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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

#341

Post by notatoad »

arthurofbabylon wrote: post #302
marcinzm wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has a financial incentive for making the browser as bad as possible for anything complicated. After all, they don’t get a 30% cut from browser apps.

Actually, they do get a cut from "browser apps" in the sense that they are paid by a big search/surveillance-based ad company to make their search engine default in the browser. And again, they have a huge financial incentive to make the browser as good as possible because it makes the hardware as useful and wonderful as possible, which are currently the two most important factors for the most successful product that…

>I'm kind of surprised by these 'browser is so bad' comments. Anyone here tried to make a browser before? Anyone make one less buggy than Safari?

not personally, but firefox and chrome both exist and are much better than Safari. Are you trying to argue that it's not possible for Safari to be better than it currently is?

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#342

Post by cube00 »

ohithereyou wrote: post #240
king_magic wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No PWA competes with a native experience. Sure they do. Consider Reddit's website (well, before the atrocious UX updates the past few months) vs. their mobile app. It work(s)/(ed) perfectly fine. There's literally no reason to use their native app (well, other than their ridiculous, atrocious, never-ending prompts on their mobile website to use their native app).

Here's a tip - take any reddit URL and add '.compact' to the end. Example: https://www.reddit.com/r/all/ becomes https://www.reddit.com/r/all/.compact This uses the original reddit mobile site. It is very fast and clean.

At least they are consistent, go to the compact site, giant banner appears:

> You've been invited to try out reddit's new mobile website! try reddit's mobile website

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#343

Post by kyle-rb »

freehunter wrote: post #320
kyle-rb wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On one hand I can see rational reasons for them not allowing it; Apple doesn't control when you push updates to your PWA, so they don't want to give their seal of approval by listing it in the app store. But on the other hand, it's pretty depressing to give up the dream of instant app updates, by wrapping your shiny PWA in Cordova and promising to never execute external JavaScript.

I recently picked up app development and I went for React Native + Expo. I was shocked that I could push OTA updates without going through the store. Basically if my app was approved once, I can make huge sweeping fundamental changes to the app without running it past Apple again. Basically the only things you can't change are the permissions. Anything else is fair game. And with Expo it was basically trivial to get…

Oh, cool. I think I was confused about Apple's rules on this. I guess you are allowed to push minor updates to your app, as long as it's JavaScript being executed by their JavaScript engine/WebKit.

But apparently there is (or at one point was) a restriction that says you're not supposed to add new features via remote executable code pushes [0] (although I'm not sure if they'd notice).

[0] https://rollout.io/blog/updating-apps-without-app-store/

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#344

Post by VLM »

sobrevivendo wrote: post #306
airstrike wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't even bother installing apps anymore, I don't have time to research whether or not they are going to abuse my privacy or have some horrendous TOS. I'm going out on a limb but I'd wager you're not exactly representative of the general userbase for which apps are developed.

HN users represent < 1% of the userbase. But people often ask their opinions on tech products, so it is hard to claim whether they matter or not.

If you slice the demographic data finely enough, everyone is a member of a tiny minority.

My non-technical retired mom also only uses about ten apps, for basically the same reasons, although she doesn't have the vocabulary and jargon we have to succinctly explain the same concepts. AFAIK its the same for my wife, aunt, and sister (different people, LOL) who mostly use Facebook app, being middle aged women.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#345

Post by rock_hard »

sslayer wrote: post #273
dave5104 wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also called the Malkovich Bias.

I disagree with the 99% estimate, I too take the same approach, and recommend the same to those who will listen. I would venture that number to be at least 80%

So you are saying that out of the 3B smart phone users in the world 600M will never install a app ever because they fear the abuse of their privacy or some horrendous TOS?

Yeah, no!

I think your intuitive judgement failed you here

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#346

Post by Babiker »

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…

That's because Apple and Google are doing everything in their power to keep apps tied to their app stores. If they wanted to they could make progressive apps runs as smooth as native apps tomorrow by enabling better native integration, but they won't.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#347

Post by choward »

wholinator2 wrote: post #245
djhalon wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious, did you start using HN with the mobile app or migrate to it after you realized the usefulness of the website?

I migrated to the mobile app after discovering the site. I find the app greatly increases the readability of the site by adding just a few more colors, some icons for particularly popular threads, and a palatable dark mode.

So nothing that couldn't be solved by a better mobile friendly web site?

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#348

Post by [deleted] »

syrrim wrote: post #323
sosborn wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you post a photo on instagram in a web browser? I thought that was reserved for the app.

Add a file input -> the users taps it -> ios asks if they want to use an existing photo or take a new one -> take a new photo. Result on android may differ.

[deleted]

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#350

Post by nybble41 »

matte_black wrote: post #297
distant_hat wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given how well known user+site@gmail.com is wouldn't many sites simply strip the +... part before selling the email data?

Yes, this is part of standard data cleaning practices. You always remove whatever custom formats a provider allows to get the raw minimum email address (this is only for export, you still send official communication with a user to their original specified address).

There's a simple solution for that: always include a label as part of your address, and treat any mail that doesn't include one as spam.
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