IssueTracker

This can be tested by running the score test found here:
http://html5demo.momac.net/

I just spent all day programming an important use of HTML5 Web Workers (company project) and I find it only works on Android phones that have not been upgraded to Froyo. To make matters worse, Google Gears was removed in Eclair, so I can't even fall back on that.

It would be nice if this could be promoted to High priority, as I am sure HTML5 compliance is an important part of building mobile web-enabled devices.

My bad. It seems that the variable window.Worker is defined in Eclair, but is not actually usable. Froyo seems to ameliorate this by not defining the variable at all.

This test succeeds on Eclair:
window.Worker != undefined

A better way to test for this functionality would be:
typeof(window.Worker) === 'function'

Is this functionality intentionally disabled? Bug 36915899 implies that it worked at some point, and the following IBM article claims that web workers are available on Android: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-html5mobile4/index.html

I'm currently using Gingerbread on a Nexus S, and both my own script and http://diveintohtml5.org/detect.html#workers claim that web workers aren't supported:

Uncaught ReferenceError: Worker is not defined

[Comment deleted]

I miss this feature so much from Android :-(

I've been playing with the first full release of the Honeycomb SDK (not the preview version).

According to http://html5test.com/, the Browser provided in the emulator still lacks any Web Workers support.

Please, Google, I beg thee, do not allow Android to become the IE6 of the smartphone space.

I've found the log to disable this feature in config.h android 2.2.
Hope they will add this feature back soon.

===log===>
commit 68698168e7547cc10660828f1fb82be7a8efa845
Author: Steve Block <steveblock@google.com>
Date:   Wed Mar 17 14:37:19 2010 +0000

    Disable workers
   
    This is because V8 on Android does not have the required locking.
    Also disables channel messaging, which is used only with workers.
   
    Bug: 2522239
    Change-Id: I6cb91b4048c7e1a0351e422561625397a2e98986

Does anyone know if this has been reintroduced in 3.0-3.2?

I have a Motorola Xoom with 3.1 (waiting for my 3.2 OTA...) and http://html5test.com/ still reports that there are no Web Worker features available.

I'd love to know when V8 on Android catches up with Google Chrome. I will be a very happy monkey when Android WebKit has all the same features as Google Chrome on the desktop.

How is Mozilla able to offer all the same features in Firefox 4 /5 regardless of platform? Firefox on Android has all the same JavaScript and HTML5 features as Firefox on Windows / MacOSX.

Hi all, I am wondering that if this bug is related to

http://www.mail-archive.com/v8-dev@googlegroups.com/msg36885.html
https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=61016

and if it's already fixed after [deleted issue] is fixed?
Thanks,

Hi,

While experimenting with Android 4.0 IS, I found that WebWorkers are not supported on it. Does this fix address that issue ?

1. After this fix, do webworkers work on Android ?
2. If yes, then installing a nightly build should do it for me, Is that correct ?
3. Would you happen to know the public release vehicle for this feature ? i.e. when is the next update of android slated ?
4. Also, if webworkers do work, can one access the WebSql database from inside of WebWorkers ?

regards

[Comment deleted]

It seems Worker is not supported in ICS, and based on the branch timing, the fix seems not included in ICS branch.

See here for a comprehensive review of WebKit in Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich" by Sencha:
http://www.sencha.com/blog/galaxy-nexus-the-html5-developer-scorecard

Web Workers are not supported in ICS.

Yeah, I can see they are not supported in ICS. Just trying to find out what the plan is. Is there a plan to support them at all ? If yes, when ?

As per the earlier understanding the WebWorkers was disabled after eclair, that means
from froyo it was disbled.

Does this mean that the feature will still work in ICS even though it has issues,if enabled?

Experimented by enabling WebWorkers in ICS by 'ENABLE_WORKERS 1' and 'ENABLE_CHANNEL_MESSAGING 1' in config.h and Android.derived.v8bindings.mk.

Even though the below checks are passing with 'truetrue' after enabling WebWorkers in ICS,but a full-fledged webworkers testcase is still failing.
document.write(window.Worker != undefined);
document.write(typeof(window.Worker) === 'function');

As per webkit bug:61016 (https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=61016)(http://trac.webkit.org/changeset/93330)the fix was done for the 'In-process dedicated workers' in chromium port of webkit.So this implementation has to be ported to android as well, to support WebWorker fully in android?.

I looked into this last year, and what I found was:

Web workers won't work with the V8 javascript engine available in Android. It worked in Eclair, since JavaScriptCore was the JavaScript engine. V8 (as it exists in Android) doesn't support multiple execution threads.

You can try building with JSC enabled as the javascript engine, and enable web workers; but JSC is a bit slower.

Hope this helps.

Well, I don't have words to describe my disappointment... This was my last problem with Android.

This seems to be working in Chrome for Android.

Google has basically stopped developing the original Browser application, and I am guessing Chrome will replace it in Android 5.0.

If you are running an older version of Android that cannot install Chrome, then your problem won't be solved here unfortunately. Only tickets about the latest available code have even a slight chance of getting Google's attention here (sad but true).

I also tested reddit.com with your code.
The problem happens when you zoom in to a level where you can read the text comfortably. When you do this, the lines are not wrapped and you need to scroll from left to right to read each line, which is very annoying for the user.
This could be achieved with previous webview with NARROW_COLUMNS.
Is there a way to emulate this wrapping / reflow behavior with chromium?

Are you google people purposely pretending not to understand the problem? Is this some diversionary tactic to avoid acknowledging that you've broken something?

One more time just in case you really don't understand. We are talking about TEXT WRAPPING. In the old browser when you zoom a page to a legible size, the text reflows so that you don't have to scroll from side to side. Saying that it "works as intended" is saying "yes, we removed a vital feature for no reason, too bad".

[Comment deleted]

Yes, it is obvious. Google is probably trying to pressure web developers into creating mobile friendly websites instead of relying on text wrapping.  It is very annoying going to a new version of android and losing features. Back on gingerbread I had flash (amazon prime videos) and text wrapping. Now I have neither. Wonder what we lose next

Fix this or give us a proper working AOSP browser in return.

It is a scandal, the Nexus 5 is 50% worse for browsing the web.

I was thinking that perhaps Android could replace my laptop. I guess that idea is ludicrous if it can't even render a webpage legibly. I'm going to have to go crawling back to Ubuntu and ask that it forgive my wandering eye. Really, honey, it was just a fling. That other OS means nothing to me!

Even this page does not perform as intended, simply double tap the comment column to expand it, and watch the left column overlay the comments.

But that is probably an artifact of whatever JavaScript they use to keep that block in view.

But, if you have severe visual limitations, and need really large text, that floating block begins to obscure everything else.

Please, developers, consider not just how you perceive things should work, but how your uses may NEED them to work to survive.

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Can the comitter PLEASE prioritize this issue up? This is definitely NOT a small issue. I'm using a Wiki app which is not usable now. What else can be done to start a bigger wave towards Google in this case?

can anyone answer this question. Is this just an issue with the Nexus 5 or is this going to happen to any phone that gets upgraded to 4.4?

Re #32: It is an issue on my Nexus 7 (2012).

Re #32: It happens on every Android 4.4 device

Wow!  Unbelievable. Thanks for the info.  Was just going to switch to a Note 3, but that sounds like it will not help either once the 4.4 update hits.  Was just reading my android news off the android news app -- used to be so easy and now it takes forever to get through one article because of this problem.  

Would rooting the phone and putting on CM or another 4.4 ROM fix the issue?

#21 What exactly is the point of your post? Your screenshot shows that the text is so small as to be unreadable.

You guys keep saying "this is WAI", "this is WAI" but stop waving the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) in our faces and explain the real WHY.

People with poor eyesight are telling you that KitKat is basically unusable. The screenshots in post #7 clearly show the problem.

You've already got the antitrust issues based on this issue: http://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=62799 Do you think waving WAI around will save Google from lawsuits brought forward based on the Americans with Disabilities Act?

[Comment deleted]

It would seem that with this change, Google has decided that it is only interested in targeting people with good eyesight. Or maybe the people that work on this code are all young and literally don't see the problem. The AOSP browser was working just fine for me. What good is increased Javascript performance if I'm having a hard time reading the damn webpage? You call this progress?

I now regret buying a Nexus 5 at least a little bit because of this behavior.

Its been weeks since this glaring error was released, why hasnt it been fixed? Has there even been a comment from anyone on the development team saying how it slipped through and why it isnt fixed yet?

WAI? Realy?
Would you please shed more light on the "I" part of the WAI?

Dude, "Works As Intended" not web accessibility.

(I too can't understand why a broken stock browser is considered WAI.)

Who knows what they're really talking about. WAI or WAI, it doesn't change reality.

I've been using my Nexus 4 with Kit Kat some more. Okay, I'm starting to come around. Most sites display pretty good. Much less zooming than I used to have to do. Some sites still aren't on board yet but I'm seeing fewer of those all of the time. Chrome is actually quite usable now. Other browsers work well also if the wide viewport is turned off. But in all honesty, I'm liking Chrome. Still, if you should have to zoom in, you have scroll back an forth to read the text. Not the way to read a page.

[Comment deleted]

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UC Browser works properly

UC Browser does indeed work properly. Well, it's a little rough in places, but it auto-flows text brilliantly. Could someone perhaps explain how it is able to do this when the likes of Firefox and Dolphin can't and Chrome won't? I notice that it's only the 'phone' version of UC that does this - the 'HD Tablet' version can't reflow either. Mine's a Nexus 7 2. Thanks Gabe - I can get back to reading the web!

I would not use UC Browser because of the insane permission requirements. Anyway, based on the size of the download, they may be working with their own WebView. Another possibility is that in sending all of your traffic through their servers they manipulate the HTML.

The response to this bug is not unexpected. Google used to be a shining light for the "Hacker Ethic", but increasingly I see shenanigans. Maybe these developers are pressured and deep down they know better. If so, I understand, but don't pretend you don't know what text wrap is. And if you're going to throw around TLAs then at least have the courtesy to explain them.

WAI == What An Insult

This is really a serious issue. It impacts almost all the HTML based eBook readers as the reflow is one of the most important functions for HTML based reader. All the users and developers get suffered. I spent almost all the thanks giving holiday trying to find a work around. My app start getting many complains and 1 ratings because of this issue. Google, please take a serious look at this issue.

While UC browser works, its not a good idea to trust your web activities to a proprietary browser by an unknown company. Remember, a "free app" that is closed source and still manages to make money = they are collecting and selling your data.

Yeah i am a bit suspicious of uc browser as well and generally don't like
it much so while I am reading my news pages with it (text reflow is a MUST
HAVE feature) I still have chrome for other uses.  Must say I was in danger
of being a Google fanboi but this issue and the widespread dumbing down of
android that is Kit Kat has all but cured me.
I didn't expect to regret my decision to wait for the nexus 5

I sold my Nexus 5 because of this issue. Nightmare, Google, shame on you.

Thanks to Wugfresh I've gone back to Jellybean on my N7. Firing up my usual sites in Dolphin was a joy. I guess I'll sit this one out until Google figure out what WAI means. I have no illusions that they ever will (see Microsoft, who are nowadays clueless about UI), so in a couple of years when it comes time to update the tablet hopefully something else will have come along. It's been educational... cheers!

I have to say that the broken AOSP browser really is a no go for me. I will be looking at windows devices in the near future if this isn't fixed. The address bar doesn't hide, no flash(which will still a major part of the web despite being phased out), and no text wrapping. Chrome would be an OK browser if it had text wrapping, flash support and the AOSP browser's quick controls. Please give us a working AOSP browser for 4.4+!!!!!

Has anyone put the new cyanogen 4.4 Tom on to see if it fixed this problem?

A workaround is available. Instructions here:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2510676

There is no workaround in the thread posted above. That is an Aosp browser, with pie controls working. Text reflow still does not work. I'm not sure if this is another plot to force mobile sites upon the Web, but Google needs to stop it. Mobile sites are terrible, and most users would prefer a full site as long as zoom and reflow work properly, so that side scrolling is not needed. Listen to the people Google.

When you have many people returning phones because of the browser, that is a major problem.

I'm still holding off on 4.4 until something is done. but my quick question is in 4.4 does Gmail still reflow with a double tap?


I did notice on my older tab that I did screw up and update. instead of pitch to zoom you can do the double tap but hold the 2nd tap and slide up and down to zoom in and out like the need Google maps went too. which I hate there too

Pinch to zoom, followed by a quick double tap to reflow in Gmail still works thankfully. Why they would remove it from Web browsing blows my mind. I sent a hangout message to Eric Schmidt and Sundar Pichai, doubt it will do anything, but can't hurt.

[Comment deleted]

TextReflow works good only on "Opera Beta"

Good news: Just installed the 4.4.2 Update - and text wrap is back again!

On my Nexus 5 (4.4.2 stock) it is still not working...
Tried on Chrome, Chrome Beta, Next Browser andò Opera.

I'm not seeing it either. Tint or Naked browsers. Chrome never had it.

I tried it with my Nexus 7 on the wiki app Wikilin, where text wrapping did not work before with 4.4. So something must have been changed.

At post #62 - which browser? Of AOSP Browser wraps text on 4.4.2 as it used to do till 4.3 that's the best news of a day. Please confirm.

At post #63 - Opera is wrapping text correctly on 4.4 and 4.4.1. I don't know about 4.4.2 as I don't have it yet. Though Opera drains battery like there's no tomorrow.
Other browser which wraps text good on KitKat is Dolphin but only with Dolphin Jetpack enabled. It's battery friendly but it does not rendered xda forum correctly - it covers while page or parts of it with grey semi transparent layer which sometimes disorders and sometimes not. I reported it to Dolphin developers, they are supposed to be working on fixing it, but last two updates of Dolphin jetpack did not do any good about it.

@#66: Of what Opera version (there are a lot in Play Store) are you speaking about?

Pretty much all Opera browsers except mini have wonderful text reflow.

I guess the wikilin app also uses WebView, but I don't know. Just see its lost capability of wrapping is back again. It does not work in Chrome and Firefox, but in Dolphin.

It's called: Opera browser for Android
18.0.1290.67495
5th Dec.2013

UC Browser correctly does Text reflow on zoom. Chrome does not KK 4.4.2
Nexus 5 - Can I return my phone because of this? or maybe I can flash to a
4.3 ROM?

Neither Opera nor Dolphin works as far as I can see.  Text gets bigger and goes off both sides of the screen.  All double tapping does is make it smaller again to fit the screen -- then the print is too small to read once more.  Pretty useless.  

UC browser does work.  However, that does not help with apps that I use often like android news or similar apps.  

I am still on 4.4 as I have not received any update yet on either of my Nexus 5 phones.  

Again, has anyone tired rooting the phone and putting on CM or any other 4.4 ROM to see if text wrapping still works the way it is supposed to work?

Thanks.

Dolphin with Jetpack works with 4.4.2

Dolphin's Jetpack is an old webkit-based Android WebView that has been compiled by Dolphin.

UC Browser, as stated above in #48, uses the same kind of old WebView and/or they modify pages while sending traffic through their servers.

Similarly, some Opera versions have their own rendering engine and also proxy traffic, where it is modified.

None of this relates to this bug report other than to note that some developers are not using the WebView component included as part of Android. Here is the bug report requesting access to legacy WebView in Android:
https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=62293

Incidentally, if you are a user considering Dolphin see: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1319529
For UC Browser, note the comically intrusive permission requirements.

>> #21 mattga...@chromium.org
>>This is WAI..
So What? I understand the WAI is the initiative to help people with disabilities to access the web content better. I am wondering how does the android webview team at google can define the "better API" for disability people? Or you guys think the people with disabilities have better eye sight?
 

Hardly a "small"issue nor is it WAI unless you never browse the internet on your smart phone.  Which if is the case why are you here?

Huge issue that needs to be fixed.

They have not explained what they mean by "This is WAI". They probably mean "Working As Intended" and not the "Web Accessibility Initiative", but who knows?

Regardless, I do not think that anyone experiencing issue cares about reasons or excuses for why text wrap is broken.

I just dont understand why google removed this feature.

There are a lot of web pages that does not have proper mobile version. Old school table layouts, fixed width colums, small fonts, etc. I have good eyes, but I think text reflow is the most important usability feature for a mobile browser. Nobody want to scroll horizontally while reading an article, but now I have to choose: small unreadable text OR horizontal scrolling.

Temporary fix. I am on 4.4.1 Cataclysm rom. Running Dolphin with Jetpack also installed. Reflow works on many websites (with a few exceptions). No double tapping though. Pinch to desired size, and wait a few seconds. It reflows sometimes, if it doesn't, try a slightly different zoom level.

I say temporary because dolphin is a bloated battery hog (not as bad as chrome though), and also collects and sells browsing history.

I also agree Reflow is THE most important feature in a mobile browser. Stop trying to impose your "mobile version master plan" on the people, Google, and let us browse the way we want.

Could someone be kind enough to point me in the right direction for what Google considers is 'proper mobile version'. Just sending me to a perfectly formed 'google-approved' mobile site would suffice as I'll read the source code and go from there. It's just that with so many apparently different opinions on how to make the perfect site it's difficult to know what the best one is meant to be.

In any case, from where I'm squinting, such a scheme would obviously include a feature to reflow text after the user has set it to any.size.they.like. Just like it used to.

Finally all this talk of WAI is off base. The new paradigm (and not just with Google) is surely BAI ('broken as intended').

Google, why would you take away text reflow? It has to be one of the main reasons many of us preferred the AOSP browser. Try using it yourself and then ask "why did we do this?"

New webview is a nightmare for the game developers. html5 canvas is not hardware accelerated and hence, rendering performance is extremely poor. Apparently, Google had killed html5 game development with this release. Please star these bugs in a hope that it will be fixed by google.

https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=239864
https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=315111

This seems like a step backwards..

[Comment deleted]

[Comment deleted]

Stupid regression is stupid

I'll let this photo explain.

this tap and slide zoom is horrible. even in maps. bring back zoom buttons. going down this one finger slide to zoom is painfully bad. and "^^^ is right, Google you should feel bad.

Interestingly, no one from the press is interested in what, is for many, a debilitating design decision by Google.

Even this page is unusable in 4.4.2 when rendered by Chrome.

With the zoom set above 50% it renderes oddly and the input boxes can become unselectsble.

Blackberry has an awesome browser, WTF?

Its sad when Blackberry, poster child for poor execution of goals, can do something better then you (Google) can.

My Blackberry Playbook is a web usability Dream compared to my Nexus 5.

My new Dell Venue auto-updated a few days ago from 4.2.x to 4.3.  This also broke text re-flow in Dolphin; my usability on this tablet just went out the window!  WAI now sucks!!!

[Comment deleted]

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Accessibility text scaling doesn't work for me. on xda forums some fonts are large, while some are still small. On livejournal.com everything is still small ignoring the text scaling settings at all.

I am having the same exact problem as above. Browsing has become useless.

[Comment deleted]

Any chance of an update on this? Thanks

WTF, Google???

This is really AWFUL!!

Before I updated to 4.4., my Nexus 7 (2013) was a joy to use for browsing the web.

Now it's - in this regard - a POS; text wrap doesn't work anymore (an absolute STANDARD feature on mobile devices doesn't work anymore! Imagine that!!), and rendering / pinch to zoom / clicking links have become unbelievable LAGGY! Luckily I have a Xperia Tablet Z which works properly.

PLEASE fix this issue IMMEDIATELY! It's offensive against Android users!!!

Does Google want to test how far it can go without consequences? Is that one of a series of tests for the worldwide dictatorship of US IT corporations?

this isn't going to be fixed. Google doesn't want our business anymore.  

my nexus 7 13' will be the last Google os I buy. Samsung will have its own os soon. and I will jump ship

I know I'm using a lot less Android these days. I've found that I'm okay with that, though.

As a result of the spammy comments, I'm unstarring this issue.

I am extremely frustrated by this issue. I have a Nexus 7 (2012) and eagerly bought a Nexus 5 and I tell everyone to go Google for their next phone. I can't believe I'm honestly wishing I had gone with iOS devices now.

I'm finding Google is terribly slow at fixing really basic user issues, or just ignores them completely.

Text reflow is the only thing that makes a mobile browser usable!  Had to switch to Opera, seems to be the only browser that text flow works on these days.  Please fix!

Google, i'm sure there's a really strong reason for all of this, but even so, what's the hurry of rushing a major update if it f@C%s up one of the basics??

PLEASE, fix this, please!!

Priority-Small Really? Priority-Blocking would be less out of place.

Very annoying behavior of KitKat/Chrome makes me send my Nexus back. For people with bad eye sight it's not usable anymore. Esp. as envies in Email-apps do not text wrap anymore.

This will probably never be fixed just like the awful POST download bug reported years ago: https://code.google.com/p/android/issues/detail?id=1780

I have confirmed this on all browsers except for Opera. It also occurs in certain emails. I work at a large university in disability services. Due to this issue I cannot recommend Android to my visually impaired students.

In Dolphin browser you can change the text size to larger and it will flow properly at that size. Does that help? For some reason zooming breaks the text flow in KitKat.

I agree, please fix it!

Sticking with 4.3 on my Nexus 4, web browsing in 4.4 is terrible. Text reflow, inverted rendering and SCROLLING SMOOTHLY (come on Google, it's 2014) are all broken in Android 4.4. At least *try* to optimize Chromium for mobile. Get your act together, Google.

Why does Google insists it is WAI? Breaking most of websites at once is INTENDED? A lot of people want old behaviour back, many sites became unreadable and it is WAI... Come on! This is a serious bug, which affects both WebView and Chrome! I hope to see it fixed soon.

Well say

GOOGLE , FIX IT!!!

Text reflow is needed BADLY. please Google someone implement this function. Also inverted color is needed too. Web browsing at night is far too bright, even with the screen brightness set to minimum. Why were these features not added back to chrome? The point is to have feature parity and move forward, not regress and move backwards. I just can't see a situation where this decision was thought as a good one. Its so obviously needed for mobile browsing.

so you break a feature and mark it "working as intended" clap clap clap, absolutely useless.

"Status: WorkingAsIntended" What's that suppose to mean??

If it's working as intended then please "un"intend your intention, because it poorly, very poorly intended!

It's intended to you, not to the end user! But I guess you'r the ones who know... came on!!

Status: Broken As Intended.
Presumably Google sells more advertising that way. When reason fails, follow the money...

LOL.  "As intended"... means it moves users off Chrome to Opera or other browsers that support it.  I'm happy enough with Opera not to be concerned anymore.  But if Opera can do it well, and K9 mail can do it well, what's up with Google?  All I can think is it's a patent infringement and they are steering clear.... but it would be nice to know if they plan on a fix, so other browsers could support it too.

We are not planning to do any change in this regard. See the comments above and this link:
 http://developer.android.com/guide/webapps/migrating.html#Columns

Are you kidding me?
If this is working as intended please reconsider your meaning of "working".

Really, shame on you Google.

horrible... what do I do with my 7 now. I can just never update it?


ridiculous

How can you not plan "to do any change in this regard"???? This is a major
issue! Is there a reason for this? Is it a patent problem?

There may be few people complaining in forums or directly to you about this,
but I can guarantee you that a lot of us felling we're going backwards. You
had the upper hand in internet navigation with this, now in KK you're just
as good as anyone else when it could be so much better. Please fix it,
change your mind. This doesn't make sense at all.

Regards;
Ant�nio P. Cunha

-----Mensagem original-----
De: android@googlecode.com [mailto:android@googlecode.com]
Enviada: segunda-feira, 13 de janeiro de 2014 16:35
Para: cunhaad@gmail.com
Assunto: Re: Issue 36949180 in android: KitKat WebView text wrap no longer
works

Project Member #120 sgu...@android.com:

"We are not planning to do any change in this regard. See the comments above and this link:
 http://developer.android.com/guide/webapps/migrating.html#Columns"

"TEXT_AUTOSIZING boosts font size of paragraphs based on heuristics to make the text readable when viewing a wide-viewport.."

And what if the user find the text too small even with this "smart" algorithm? Why don't you let the users decide? Make text reflow optional, and problem solved. This TEXT_AUTOSIZING concept is simply bad. I hate it. There are a lot of web pages which are now unusable/unreadable for me. The whole browsing experience is a pain compared to the previous versions. After pinch-zooming to a comfortable text size I have to scroll _horizontally_ to read. Do you really think it is good? I think it's a bad joke...

This is potentially the stupidest most arrogant thing google has ever done

This decision by Google is the equivalent of giving every browser but Google Chrome a lobotomy, or as taking them from mature adulthood back to thumb sucking infancy. This wouldn't be quite as bad if Chrome was not terrible and the new webview extremely poor. Trying to own something by anticompetitive behavior rather than by competing on merit always results in an inferior product. This is Google's "Windows Vista" moment.
 
You see Google needed the hooks in software to incorporate the new features of Google Now in KitKat and therefore needed a new webview to accomplish that.  But, when they finished Kitkat, their new webview was not quite ready, was a kind of half baked creation.  Therefore, they knew that if they left legacy webview in place, absolutely no one would use the new Chrome based on their new webview engine, because it is so inferior to the many browsers that used the old webview, particularly for the vision impaired/elderly population.
 
From what I understand the following is what is broken in KitKat webview:

• text wrap no longer works
• cannot upload files
• cannot save passwords
• cannot force enable zoom
• no inverted rendering
• cannot play Flash videos (broken in 4.3 too)

So one can see that if all of the above did not work in Chrome, then Google in order to have Chrome survive, had to break all of the above in every other browser too.

"working as intended"? are you joking?
now please try to review your wrong intentions and fix this, asap.
thank you.

Come on Google - be a man and admit you got it wrong and fix it.

"WorkingAsIntended" is the status of this bug.  What is the intent?

When I found out about this a while ago I shook my head. What could possibly compel you, beyond a massive lawsuit or losing a drunken bet, to remove one of the most useful features in any mobile browser? Text reflow is an absolute must have feature on a lot of sites that either have no mobile site or a very poor one that forces you to use the desktop version.

Is it intended to cause people to resort to scrolling back and forth to view a page? Is it intended to make people use an actual magnifying glass to read a page on their phones? I've used Windows Phone 7, 7.5 and 8 as well as iOS and none of them have text reflow in the browser. It's an awful experience. Have any of your engineers and people responsible for this tried using it for any length of time? I'm betting you haven't or this would not have happened.

Just to say:fuck you google!

Next device will not be android powered anymore.

One commenter in The Register article linked above states the reason that Google "intended" to break text wrap is because it makes advertisements more visible.

Google devs, if you don't stand up for what is right, if you don't live by the Hacker Ethic, then what's the point of it all?

It seems that Dolphin has updated its browser or otherwise worked some magic so text reflow now works again on 4.4.

This is a terrible decision, I can't use my nexus 5  default browser or the gmail app to read email, I have poor eyesight and you have just killed the best feature of android off. Back to getting my mum to read to me!

#135 Dolphin now includes legacy WebView with KitKat version of browser as stated in their release notes. Too bad that app lives to phone home your data.

Since this bug is "intended", solutions:
-figure out how to include 5MB+ legacy WebView with your app. Don't forget the never-ending security ramifications!
-use a "ROM" like CM that has a working WebView and developers WITH A SOUL

Status:  WorkingAsIntended  
Priority-Small
Closed:  Jan 13  

The above only shows it's been done on purpose.
When company starts to think that they can do anyting and nend customers to their will, not takeing into account what the customers realy want, this is when the fall begins.
Since November 1st 2013 Chrome is uninstalled from my Nexus 5 and it will not come back any soon or ever if Google does not show comon sense.

This is just ridiculous. I am one of the first ones who bought an Android device, the good old HTC Hero when it first was launched.

Ever since I appreciated the superior browsing experience.

Now I don't and can't see and reason for why to stick with Android.

If the textsizing would work consistent I would be eine with it. But it just doesn't.

What a retrograde step!

Why institute such an idiotic step when utilising the internet is one of the more important functions of a large screen phone?

Plain stupid, no other way to describe it.

I'd really appreciate having the text in my browser be readable please.

Yes, some of us can read, given the chance.

http://imageshack.com/a/img546/6007/0wbf.png

wth were you thinking?

Wow! are we watching the slow motion metaphorical jumping of the shark here? It's like we now have the benevolent dictators from the softies and the fruits poisoning the dev teams. You know, the kind of asshats that respond to consumer concern complaints with if you want an xbone that works offline get an xbox 360 or mice should only have one button and try to convince themselves that they know whats best for EVERYONE. That's right bugs are now "features" in android.

Why ruin something that worked?

Still no solution, no answer?? REVERT!

NOW!!

why isn't this on all the tech blogs?  please forward this to any and all tech blogs.  

Reading websites in kk is abominable. This very site and threads like this one are always a pain to read. When I zoom in far enough to have readable text, the text from the upper left hand side zooms and floats over the commentary text. This happens on googles code site? Floating toolbars from so many websites get so large that there is barely a small space to be able to read the content that I am visiting the site for... Unacceptable.

Updated my HTC One to kitkat over the weekend and now reading e-mails in the Yahoo Mail app is a pain.  But at least text wraps when viewing the mail site in Chrome.  Was that the point?  This needs to be fixed ASAP!

Back to Opera Classic, which uses Opera's own rendering engine (the newer Opera uses same layout engine as Chrome).
Text reflow works great when zooming in that browser!

 (The 'single column mode' which you can enable from the settings, is only useful for zooming and reflowing text files (.txt); otherwise changes website layouts too much to be useful.)

Wow.  Google is the new Apple.  Time to start looking for a new OS.  And more services to replace Google.  Nice knowing you Google.  It was good while it lasted.

"Upgrade" to Chromium-based WebView is a major step back. No text reflow, scrollTo() rarely works, zoomOut() is broken, setInitialScale() is broken, standard find dialog inexplicably causes text size to change, showFindDialog() is deprecated (we are now all supposed to roll our own because you see, it's so hard that Google can't do it).  I wonder if people who brought us this "upgrade" are deliberately sabotaging ecosystem around webview and all the apps that rely on it or are simply incompetent?

Working as intended?? Do you so called 'engineers' actually browse the web on kitkat? Did you use the browser BEFORE kitkat? In which universe is the kitkat browser 'working'?? You need to make an option for the old webkit browser in kitkat at least, in 'typical' android fashion, freedom no? Or perhaps that's not so much on the agenda anymore?

You can't reason with these people. Many have tried. Wankers, basically.

Please fix text wrap. No longer functions after upgrading to kit Kat today.

Come on Google your OS has been great up until now. You've also been great at listening to consumers for the most part. We all feel you should reconsider this idea and bring back text wrap. Without it, browsing the web or even using your very own email apps is a major headache

This issue shows that even unbelievable things can happen, and last for a very long time. Is Google really telling its users that text wrap/reflow, in any web browser, will never be supported again at the Android OS level??

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I thought this feature only is worth to use an Android phone over an iphone. Now it is gone! Hard to believe. There can be no argument to justify such a stupid move. I still hope 4.4.3 will fix it, otherwise I will definitely get rid of my Nexus 5...

If i had known of this major BUG i wouldnt have bought a Nexus 7.

A major step back for Android.

I've reverted my device back to pre google breaking text reflow so I can still use the web browser. And I won't be upgrading till this is fixed, and if not fixed I'll be moving to a different OS.

When will this be fixed google??? Fix this please!! Put again text wrap!!

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I like Opera and Chrome but I'm using Opera because of the text wrap issue.

Text wrap was a very useful feature. It should be fixed ASAP.

Please bring text wrap back.