Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App • Hacker News Board

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#501

Post by danmaz74 » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 8:37 AM UTC

bearcobra wrote: post #261

ed312 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

off topic of the thread: do you have a strong opinion of Dark Sky vs Weather Underground?

I really like Weather Undergrounds local stations. Being able to see that a location at the top of a hill in town is a couple degrees cooler or windier than one down the street has proven to be really useful when decided to bring a jacket or not. That said Dark Sky's UI is top notch and the data seems to be pretty solid as well.

I love those... Except when those stations start working badly and it's impossible to disable them (a month going where I live in London)

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#502

Post by Aissen » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 8:42 AM UTC

"Browsers automatically translate text". I was not aware of non-Chrome major browsers having this feature, what have I missed ? Are they in fact targeting Chrome first ?

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#503

Post by Iolaum » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 8:52 AM UTC

glenneroo wrote: post #257

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.

I would take that even further and venture a guess that 99% of HN readers are not representative of the intended general userbase of 99% of the apps for ios/android.

On the other hand HN users influence is much greater than their numbers because many of them are doing tech support for family and tech advice for friends.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#504

Post by DeusExMachina » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:10 AM UTC

Iolaum wrote: post #503

glenneroo wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would take that even further and venture a guess that 99% of HN readers are not representative of the intended general userbase of 99% of the apps for ios/android.

On the other hand HN users influence is much greater than their numbers because many of them are doing tech support for family and tech advice for friends.

I used to do that a bit in the past, but not even my completely technologically illiterate father asks me anything anymore since he got an iPad.

While he is not the type to install new apps, all my friends are, and never ask me for any advice.

Anecdotal, but I think HN users do not have all the power you think they have.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#505

Post by ptx » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:15 AM UTC

There are some very strange arguments in this article.

One claimed advantage of a web app is: "An App Store developer license costs $99/year, whereas a Namecheap domain is less than $10/month". Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but surely a year has 12 months, making it actually more expensive? I guess it's an advantage if you expect your business to fail within 10 months?

Also: "Browsers automatically translate text, so web developers don’t need to do much extra work to reach foreign users."

...

What? Presumably the author speaks no languages other than English. Developers of native applications could easily run their UI strings through machine translation if they wanted to - but nobody wants that because the results are at best unprofessional and usually nonsensical gibberish.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#506

Post by danboarder » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:18 AM UTC

ptx wrote: post #505

There are some very strange arguments in this article. One claimed advantage of a web app is: "An App Store developer license costs $99/year, whereas a Namecheap domain is less than $10/month". Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but surely a year has 12 months, making it actually more expensive? I guess it's an advantage if you expect your business to fail within 10 months? Also: "Browsers automatically translate text, so…

Typo. Namecheap domains are less than $10/year.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#507

Post by muthdra » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:19 AM UTC

grogenaut wrote: post #500

mehulkar wrote: post #490

I'd like to venture another guess even further that this is possibly the furthest venture anyone can guess.

I'd venture you'd be wrong. I'd not venture to guess how deep one could venture.

I agree and I would go as far as distancing myself further to guess that you just ventured one guess deeper.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#508

Post by nnd » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:19 AM UTC

ptx wrote: post #505

There are some very strange arguments in this article. One claimed advantage of a web app is: "An App Store developer license costs $99/year, whereas a Namecheap domain is less than $10/month". Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but surely a year has 12 months, making it actually more expensive? I guess it's an advantage if you expect your business to fail within 10 months? Also: "Browsers automatically translate text, so…

Surely it meant to say, $10/year for domain registration? Either way, this is still nonsense. Besides App Store developer license can be reused for other apps and comes with other additional benefits.

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#509

Post by mongol » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 9:53 AM UTC

msravi wrote: post #467

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.

A few years ago, Flipkart was the leading e-commerce portal in India, and Amazon was a poor third, behind Snapdeal[1]. At some point in March 2015, Flipkart (and their fashion portal, Myntra) decided to go "app-only" on mobile[2], i.e., if you went to their website using a mobile browser, you would get shown a large interstitial to install their app, and nothing else. There was no option to proceed with their mobile…

Very interesting story. I must remember to ask my Indian colleagues about this

Re: Start with a Website, Not a Mobile App

#510

Post by Piskvorrr » Sat, Jan 05, 2019, 10:17 AM UTC

wvenable wrote: post #465

da_chicken wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. I don't give them permission to run code on my device arbitrarily and perpetually. Think of it like this: If Hacker News required a fat client to function on your desktop, would you actually be here at all?

Given that all websites are running code on your device, that seems like a distinction with a very small difference. The question is what has the better sandbox to protect yourself. The web is definitely better but somehow I still get tracked across sites and shown "relevant" ads. Mobile apps are also fairly well sandboxed and yet some apps that need your permission to do something useful also use that permission to…

It is much easier when being nice is enforced by a third party - in other words, the webpage might have an interest in taking all your cycles, but the browser app has an interest in the opposite (battery life and whatnot). So far, this seems to work well - for all the gripes of FB Messenger taking all the CPU and requiring every permission in the known universe, the FB mobile web gets adequately sandboxed by the browser.

(I am aware that the Android app model has also promised some sandboxing, but apparently even in a low-permission mode, the protection seems to be rather anemic)