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Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

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Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#31

Post by mikodin »

dehef wrote: post #25

Just be aware that ionic3 is full of bugs. You can use angular 4 which is absolutely ready now. Ionic is full of promises (literally and figuratively), but it is not even ready as a beta. - I spent days to make workaround for making it work. Even basic things like routers. - I suffered a lot with its build process. Transpiling my typescript is a so much pain for my mac. That is even worse than when I compiled java ye…

Interesting that you had so many pain points. I like Ionic, don't love it but I find it to be very very easy to work with.

I don't mean to flame, I just want to provide a counter example as I was using Ionic on the day to day basis for about 5 months.

- I find the router to be very easy to use, requiring no work arounds, you call the nav controller and push / set a view, nothing crazy here.

- The build process, specifically for the TypeScript? Are you using the CLI? There's just about nothing you need to do

-I was able to start fresh on a mac and have everything up and running for both Android and iOS within 2 hours (this is mostly installing the Android SDKS).

- And the live reloading will reload your entire app within 20 seconds, and this was on a pretty large Banking application using most of the plugins that are available (Camera, fingerprint, maps, etc etc etc).

Note that this is all done through using the Ionic CLI, which really eases the development process. I personally wouldn't try it without the CLI.

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#32

Post by sotojuan »

I think buildings sites as PWAs is a good idea but it'll take some time for them to actually replace apps. As other commenters have said, user habits go straight to apps. And until Apple decides to support service worker in iOS Safari, it won't have the same functionality as on Android.

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#33

Post by e12e »

scaryclam wrote: post #16
aeorgnoieang wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being able to use the 'app' offline is a pretty important feature tho. I almost always have web access, but most apps also almost never need it (for me to do what I want to do).

This really depends on what the app is . A few of my friends use apps to look up when the next bus is coming. I use the official website. There's zero need for their apps to be available offline, they only thing they're for is looking up the next bus, which requires an internet connection. The app in this case gives absolutely no advantage to the website. I find that's the case for a lot of phone apps

> look up when the next bus is coming

That's ridiculous argument against offline use - bus schedules are small enough data that we print them out and carry them in our pockets.

Sure, if the bus company socks, it might be nice to know about changes due to roadwork, real-time updates (ie look up the next bus via it's gps location and speed) - but doing off-line route planning would be a great feature...

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#34

Post by k__ »

jawns wrote: post #3

So it sounds like PWAs now make this true: > You don't have to create a native app because PWAs now offer all the functionality of a native app. That's cool. But _this_ has been true for a while: > You don't have to create a native app because a mobile-friendly website offers all the functionality you need. I use (reluctantly) a bunch of apps that really should be just websites. They don't make use of my phone's came…

Isn't the reason for stuff like NativeScript and React-Native that stuff like PWAs and PhoneGap weren't good enough?

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#35

Post by conroy »

e12e wrote: post #33
scaryclam wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really depends on what the app is . A few of my friends use apps to look up when the next bus is coming. I use the official website. There's zero need for their apps to be available offline, they only thing they're for is looking up the next bus, which requires an internet connection. The app in this case gives absolutely no advantage to the website. I find that's the case for a lot of phone apps

> look up when the next bus is coming That's ridiculous argument against offline use - bus schedules are small enough data that we print them out and carry them in our pockets. Sure, if the bus company socks, it might be nice to know about changes due to roadwork, real-time updates (ie look up the next bus via it's gps location and speed) - but doing off-line route planning would be a great feature...

It sounds like you're not a daily bus rider. The printed bus schedules are useless due to delays. I take transit into work everyday and you need to know when the next bus is coming or you risk waiting at a station for twenty minutes.

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#36

Post by msla »

e12e wrote: post #33
scaryclam wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really depends on what the app is . A few of my friends use apps to look up when the next bus is coming. I use the official website. There's zero need for their apps to be available offline, they only thing they're for is looking up the next bus, which requires an internet connection. The app in this case gives absolutely no advantage to the website. I find that's the case for a lot of phone apps

> look up when the next bus is coming That's ridiculous argument against offline use - bus schedules are small enough data that we print them out and carry them in our pockets. Sure, if the bus company socks, it might be nice to know about changes due to roadwork, real-time updates (ie look up the next bus via it's gps location and speed) - but doing off-line route planning would be a great feature...

In Missoula, Montana, where I live, the Mountain Line app shows you where every individual bus on a given route is, and computes ETA to a selected bus stop.

I'm pretty sure that's common functionality.

(To be honest, the Mountain Line is very punctual, so I could likely do just fine with just a printed schedule.)

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#37

Post by jimktrains2 »

jawns wrote: post #3

So it sounds like PWAs now make this true: > You don't have to create a native app because PWAs now offer all the functionality of a native app. That's cool. But _this_ has been true for a while: > You don't have to create a native app because a mobile-friendly website offers all the functionality you need. I use (reluctantly) a bunch of apps that really should be just websites. They don't make use of my phone's came…

> > You don't have to create a native app because PWAs now offer all the functionality of a native app.

I didn't think you could do arbitrary network or disk I/O. The sandbox is really, really nice for many applications, but PWAs aren't suitable for all native applications.

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#39

Post by WoodenChair »

maxsilver wrote: post #19
criddell wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author also points out (correctly) that web apps are smaller than their equivalent native app. That's nice, but I'm not terribly constrained as far as storage goes on my phone. I am constrained by battery life and data consumption.

> The author also points out (correctly) that web apps are smaller than their equivalent native app. Well, the author straw-mans that web apps are smaller. Yes, web apps are lighter than equivalent native apps. But not to anywhere near the degree described in the article. There's no legitimate reason for the Starbucks app to be 100MB. None. A native Android app equivalent to the PWA in the article would come in at ab…

Even worse every time you go to Starbucks.com you might re-download all of the junk. If you use it multiple times a day, that's a lot of wasted bandwidth compared to a slim (unusual in these days) native app.

Re: Betting on the Web – Why I Build PWAs

#40

Post by [deleted] »

conroy wrote: post #35
e12e wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> look up when the next bus is coming That's ridiculous argument against offline use - bus schedules are small enough data that we print them out and carry them in our pockets. Sure, if the bus company socks, it might be nice to know about changes due to roadwork, real-time updates (ie look up the next bus via it's gps location and speed) - but doing off-line route planning would be a great feature...

It sounds like you're not a daily bus rider. The printed bus schedules are useless due to delays. I take transit into work everyday and you need to know when the next bus is coming or you risk waiting at a station for twenty minutes.

[deleted]
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