Support for older browsers that don't support ES6

[codercms]

Describe the problem

There's quite old issue - #12
But it does affect not only old versions of IE, Chrome, Firefox, etc., but it also affects SmartTV clients (TizenOS for Samsung SmartTV for example) or old versions of Android WebView.
For my particular case with TizenOS - async/await syntax does not support, but I'm sure there's pretty much things that TizenOS does not support from modern JS spec.
So, there's no way to make my app working on SmartTV's.

Describe the proposed solution

Is it possible to make this PR #6265 finally reviewed and merged?

Alternatives considered

If it's still impossible for some reason to accept PR I have mentioned, is it possible to publish some guide that will describe how to build SvelteKit client bundle into ES5?

Importance

would make my life easier

Additional Information

No response

[antony]

The effort of supporting abandoned / non-compliant browsers is monumental, and too time consuming to maintain for this small team. We simply can't afford to pay the ongoing price for somebody else's failures.

It's also burdensome to have all of this code in the code base, and impedes our ability to push forward quickly.

If you really need to get things working on older devices, I would suggest picking an older framework - Sapper worked pretty well on IE after a fair old bit of manipulation - see https://github.com/antony/sapper-ie

Having been there, done that, I feel your pain, but this isn't something that we intend to support.

I'll leave the old issue open as it has all of the context, but it is indeed an old issue, and I don't think it's still the aim.

EDIT:

After a discussion with some other maintainers, we feel it would be reasonable to support a subset of the use-cases that have been discussed on the other thread. It would be good to understand which specific older devices you're struggling with. It seems that Tizen uses a relatively up to date version of Chrome, for example.

We don't plan to provide inbuilt support for IE, nor any browsers older than a few years, for the reasons previously stated.

[PatrickG]

To run sveltekit apps on tvs, take a look at https://github.com/bfanger/tvkit
I have not used it, but it was specifically created to use sveltekit apps on tvs.

[nostrorom]

Hi !

I have made a longer post on the original issue supporting it as well #6265 (comment)

The TL;DR of it is while I and others fully understand the impossibility of maintaining compatibility with every legacy OS/browser under the sun, ensuring compatibility with @vitejs/plugin-legacy is a relatively low-cost/high-gain time investment, and has a worthy impact in terms of sustainability and environmental footprint.

I do hope this helps nudge the issue in the right direction :)