The web apps that will eat mobile • Hacker News Board

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#61

Post by pjmlp » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:26 PM UTC

mtgx wrote: post #53

bsbechtel wrote: post #30

Unpopular opinion here, but I just don't see PWAs living up to the hype. Yes, there are lots of technical advantages, they're catching up to native apps in capabilities, and there is reduced friction by bypassing app stores. However, the ingrained user behavior of downloading apps from the app store, trust of knowing what you're downloading by doing so (yes, even on Android), and browsability on mobile falling behind…

> there is reduced friction by bypassing app stores It's funny, because Microsoft seems to be actively encouraging/misleading developers to bundle their PWAs as "Microsoft Store apps". Seems like Microsoft is looking at PWAs from the opposite angle - an opportunity to "liberate" users from Android/iOS stores lock users in to its store. Will it work? That depends on all of you developers out there.

That is certainly their idea, PWAs on Windows Store are able to access UWP APIs.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#62

Post by xamarinthrw » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:28 PM UTC

mikece wrote: post #40

xamarinthrw wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you tell us a bit about your Xamarin experience? I want to create an app where the users would be regular mom and pop- my primary users would be windows and Android and a few iOS (iphone). Would you recommend I go the Xamarin way? Who is xamarin good for and who not?

I refer to my period as a Xamarin contractor as "bomb technician programming." The biggest advantage of Xamarin is also the greatest source of its problems: anyone who programs C# can start a Xamarin.Forms app and get a proof-of-concept sufficiently advanced to show their boss who will run it up the chain and get it approved as a project. And THEN the devs -- who are awesome web developers -- begin to realize just ho…

Thanks for your very helpful and detailed reply.

I take it that you didn't compare xamarin to anything besides pwa- I'm assuming it's your way of saying that anything else you evaluated didn't stand up to xamarin?

Please let us know if there are any helpful getting started pointers and also for pitfalls.

Right now PWA is not something I'm considering although I see how they are the future (and am glad they are)

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#63

Post by mikece » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:29 PM UTC

HillaryBriss wrote: post #54

mikece wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I refer to my period as a Xamarin contractor as "bomb technician programming." The biggest advantage of Xamarin is also the greatest source of its problems: anyone who programs C# can start a Xamarin.Forms app and get a proof-of-concept sufficiently advanced to show their boss who will run it up the chain and get it approved as a project. And THEN the devs -- who are awesome web developers -- begin to realize just ho…

> If you really want the app store exposure ... thanks. i got a lot out of your comment, but then you lost me when i read that. i mean, what are the benefits of app store exposure? it's a needle in a haystack. the standard experience after putting an app in the store is crickets. do users pay more attention to app store listings than they do to mobile web sites?

You and I know that, but some managers and companies soliciting mobile solutions only think in App Store terms. For these folks a PWA can be packaged and put in the store. And we can bill it as a value-add. :-)

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#64

Post by ams6110 » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:29 PM UTC

lazerpants wrote: post #51

iainmerrick wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically yes. This is his famous "reality distortion field."

Indeed. Somehow people even manage to forget that he died of a typically curable cancer because of his hubris.

Pancreatic cancer is serious business. It's not "typically curable" by any stretch. The 5-year survival rate is 1% - 15% depending on how early it's detected.

That said, his holistic approach to treatment didn't help him at all.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#65

Post by hrayr » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:34 PM UTC

elboru wrote: post #38

hrayr wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also don't forget his famous comments on no one will watch video on small screens and no need for big phones. I don't think any of his comments were lack of insight, rather it was him playing the market until he was ready.

Come on, so even his mistakes were not mistakes?

I'm the first one to criticize apple, but in this case they were clearly privately working on the things he was bashing in public. The only apple product I own is a macbook pro, so not your typical apple fanboy.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#66

Post by mikece » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:35 PM UTC

xamarinthrw wrote: post #62

mikece wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I refer to my period as a Xamarin contractor as "bomb technician programming." The biggest advantage of Xamarin is also the greatest source of its problems: anyone who programs C# can start a Xamarin.Forms app and get a proof-of-concept sufficiently advanced to show their boss who will run it up the chain and get it approved as a project. And THEN the devs -- who are awesome web developers -- begin to realize just ho…

Thanks for your very helpful and detailed reply. I take it that you didn't compare xamarin to anything besides pwa- I'm assuming it's your way of saying that anything else you evaluated didn't stand up to xamarin? Please let us know if there are any helpful getting started pointers and also for pitfalls. Right now PWA is not something I'm considering although I see how they are the future (and am glad they are)

I’m not exclusive to PWA and Xamarin; React Native is huge right now and Google is pushing Flutter heavily (in order to ease the transition from Android to Fuchsia, but I digress). And Swift/ObjC with Xcode and Kotlin/Java with Android Studio are always solid options and the ones Apple and Google officially recommend if you ask them.

The stacks and options are just tools in a box; I believe in using the right tool for the job (or the tool required for the contract) rather than being a tool about this stuff. But if asked my opinion I will default to PWA until I know there's a feature requirement beyond PWA's growing abilities.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#67

Post by jmull » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:36 PM UTC

judah wrote: post #9

PWAs indeed have a bright future. Apple's iOS Safari remains terribly lagging behind in PWA support. Even the latest iOS 12 beta support for PWAs is utterly broken[0], including full reloads on suspend/resume, local storage gets blown away on reload, no icon, incomplete support for web manifest, and much more[1]. A charitable interpretation of this would be, Apple hasn't felt the need to keep its PWA support up to pa…

"A cynical interpretation is that Apple is deliberately dragging their feet because PWAs undermine their $99/year + 30% app price + 30% in-app purchases business."

That interpretation doesn't make sense. The $99/year/active developer is a nominal amount -- sofa change to Apple -- that couldn't sanely affect the Safari development roadmap. The 30% is a much a larger amount (though still small to Apple's scale), but PWAs don't compete for that money; a PWA developer looking to monetize their app doesn't have an alternative monetization platform/store with anything like the reach into the iOS device market. Put another way: a PWA developer looking to monetize their app is surely going to release it through the Apple app store anyway.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#68

Post by tjoff » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:37 PM UTC

zwieback wrote: post #36

bsbechtel wrote: post #30

Unpopular opinion here, but I just don't see PWAs living up to the hype. Yes, there are lots of technical advantages, they're catching up to native apps in capabilities, and there is reduced friction by bypassing app stores. However, the ingrained user behavior of downloading apps from the app store, trust of knowing what you're downloading by doing so (yes, even on Android), and browsability on mobile falling behind…

Depends on the user, I might be an outlier but my "ingrained behavior" is to not download an app unless I absolutely have to.

So the solution is to automatically download and execute anything and everything?

The 90s called and want ActiveX back.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#69

Post by innagadadavida » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:40 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #35

jaegerpicker wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I very much agree, we evaluated PWA vs native recently and found PWA(on iOS) to be a really poor decisions. We likely build one for Android as the experience is better there but it's very poor on iOS and unlikely to get better anytime soon(next 1-2 years).

At this point, isn't Apple actively delaying PWAs? It seems like it, based on their recent sluggishness in adopting web standards in Safari.

The nice things about standards are that there are so many to choose from. Looks like Apple is making their own standard just like Google.

Re: The web apps that will eat mobile

#70

Post by Yetanfou » Tue, Jun 05, 2018, 3:41 PM UTC

zwieback wrote: post #36

bsbechtel wrote: post #30

Unpopular opinion here, but I just don't see PWAs living up to the hype. Yes, there are lots of technical advantages, they're catching up to native apps in capabilities, and there is reduced friction by bypassing app stores. However, the ingrained user behavior of downloading apps from the app store, trust of knowing what you're downloading by doing so (yes, even on Android), and browsability on mobile falling behind…

Depends on the user, I might be an outlier but my "ingrained behavior" is to not download an app unless I absolutely have to.

Indeed, the assumption being that those who do their utmost best to steer users towards an app when a simple site would suffice for the purpose have ulterior motives, most likely related to data collection on said users.

This growing aversion to device-specific apps is actually a good thing in itself. Remember when web sites used to state that they were 'best viewed with browser X at resolution Y'? The rise of Firefox and the related demise of Internet Explorer (I wrote 'Internet Exploder' initially, a habit very much ingrained after years of suffering at the hands of Github's new overlord) did away with that nonsense, the web was slowly starting to live up to its promise of universal access no matter the OS or browser vendor. Then apps showed up, and with them the balkanisation returned with vengeance: to access this service you need to use iOS, Android app under construction, no plans for other devices, sorry 'bout that.

There is a space for apps: games and other performance/timing-critical applications which are hard to implement using web technologies. Applications which by nature are device-specific, e.g. Android Xposed, firewall apps, etc. Things like checking the bus times or booking a train ticket should never require an app.