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Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

atrium.co

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Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#71

Post by johannes1234321 »

sgt wrote: post #65

"No one wants to download apps anymore" I stopped reading there. The major advantage of the App Store (primarily for consumer apps though) is the fact that there's some kind of filtering at place. If I find a quality app, I want to actually pay for it. In fact, if it's a good app - then I prefer to pay, as it often ensures some kind of continuity in the app's lifecycle.

What kind of filtering is that? The fact that there is (hopefully) no malware? - A browser should prevent that as well and has similar failure rate as app review. The app store doesn't tell me anything about whether it's useful or of high quality or anything.

From my perspective many apps are single tab browsers with additional spying capabilities.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#72

Post by johnday »

wvenable wrote: post #36
Spivak wrote: post #11

> An App Store developer license costs $99/year, whereas a Namecheap domain is less than $10/month. I think you mean $10/year.

Web hosting will cost more than $99/year so not all the costs of the web application are factored into this article.

Sure, but there's a bit of apples and oranges here - for example, any modern internet-connected app would also need a server backend.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#73

Post by wuliwong »

orev wrote: post #18
onion2k wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On iOS you won’t get notifications or be able to run anything in the background. Ok, but what are the downsides?

As a user notifications are a problem, but as an app developer they absolutely work to drive engagement, which is why so many apps use them. So if you’re trying to run a business that’s a pretty important thing.

You think notifications are universally "a problem"? I find many notifications to be quite useful. Appointment reminders are VERY important to me and not at all a problem.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#75

Post by mbesto »

endorphone wrote: post #34
shams93 wrote: post #2

Given the fact that most people are already maxed out on apps on their device with just things like facebook and youtube, you're going to be hard pressed to get people to install your app just to try it out. With a progressive web app if they like your app they can add it to their device home screen without installing via the app store and without using up space on their device. Also don't need to pay Apple $100 a ye…

We've been hearing the same pitch for literally years. Heck, I've made some of them myself: "This is it, people! Native apps have been rendered unnecessary!" No PWA competes with a native experience. Not performance wise, not usability wise, and ultimately for the developer not even development wise. It may still make a lot of sense, and there are a lot of arguments for web apps, but the enthusiasm in this discussion…

> but the enthusiasm in this discussion seems disconnected from reality.

This isn't the OP's point. The point is there is more friction to download new apps today so coming out with a new native experience is going to much harder to do in today's world. It doesn't mean that this is the long term strategy.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#76

Post by mcny »

untog wrote: post #61
mcny wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you are an Apple engineer and can help get that shipped, I will buy you a nice dinner. If you're an Apple recruiter, hire me so I can help ship it! :) Not that I know anything not known publicly but I suspect the reason Apple iOS Safari does not have Web Push API is not because they lack developer resources to write the code to get it done. Apple is under tremendous pressure to increase revenue from its "service…

I don't think that's really true, because Apple has strengthened PWAs in a lot of ways in recent iOS releases. I personally suspect it has a lot to do with waking up a service worker outside of the browser lifecycle - given how aggressively iOS monitors apps no longer running in foreground I can imagine that being quite a hurdle to overcome (without compromising the reason for doing it in the first place).

> I personally suspect it has a lot to do with waking up a service worker outside of the browser lifecycle - given how aggressively iOS monitors apps no longer running in foreground I can imagine that being quite a hurdle to overcome (without compromising the reason for doing it in the first place).

I don't think this is true. Please correct me if I am wrong but there are ways to handle the scenario. Apple could create nsfirebase (basically an Apple version of Firebase for lack of a better name) and require all websites to talk to nsfirebase and the iOS device only needs to reach out to that particular end point on nsfirebase which minimizes battery loss. In addition, it could say something like your worker can only run in the background if a user has been to your site in the last n hours (where n is something Apple can monitor and update with any iOS release).

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#77

Post by cschep »

scarface74 wrote: post #3
shams93 wrote: post #2

Given the fact that most people are already maxed out on apps on their device with just things like facebook and youtube, you're going to be hard pressed to get people to install your app just to try it out. With a progressive web app if they like your app they can add it to their device home screen without installing via the app store and without using up space on their device. Also don't need to pay Apple $100 a ye…

On iOS you won’t get notifications or be able to run anything in the background. But if you are trying to start a business and the $100 a year you would have to pay to distribute your app will make or break you, you have bigger issues.

Using email as a notification service works in this case. The user probably gets a notification for new emails.. at least if they do they chose to. :)

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#78

Post by diminoten »

sinatra wrote: post #14

IMHO, the reasons mentioned are not very convincing. Your goal, when starting a product, is to find whether you serve a real user need or not. So, start with a website or a mobile app depending on what suits your users needs better. Where would a user naturally go (web or mobile) for that need? That's the platform you start with.

It takes longer to get to market with an app, especially if its your first. No contact with users == death.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#79

Post by troygoode »

egeozcan wrote: post #48
endorphone wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've been hearing the same pitch for literally years. Heck, I've made some of them myself: "This is it, people! Native apps have been rendered unnecessary!" No PWA competes with a native experience. Not performance wise, not usability wise, and ultimately for the developer not even development wise. It may still make a lot of sense, and there are a lot of arguments for web apps, but the enthusiasm in this discussion…

> (paraphrasing) No PWA competes with a native experience even development wise I'm personally too spoiled by the React debugging experience, and I'm saying this as a developer who mainly does C#. On the other hand, I know many developers who can't stand a line of JavaScript. The answer is here a huge "it depends, really".

React Native gives you the best of both

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#80

Post by scarface74 »

cschep wrote: post #77
scarface74 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On iOS you won’t get notifications or be able to run anything in the background. But if you are trying to start a business and the $100 a year you would have to pay to distribute your app will make or break you, you have bigger issues.

Using email as a notification service works in this case. The user probably gets a notification for new emails.. at least if they do they chose to. :)

Email delivery has its own set of problems - mostly spam filters.

Even when the email does reach the end user, most people get so many emails it’s easy to get lost in the noise.

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