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What desktop apps do you use?

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#21

Post by SwellJoe »

tx wrote: post #19
nostrademons wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or it could be that other people have moved to the web sooner than you have. ;-) Most of the planning and early design work was done over Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Groups, and Skype. (We mostly moved to AIM/phone/going to each others houses when we dropped from 5 founders to 2.) FictionAlley.org has a staff of close to 200, all managed through Yahoo Groups and Yahoo Messenger. Even at work, I often find myse…

No kidding. :) Is this thread about working or talking? Surely it's hard to collaborate with people using desktop applications without an internet connection. The point I was trying to make is that "death of desktop" is a myth. A new buzzword, invented to get more PR for whoever is NOT developing "desktop software". While harsh reality is that there are applications and there are web applications . And we all make ou…

Tell us what you really think, tx! Don't hold back on our account.

Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#22

Post by SwellJoe »

tx wrote: post #19
nostrademons wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or it could be that other people have moved to the web sooner than you have. ;-) Most of the planning and early design work was done over Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Groups, and Skype. (We mostly moved to AIM/phone/going to each others houses when we dropped from 5 founders to 2.) FictionAlley.org has a staff of close to 200, all managed through Yahoo Groups and Yahoo Messenger. Even at work, I often find myse…

No kidding. :) Is this thread about working or talking? Surely it's hard to collaborate with people using desktop applications without an internet connection. The point I was trying to make is that "death of desktop" is a myth. A new buzzword, invented to get more PR for whoever is NOT developing "desktop software". While harsh reality is that there are applications and there are web applications . And we all make ou…

Oh, yeah, you're also wrong. The desktop is dead. It, and apparently you, just don't know it yet.

Sure, it'll be years before everything we do happens on the network...but not many years. It's just too damned convenient to have it floating in the cloud, accessible wherever you happen to be and with whatever devices you have handy.

Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#23

Post by nostrademons »

tx wrote: post #19
nostrademons wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or it could be that other people have moved to the web sooner than you have. ;-) Most of the planning and early design work was done over Google Docs & Spreadsheets, Google Groups, and Skype. (We mostly moved to AIM/phone/going to each others houses when we dropped from 5 founders to 2.) FictionAlley.org has a staff of close to 200, all managed through Yahoo Groups and Yahoo Messenger. Even at work, I often find myse…

No kidding. :) Is this thread about working or talking? Surely it's hard to collaborate with people using desktop applications without an internet connection. The point I was trying to make is that "death of desktop" is a myth. A new buzzword, invented to get more PR for whoever is NOT developing "desktop software". While harsh reality is that there are applications and there are web applications . And we all make ou…

'And if you ask people why they build web apps, the answer will not be "because desktop is dead"'

I actually started my career in desktop apps and moved to web "because desktop is dead". My first couple tasks projects at my current employer were Swing apps, IDE plugins, etc.

I was pulled onto web development because we basically can't sell desktop interfaces anymore. I'd prefer to do desktop software, IMHO it's easier (particularly in Java, where the web frameworks suck), but there's just no demand for it. Almost all new development at my employer uses a web front-end. Almost all of our competitors are still using thick-client desktop apps. When we go out to prospective clients and give demos, our web interface is a significant selling point.

'"web software" is almost never considered valuable enough to get people to open their wallets for'

Our customers give us close to a million dollars a pop for our webapps.

Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#25

Post by tx »

SwellJoe wrote: post #21
tx wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No kidding. :) Is this thread about working or talking? Surely it's hard to collaborate with people using desktop applications without an internet connection. The point I was trying to make is that "death of desktop" is a myth. A new buzzword, invented to get more PR for whoever is NOT developing "desktop software". While harsh reality is that there are applications and there are web applications . And we all make ou…

Tell us what you really think, tx! Don't hold back on our account.

Look, this discussion is getting silly. I can give you a list of 100 applications that will never go online. And you can give me your list of 100 applications that should be online. And both of us will be absolutely right.

But slogans like "desktop apps are dead" (just like popular "everything will be XML" a few years ago) are plain stupid. The application you spend most of your time in front of is a "desktop app", it's called a browser.

Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#28

Post by mynameishere »

I don't think we're being honest here. I use 5-6 different media players alone. Most of you seem to be boning up on your nerd credentials, because I don't see too many mentions of Doom or Quake, or MSFT Office, or Notepad, or IM clients, or Winzip/winrar, etc. The most popular dev environment seems to be Emacs. This tells me that your favorite language is still in diapers. I develop 10x faster in Eclipse than I ever could in Emacs. (I used emacs for a year coding C--it's okay, but its whole 'culture' harkens back to 300 baud modems.)

Some things that seem non-desktop, like Flash, really are in a sense--the connection to the browser and the web is very weak.

Re: What desktop apps do you use?

#30

Post by hello_moto »

SwellJoe wrote: post #22
tx wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No kidding. :) Is this thread about working or talking? Surely it's hard to collaborate with people using desktop applications without an internet connection. The point I was trying to make is that "death of desktop" is a myth. A new buzzword, invented to get more PR for whoever is NOT developing "desktop software". While harsh reality is that there are applications and there are web applications . And we all make ou…

Oh, yeah, you're also wrong. The desktop is dead. It, and apparently you, just don't know it yet. Sure, it'll be years before everything we do happens on the network...but not many years. It's just too damned convenient to have it floating in the cloud, accessible wherever you happen to be and with whatever devices you have handy.

Not quite actually.

Take 37signals app. I can't use it for work related because that would resulted in me storing the confidential work related items under their server. Work also takes much of your time.

Another example would be to store Word docs in Google. One slip-up and your word docs is searchable by Google.

So no, the desktop isn't dead yet.

In fact, I only use websites to read news and forums.

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