Where's our data, Google? Chrome 79 update 'a catastrophe' for Android devs with WebView apps

LocalStorage data has always been in peril

Sure the bug and it's handling has been terrible, but localStorage, IndexedDb, WebSQL, etc data has never been entirely safe. For starters, Chrome has never included code that can handle/migrate this data when Chrome is downgraded. An Android user has always been able to remove a Chrome update and it's never been obvious what consequences this has for other installed apps. Phonegap/Cordova have ways to save data more persistently not linked to the Chrome implementation and if your data is important, this is where it should be saved.

Similar to a supply chain attack

These apps' developers should perhaps view their dependence on 3rd-party-provided functionality as a supply chain attack vector and act accordingly.

I am not saying that these developers are at fault for causing this issue, but it is clear that they have taken a risk by relying on the 3rd-party functionality, which makes that functionality part of their supply chain.

Blame, blame everywhere ...

No sympathy for any developers that were relying on Google - that's weapons grade idiocy.

However, it's scary to think how an update this dramatic managed to slip out of the Chocolate factory, with it's untold ratio of genuises/lattes without at least one person saying: "Hang on, is this right ?"

Imagine how many more subtle unseen and potentially corrosive bugs have slipped thought these past months and years. And imagine the horror of some poor "app" user when their data vanishes forever.

WebView?

WebView is only used to display an existing web page in an app :

https://developer.android.com/guide/webapps/webview

Back up your data...

...Even if you are locked in to one vendor that makes it hard to access. Back Up. Your. Data.

Carl Sagan seems apt here

"If you wish to make an apple pie, first you must create the universe."

If you do not build every component yourself and instead mix in unknown 3rd party elements, your system will surely have undefined behavior.

The browser

is the new operating system :-(

Write once and test on every version/update of Chrome. If you manage to find a serious bug in a canary build, good luck with convincing Google to fix it for you.

Where’s our data, Google?

Is this a Rick and Morty reference (where are my testicles, Summer?)

Quiz

You are a developer needing to create an application to allow a vet to keep patient records. A reasonable starting point would be:

1) "Animal Farm" by George Orwell

2) A text editor

3) A search engine

4) A database engine

5) Minecraft

6) A web browser

7) The cloud

8) Blockchain

9) Internet of Things

10) All of the above

11) Any of the above

12) None of the above

How many went for (6) ?

Where, where... There!

Customer: "Where's our data, Google?"

Google: "All your data belongs to us. *We* have it, no need to worry."

There was a time—

—when you sold your software on a CD. Go back far enough, you may even have sold it on a floppy. You had to print millions of the things and ship 'em across the world to an equally enormous number of people and organisations.

The cost of a screwup, financially and reputationally, could be existential, so you had absolutely no choice but to ensure that you tested the stuff very, very, very thoroughly.

Nowadays we have the world's biggest companies reaping billions while treating end-users as unpaid beta testers of startlingly flawed software. The billions accumulating in Google's pockets (and those of Microsoft, for that matter) are directly stolen as the losses of time, data and damage incurred by customers who have to waste effort and lose money, yet again compensating for the shoddy wares inflicted upon them.

From politics to finance to the tech business, increasingly I see a world in which a sizeable majority of basically lazy, unaware, gullible people might as well be hooked up to IV lines as they are relentlessly bled for the benefit of the few.

I'd like to believe this is just a bit of cynical moodiness speaking, really I would—but everywhere I look, and as recent political events demonstrate, a vast number of people seem to walk, sheep-like and heedless, directly into the abattoir ... staring transfixed at their stupid little screens, probably.

Mostly we use if for caching. That stuff will be recalculated - which will make for a slow app start and force the installation wizard to rerun, but it won't otherwise cause harmful effects for anyone who has the internet.

Users without internet, however, will lose access to their purchased features until they're back on line. At that point, Play Services will renotify the app that they own the feature and it will be recached. (I've just had a panic about subscriptions. But I think that's true even for them.)

Ironically we use a file on iOS because storage was far more flaky. (And also because iTunes wouldn't renotify us of purchases and because on iOS we had to store the level of consumables.)

So

- Google Chrome doesn't create profile backup before any upgrade; if anything breaks, it's lost for good

- Google Chrome isn't in fact thoroughly tested within Google - the guinea pigs are randomly selected real-life users (a great cost saving)

- users, in their absolute majority, have no habit and/or knowledge of backing up their data

Welcome to brave new world.