Safari Technology Preview 242: Key Updates and Enhancements
Welcome to our deep dive into Safari Technology Preview 242! This release brings a host of improvements and fixes across accessibility, CSS, forms, HTML, and image handling. Below, we answer the most pressing questions about what's new and what's been resolved.
What is Safari Technology Preview 242 and how do I get it?
Safari Technology Preview 242 is the latest experimental version of Apple's web browser, designed for developers to test upcoming WebKit features. It's available for both macOS Tahoe and macOS Sequoia. If you already have it installed, you can update via System Settings > General > Software Update. This release incorporates WebKit changes between revisions 310187 and 310599, bringing a range of improvements and bug fixes.
What accessibility improvements does this release include?
Two key accessibility issues have been resolved. First, VoiceOver no longer reads text inside images that have the role="presentation" attribute, ensuring that decorative images are ignored as intended. Second, macOS accessibility support for customizable <select> elements using appearance: base-select has been fixed, improving the experience for users relying on assistive technologies.
What new CSS features are introduced in Safari Technology Preview 242?
Two notable CSS features have been added. The first is support for the attr() function from CSS Values Level 5, allowing developers to retrieve attribute values directly within CSS, enhancing dynamic styling. The second is the oblique-only value for the font-synthesis-style property as defined in CSS Fonts Level 4, which gives finer control over font style synthesis.
What CSS bugs were fixed in this release?
Several CSS issues were resolved. These include fixing @media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) not matching inside an iframe when the iframe's color-scheme was set to dark, and correcting position-try-order to interpret logical axis values using the containing block's writing mode. Other fixes address percent-height replaced elements computing stale widths in shrink-to-fit containers, the table cell nowrap minimum width calculation quirk being applied outside quirks mode, misaligned checkbox outlines, anchor-positioned elements not sticking when anchored to children of sticky boxes, pseudo-element sorting by tree order, ligatures causing a non-zero layout width for text with font-size: 0, :in-range and :out-of-range pseudo-classes not updating with readonly attribute changes, and view-timeline-inset serialization failing to coalesce identical values.
What improvements were made to forms and HTML?
In forms, a bug was fixed where <select multiple> did not always fire the onchange event when the mouse button was released far outside the element, improving form reliability. For HTML, the closedby attribute on <dialog> elements is now supported, enabling easier dismissal of modal dialogs. Additionally, three HTML parser fast path issues were corrected: handling escaped attribute values longer than one character, correctly detecting nested <li> elements, and using the adjusted current node for MathML and SVG integration point checks.
How does this release improve image handling?
A specific image-related bug was fixed: inserting an image with a srcset attribute into the DOM no longer causes unexpected behavior. This ensures that responsive images with multiple source candidates work correctly when dynamically added, enhancing page rendering performance and visual fidelity.