the new WebKit features, Apple notes the following:
  • WebGL. Safari support for WebGL allows developers to create 3D experiences
    that work natively without plug-ins.
  • IndexedDB. The IndexedDB API allows web developers to store structured
    data for web applications that work online or require large amounts of data to
    be cached client side.
  • JavaScript Promises. Safari enables JavaScript authors to more naturally
    work with asynchronous programming patterns.
  • CSS Shapes and Compositing. Using CSS, websites can now easily ??'ow text
    around images and geometry shapes, and perform image compositing
    operations on DOM elements.
Developers can download Safari 7.1 for Mavericks and version 6.2 for Mountain Lion via Apple's Developer Portal.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 20
    Safari 7.1 Seed 1 Developer preview just appeared in my Mac App Store Uodate pane in Preferences although I’m not a Developer.

    How to delete the the Update from the Mac App Store pane?
  • Reply 2 of 20
    ecatsecats Posts: 272member
    (right click -> Hide Update)

    It can appear there for a variety of reasons.
  • Reply 3 of 20
    lee123lee123 Posts: 5member

    Same here, I'm just a regular user, has it been pushed to everyone? :wow:

  • Reply 4 of 20
    lotoneslotones Posts: 54member

    Same here here. I thought I'd won something.

  • Reply 5 of 20
    sockrolidsockrolid Posts: 2,789member
    And yes. It's hella snappy.
  • Reply 6 of 20
    That's strange. I have one computer with a developer account, but this showed up on two others that are not signed in.

    Edit: I'm going to download it on one of my non-dev computers to see if it gets notified of future updates later. Just curious. Someone made a mistake. :)
  • Reply 7 of 20
    lee123lee123 Posts: 5member

    I didn't install it, and when launching App Store again the update disappeared, so it appears someone realised a mistake had been made and rectified it.

  • Reply 8 of 20
    hexxhexx Posts: 40member

    anybody who tried can confirm that html5 form validation is functioning? it's shame that safari is behind with this basic stuff. even IE does have it. validation is built-in but it doesn't prevent form submission, nor provide customer facing feedback if incorrect data is entered. all is there, just not finished and that's real shame

  • Reply 9 of 20
    lorin schultzlorin schultz Posts: 2,771member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post



    Using CSS, websites can now easily ��'ow text around images and geometry shapes

     

    Huh? Websites can use CSS to swear at pictures? Or does " ï¿½ï¿½'" mean "fl" in AppleInsiderese?

     

    To me the extra characters just seem super��'uous.

  • Reply 10 of 20
    hexxhexx Posts: 40member

    right, tested it, still no validation - FFS APPLE!!!!! is safari turning into another IE?

  • Reply 11 of 20
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by ECats View Post



    (right click -> Hide Update)



    It can appear there for a variety of reasons.

    Cheers, it worked.

  • Reply 12 of 20
    jpellinojpellino Posts: 697member
    Still no WebKit LLVM in the notes...
  • Reply 13 of 20
    bobringerbobringer Posts: 106member
    1 for Promises

    In these crazy times... in this crazy asynchronous world we live in... it's good having someone on our side to think about our sanity!

    (that being said... "q" has been keeping me sane for a few years now, still nice seeing the ECMAScript 6 native implementations starting to show up)
  • Reply 14 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by Lorin Schultz View Post

    Huh? Websites can use CSS to swear at pictures? Or does " ï¿½ï¿½'" mean "fl" in AppleInsiderese?

     

    To me the extra characters just seem super��'uous.


     

    Speaking of ‘fl’, if you type those characters together in iBooks Author in Yosemite, it instantly crashes. Same with ‘fi’. No other combination does that, and the combinations don’t crash it on only ONE template. Opening existing files that contain either string also crashes it instantly.

     

    It’s so weird.

  • Reply 15 of 20
    kibitzerkibitzer Posts: 1,114member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Lee123 View Post

     

    I didn't install it, and when launching App Store again the update disappeared, so it appears someone realised a mistake had been made and rectified it.


    Same thing happened to me on one of our Macs. The App Store update didn't show at all on another desktop and a MacBook.

  • Reply 16 of 20
    wizard69wizard69 Posts: 13,377member
    :\Kinda unrelated but Apple seems to be having issues with their developer web sites over the previous two days. Yesterday and the day before I had a hell of a time trying to update one iPad related bug report. In fact never did get logged in one day.

    Obviously I have no idea if the betas showing up are related but something is a bit flakey on some of Apples portals. Hopefully whatever is going on gets resolved soon!


    By the way, the WebKit nightlies are very snappy. :\.

    I urge testing and bug reporting for WebKit if you are up to it. If the bugs get expunged I suspect people will be very happy with Yosemite simply due to a far better Safari, likewise on iOS.
  • Reply 17 of 20
    eluardeluard Posts: 319member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

     

    Speaking of ‘fl’, if you type those characters together in iBooks Author in Yosemite, it instantly crashes. Same with ‘fi’. No other combination does that, and the combinations don’t crash it on only ONE template. Opening existing files that contain either string also crashes it instantly.

     

    It’s so weird.


     

    Some sort of broken conversion to a ligature, perhaps?

  • Reply 18 of 20
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by Eluard View Post

    Some sort of broken conversion to a ligature, perhaps?




    Ooh! I thought of that but dismissed it because others work fine… I’m using Palatino, too. That could very well be it. Wonder why no other applications have that problem.

  • Reply 19 of 20
    waybacmacwaybacmac Posts: 309member

    I also unexpectedly received the beta of Safari 7.1 which was automatically installed onto my MBP. On first opening Safari 7.1, a dialog advised me to re-enable those extensions that I felt were safe. From Preferences I began to re-enable my extensions without a problem. However, on checking the Enable box for LastPass I got a spinning beach-ball and Safari 7.1 was totally locked up. Anyone else seen this? I sent a bug report to both the LastPass people and to Apple (thru the feedback page since I'm not in any developer or tester program).

  • Reply 20 of 20
    miishamiisha Posts: 6member

    Looks like Safari 7.1 introduces underlining that respects both font size and letters which go under the line:

    (7.0.5 vs 7.1)

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