Apple just confirmed PWA functionality is being cut in the EU, because they would otherwise "favor Safari". This is so clearly bullshit malicious pettyness at the cost of their users to get back at EU regulators, I'd like to return my iPhone now, please. This is like being out with your friends while they're having the beginnings of a breakup.
PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
31–40 of 268 posts
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#32PWAs will only replace native apps when the operating systems support them properly. Let's see how the European Union moves forward with the Digital Markets Act.
Let's see if a regulation like that can tame Apple, or if Apple keeps finding loop holes to not fully comply in the intended way (to liberate the European market from oligopolist gate keeping companies). If it works there might be a further revision that forces Apple to support PWAs. And on the long run I don't think they will limit those features just to the European market.
Once alternative browser engines and alternative app stores arrive, it might be possible to provide an app store that just wraps any known PWA into a native iOS app and runs them inside a Chromium browser. With full PWA support. Like the Microsoft store does. You can just register your PWA there and it will show up in the store, they even had the plan to scan the web for PWAs and put them in the store even if the author didn't register it. I don't know if they ever followed though with that plan.
One positive mention: I recently switched my PWAs on Windows to Edge, and it's the best PWA experience I've ever had on any platform. A good PWA feels 98% like a native application.
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#33Maybe we should be pushing for fewer PWAs overall. I personally will not use any web-based app when I can use a native app (with a few exceptions). PWAs just add unnecessary bloat, and the current HTML/CSS/JS stack that the web uses was designed for delivering text documents, not apps, so that inherently limits the experience.
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#34In my opinion, it is always the same "cross-platform" discussion. If you hire an iOS/Android mobile dev to write a native iOS/Android app, it means that you hire someone specialized in apps for mobiles. The whole point of a cross-platform framework is the hope that it won't need the specialization: "any web dev can now write a mobile app".
But every cross-platform framework has the same problem: platforms are different, and require work specific to them. As a result, cross-platform is "write once, debug everywhere".
If you don't know better, cross-platform frameworks systematically seem to "get to the same result faster". So many companies go for cross-platform frameworks. But in reality, the different platforms are so different that the only way to make a truly great app is to go native everywhere.
Not that there is not a place for PWAs: "cheaper but not as good" is clearly the trend everywhere. But I don't see PWAs replace "great native apps" anytime soon. If PWAs win, it will just mean that the users got worse apps because the companies spent less money on them.
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#35I love developing PWAs because I can quickly and easily make an app for myself and my family that works without having to provision their devices or pay a dev license to Apple. I also use it at work for internal apps. It’s great for all those things. It’s very obvious to me that I’m a second priority for Apple. Dark mode breaking in iOS 17 and still broken 5 months later. Updating the app is tricky, and making users…
> I can quickly and easily make an app for myself and my family that works without having to provision their devices or pay a dev license to Apple. I also use it at work for internal apps. This is exactly why they don't want it. Some will say it's because those are Apple's users and Apple wants to ensure a great user experience and doesn't want unapproved things running on their devices, and others will say it's beca…
They would probably ban browsers altogether from iOS, if they could get away with it. Fortunately we are not there yet.
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#36Maybe we should be pushing for fewer PWAs overall. I personally will not use any web-based app when I can use a native app (with a few exceptions). PWAs just add unnecessary bloat, and the current HTML/CSS/JS stack that the web uses was designed for delivering text documents, not apps, so that inherently limits the experience.
I personally will not use any native app when I can use a web app
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#37Understandable... PWAs are ultimately an alternative path from traditional mobile apps which will take away money from apple/google. But as a web dev community we need to stand firm and build PWAs regardless. If we treat pwas on iOS like we did Internet explorer (i.e. giving it special attention and hack solutions as opposed to just not developing for it) we will lose the fight. I suggest you call out the issues with…
Can't we just give up on the "Progressive" branding and just say we are making Web Apps? There are just so many things that make "PWA" a bad smell. I mean, have you ever asked a user if they need more spam spamifications in their life? (Yeah, your app does and 95% say "hell no") Personally I find it much easier to find web sites with Safari (until last week I would hit "1" and Safari would automatically show me my RSS reader, now I have a choice of that or my Fraxinus bookmark manager) than it is to find icons on my iPad (there are so many signs of carelessness on both the part of Apple and app makers; the other day I realized part of it is that iOS doesn't draw boundaries around icons so if the colors of an icon are similar to the colors on the background the edges of the icon become invisible which means the icon becomes invisible) I can type "n" in Safari and it fills in Hacker News, if there was a (cr)app to use HN it might have an H for an icon, or maybe a N or another Y and it would be orange: orange icons tend to disappear into the background on my iPad and for any given letter there is some app that uses it for an icon.
We should just have the story that we are making better and better web apps and Apple isn't keeping up with others.
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#38I love developing PWAs because I can quickly and easily make an app for myself and my family that works without having to provision their devices or pay a dev license to Apple. I also use it at work for internal apps. It’s great for all those things. It’s very obvious to me that I’m a second priority for Apple. Dark mode breaking in iOS 17 and still broken 5 months later. Updating the app is tricky, and making users…
Looks like Apple is going to fix dark mode in iOS 18 by dropping support for PWAs altogether in my part of the world. https://www.macrumors.com/2024/02/08/ios-17-4-nerfs-web-apps...
Looks like Apple is just going to blame the EU. They are officially pulling PWA support on iOS in Europe.
So fuck me I guess :(
https://9to5mac.com/2024/02/15/ios-17-4-web-apps-european-un...
Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#39Re: PWAs wont replace native iOS apps
#40"you must show the notification when you receive it", is it not possible to filter the notifications on the server before sending them down?
That's what they did. 10 second delay before sending out a "new message" notification to give it time to be marked as read.