461–470 of 599 posts
Hall of shame: * Reddit won't let you read "unreviewed" content on mobile web (but will on desktop web) * PayPal won't let you pick your 5% rewards category, or set up balance auto-replenish without their app * Robinhood Banking won't let you see your credit card statement or pay your balance without their app * Instagram won't let you share posts as stories without their app * SeatGeek won't let you attend events wi…
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Apps generally have a lot more access to the user info than Web sites. I remember getting into an argument, here (one-sided, I didn't argue then, and I won't now), about how a Web site is just as intrusive and privacy-endangering as an app (I think they wrote PWAs, and didn't want to cede the point to native apps). I feel they were wrong. Apps can get more information than web sites; even with sandboxing. In my exper…
I suspect that what happens, during this "daily checkin," is that the app sends a bunch of encrypted data that it got from your device, to the servers in China. What information do you think they got from your device other than what you gave them permission to have? If you actually have any info on how apps can break Apple's sandbox to leak your personal info, you should share it.
Have a great day!
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Android modes provide control over notification display. Modes control which people and apps can trigger a sound/vibration, but also offer the option to hide the silenced notifications from the status bar, pull-down shade, and dots on app icons. I hide them from the status bar, but not the pull-down shade so that I can manually check if I want to, but don't see them at a glance. I'm not a heavy user of this feature t…
Right. I'm saying that living for a week without any notification bar at all made me realize that even my usual well-curated notification bar is impacting me much more than I realized.
Or it's full of annoying popups to use the app, looking at you, Google.
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To be fair, what other simple way is there to send a document to a contact through an e2ee channel? Mail + PGP/GPG? Wormhole?? openssl??? Sending it via WhatsApp (which also has desktop clients, btw) strikes me as a perfectly reasonable solution. (Which is somewhat of an indictment of the current state of cryptographic software, but that's a different topic.)
Whatsapp "claims" to be e2e, but nobody knows for sure since its sources are closed.
Yep. If your product needs me to install an app for a one-off thing, you've probably already lost me. The crazy part is how many teams still treat the web as the demo and the app as the “real” product. For a lot of stuff it's the opposite now. I know there are edge cases, but most of the time “download our app” just means “please care way more about our product than you currently do.”
But that's just the technical reality of what can be implemented on web vs. native because you are within an ephemeral browser tab and have all the restrictions that come with that.
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> that is a galaxy away from how the average user interacts with the internet Exactly! Esp if you just move away "one tile" from tech/IT or business-power-users, most people are more or less clueless what they are doing/have to do with a computer. Yes, we are in a bubble here - as with every niche/special interest topic: It would be same for me if I would join a "car tuning event" or similar - Im just a car user, and…
> Exactly! Esp if you just move away "one tile" from tech/IT or business-power-users, most people are more or less clueless what they are doing/have to do with a computer. I don't think so. A majority don't want to. But they are forced by geeks/nerds. Geeks/nerds often show off especially in family/friends parties with older/common folk - telling - I can do this/that. Then average CEO or parent is forced to get a sma…
A lot of older people rely on yougins for tech support not because they have to, but because it's easy learned helplessness.
A large part of this is ALSO software's fault, though. Software changes too quick and for no reason. Software these days lies to users, erroding confidence.
I have an app that is literally just a wrapper around the website. The mobile website and the mobile app are the exact same experience. Before I built the app, people were constantly asking me to build a mobile app. Yes, I had a PWA but people still wanted an app. I thought it was kind of silly but I eventually built that wrapper app. It immediately got thousands of downloads, users upgrading to paid plans increased…
It is silly but you have to meet customers where they are. I think the problem is also that PWAs don't have any discoverability, and no standardization. I did some consulting work for a company that had a PWA. They had a 200-line long react component that was intended to determine what modal to show the user depending on what web browser and OS they were using to instruct them how to install PWA depending on the comb…
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> But today, the very first touchpoint with "the internet" for younger folks is a smartphone display. The even do homework on this small screens! I saw a tweet recently that perfectly encapsulates this: for most people over 30, certain things are "big screen tasks". I use my phone for a lot, but for some things I put the phone down and use my computer instead. I am most comfortable using a large screen and a keyboard…
It's because of limited RAM that this distinction started. On especially older phones if I were to write a long comment and move to a different tab or app before submitting, I can all but guarantee the OS would kill and try reloading the tab and lose all my text. What's even worse is this could happen mid online purchase which can have even greater consequences (double booking or purchasing especially but things like…
How much of the native app push is to bypass ad blockers? If you’re just using a browser plugin like AdGuard or uBO it can’t block in a dedicated app unless you replace it with AGH or PiHole, can’t help but wonder if that plays a role as well