Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#391

Post by s73ver » Thu, Jul 27, 2017, 11:39 PM UTC

SquareWheel wrote: post #101

egeozcan wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know that the need for citation goes both ways and anecdotal evidence isn't a real reference, right? Web developers know at least JS, HTML & CSS. Too many know Ruby, Python and/or PHP. Significant amount of them know C#/Java/Go or something similar. Then there is Typescript, all those compile-to-js languages and so on. I've never ever seen a web developer who could only program in JS. That would be very ridiculou…

I'd also add SQL to your language list, and often SASS, gulp/grunt configuration, JSON, ASP.NET, and so on. And come on, JS is a C-style language. If you know one you know them all. It's also not a difficult jump to OOP languages; especially now that Java 8 supported lambdas and C# supports async/await. It's hard to learn concepts, not syntax.

If that's the case, then we shouldn't hear any complaining about having to learn Java, ObjC or Swift.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#392

Post by crispinb » Thu, Jul 27, 2017, 11:40 PM UTC

interpol_p wrote: post #91

christiangenco wrote: post #65

I think a lot of commenters here are missing the point and getting distracted by push notifications (who wants a website spamming them with notifications?) and loading screens (hardly a feature). Apple supporting PWA (Progressive Web Apps) is hugely important because it enables a future where web apps can natively support browser, Mac/Windows/Linux desktop, and mobile iPhone/Android/Windows native mobile with a singl…

But as an iOS user I expect you to use the technology stack provided by my preferred operating system. I don't want to use your app if you're targeting a lowest-common-denominator feature set. When I change my preferred text size through accessibility settings, good native apps respond correctly. If I need voice over support, the operating system knows how to read the view hierarchy to me in a logical way. When drag-…

> But as an iOS user I expect you to use the technology stack provided by my preferred operating system.

As an iOS user I don't expect Apple to mandate your preferences for me

> There are thousands of tiny details that your web app just won't have. Those details are more important than your familiarity with a tech stack or how long it takes you to deploy something.

They are more important to you. They may not be to me if they prevent an app I need being made, or being available cross-platform (much more important to me than it being perfect on any one), or being affordable (to me).

The notion that every app must be the perfect gold-plated 'delightful' experience is corporate marketing drivel. It is relevant to some (people and apps), but not others. We don't need the personal tastes of some precious souls to be mandated for all of us by the platforms we happen to use (today).

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#393

Post by crispinb » Thu, Jul 27, 2017, 11:59 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #142

drusepth wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>But as an iOS user I expect you to use the technology stack provided by my preferred operating system. I don't want to use your app if you're targeting a lowest-common-denominator feature set. I would wager that the average quality of an iOS app written by someone like OP that "has a web experience and _has_ to learn iOS just to work on that platform" will probably be lower than if that person (with web experience)…

> iOS app written by someone like OP That's a business choice that they made, and will suffer for. If a developer and business choose to half-ass the native iOS application, there's no reason to believe it would behave any better on iOS when written as a webapp. > the tools they need to write the best product they can The best product that can be made will never be made with cross-platform tooling. It will always be…

> The best product that can be made will never be made with cross-platform tooling

True or not, this is only relevant if it's indubitable that every app has to be 'the best product that can be made' in terms of platform-centric gold-plated polish. But it's not. Values often clash and tradeoffs are made. For some apps I would prioritise cross-platform availability far above platform polish. For others the converse is true. Some products don't merit the effort or expense of being 'the best product that can be made'. Others do.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#394

Post by yladiz » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 12:22 AM UTC

jwong_ wrote: post #217

christiangenco wrote: post #65

I think a lot of commenters here are missing the point and getting distracted by push notifications (who wants a website spamming them with notifications?) and loading screens (hardly a feature). Apple supporting PWA (Progressive Web Apps) is hugely important because it enables a future where web apps can natively support browser, Mac/Windows/Linux desktop, and mobile iPhone/Android/Windows native mobile with a singl…

What are you storing in your contacts database that's so huge that it can't be loaded over the network every time? Are you hand-writing notes and storing the notes as images? I use Apple/Google's built-in notes fields on the default addressbooks and it works just fine. I can't imagine having huge write-ups on individual contacts unless it was for some business purpose. In that case, I'd move to a dedicated note-takin…

He is probably concerned about users who cannot use a network all the time or have slow connections. Many phones have LTE but trying to load some modern websites over slower 4G, or even slower 3G, is a nightmare, not just from the size but also if they're not on a proper CDN.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#395

Post by SquareWheel » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 12:33 AM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #176

SquareWheel wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't you want that? PWAs are seamless (no downloading/installing), allow native features, can be saved offline for later, run in a secure sandbox, and are completely open and cross-platform.

And that was such a great experience with Java applets....

False equivalence. The points I listed above were not true for Java applets.

Applets were not seamless (requiring a plugin to be installed), did not allow most native features, and ran in anything but a secure sandbox.

They were open (by nature of the JVM), and cross-platform, but that's it.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#396

Post by SquareWheel » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 12:41 AM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #182

yellowapple wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure it boils down to "we're fancy iOS users who want nothing to do with those peasants over in the Android world". It seems like the majority of the comments opposing web apps oppose them because they're cross-platform and not written specifically for their chosen platform, which is a very silly stance to have. There are some more coherent arguments in play, don't get me wrong (in particular, the argument…

It's not. I feel the same way as 'interpol_p, and I'm an Windows/Linux + Android user. The webapp ecosystem is making the same class of mistakes pure-Java UIs used to. They assume e.g. that a textbox is just a rectangle on a screen that you can type stuff in. But it's not just that; it's much more . Each operating system has a large set of default UI behaviours and idiosyncrasies. Continuing the example, a native tex…

>On top of that add resource waste (spinning up a webview and parsing heavy markup languages just to show a bunch of buttons)

Hold on - do you know what a progressive web app is? We're not talking about apps like Slack which bundle a browser inside of them - we're talking about webpages that behave like applications.

>many vendors do not care about making their webapp work correctly when connectivity is limited, spotty or lacking.

Offline support is a key feature of PWAs, so this point is moot.

>Each operating system has a large set of default UI behaviours and idiosyncrasies.

Browsers are completely able to define their own design language, so a text box need not look the same in every browser. As long as they conform to common standards, everything will work fine.

As such, you don't get the Java problem where everything must conform to the same style, and thus feels foreign in different environments.

>I want my applications to be performant, platform-consistent and interoperable. Web apps fail at all three

PWAs excel at all three. That's the whole idea.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#397

Post by Aaargh20318 » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 1:41 AM UTC

erikpukinskis wrote: post #353

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A website is not an app. Not sure why I need to explain that.

Sure they are. Web sites are a subset of apps.

No they aren’t. Websites are a subset of documents, not apps.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#398

Post by Spivak » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 2:03 AM UTC

euyyn wrote: post #388

scaryclam wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a day to day occurrence, within Web development teams who have different preferences in browser. I've witnessed it in multi companies over the last decade. If you've not noticed it, then it's highly likely you're not testing outside of a single browser. The fact that you think this is a 90s issue shows that you're either extremely junior and arrogant, or totally out of touch with modern Web development. Either t…

If you're talking of the need to use polyfills, and test in multiple versions of multiple browsers before pushing to production, I think it's incomparable to having to write multiple native apps. If you're talking about fonts rendering differently, or some line being some pixels further to the right, same thing; incomparable. If you're talking about corporate web apps written for IE, those aren't accessible from a ph…

> I think it's incomparable to having to write multiple native apps.

It's not comparable to writing multiple native apps, but it's the exact same model as having to use cross-platform toolkits like QT. The web has just replaced OS with browser.

> taking about fonts rendering differently

This mimics what happens when using something like QT or Java since they at least try look kind of like the platform they're running on.

> talking about corporate web apps written for IE

IE & Chrome specific features are exactly kinds of things that make cross-browser development just like cross-platform development. Your site either has to use the lowest common denominator or be littered with platform ... err browser specific code -- exactly like native apps.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#399

Post by CountSessine » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 2:54 AM UTC

marcosdumay wrote: post #312

falcolas wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> iOS app written by someone like OP That's a business choice that they made, and will suffer for. If a developer and business choose to half-ass the native iOS application, there's no reason to believe it would behave any better on iOS when written as a webapp. > the tools they need to write the best product they can The best product that can be made will never be made with cross-platform tooling. It will always be…

> My proof for this? Java programs. TCL programs. Electron programs. Do you feel the same way with QT? There's a reason all of those you cited failed. That reason is not "a cross platform environment can not be good".

Do you feel the same way with QT?

Yes!

Qt is a nice library, and was almost certainly the right choice for an open-source application like Wireshark that had previously used the execrable GTK lib on non-X11 platforms, but Qt tries really hard to make water not wet in MANY cases.

Just look at what it takes to get a Mac Qt application to work well in full-screen mode on multiple monitors. Or handling keyboard-focus changes when a notification window pops up (especially one for iMessages). Or any number of things where the underlying platform libs on Windows, MacOS, and X11 differ significantly.

People who've only programmed web applications don't understand how weird platform GUI libraries are or how many corner-cases they have, especially when dealing with multi-window applications, keyboard focus changes, and notification & tool windows. Programming an application to this stuff is tricky - wrapping it in a cross-platform lib is nearly impossible!

Qt exactly proves the point that cross-platform libraries will NEVER give you the same high-quality experience that native applications written to the platform libs will.

Re: Apple’s refusal to support Progressive Web Apps is a detriment to the web

#400

Post by DerekL » Fri, Jul 28, 2017, 3:24 AM UTC

Jyaif wrote: post #16

Fundamentally, it's Apple's refusal to allow real 3rd party browsers that is the problem.

Actually, 3rd party browsers are now allowed on the App Store, with a few restrictions. Previous, section 3.3.2 of the developer agreement prevented the downloading and running of any code, except for JavaScript running inside iOS's JavaScriptCore. But the June 5th agreement allows any language and interpreter. There are two limitations. The system makes it impossible to run unsigned code, so JIT compilation is out. Also, an app can't establish its own app store, so Google would have to get special permission for the Chrome Web Store.