The profusion of underpowered interfaces is frustrating but I don't see how browsers could
"just use files"
What does this mean? Providing the POSIX filesystem C language APIs with file descriptor numbers, etc? I guess the browser makers could go Cosmopolitan-C style and emulate the Linux filesystem interface on all platforms, but I think you'd find there's still a weird intermediary layer in between your code and the underlying OS filesystem. Even on Linux the browser would have a virtual filesystem to provide sandboxing & quality-of-service governance. On other systems you'd need a virtual filesystem to paper over those differences between operating systems. Windows exists!
Mingw has been paving over the differences for years. Node.js paves over them, makes windows look very posix'y.
I'm tired of Windows being an excuse, a forever dragging boat anchor, a lower than low denominator that justifies doing shitty jobs. Keep the current virtualized file system for Windows that's fine, but man, we should stop designing specs, setting the future to keep targeting the dirty distant sad past. And we have decades of experiences (mingw) showing that we can polyfill a good platform atop the big bad no good windows Boogeyman.
It just feels like the make excuse for bad camp has been in charge of our spiritual direction for 25 years here & it's never gotten us anywhere. It's always pretty shitty. I struggle to believe these protestations against doing the natural good thing help. We should 100% just triple down on trying, on bringing WASI forward.
"just use files"
What does this mean? Providing the POSIX filesystem C language APIs with file descriptor numbers, etc? I guess the browser makers could go Cosmopolitan-C style and emulate the Linux filesystem interface on all platforms, but I think you'd find there's still a weird intermediary layer in between your code and the underlying OS filesystem. Even on Linux the browser would have a virtual filesystem to provide sandboxing & quality-of-service governance. On other systems you'd need a virtual filesystem to paper over those differences between operating systems. Windows exists!