What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications • Hacker News Board

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#381

Post by Ntrails » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:09 PM UTC

miki123211 wrote: post #340

1718627440 wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apps can know whether you granted permission?? That sounds like a security flaw.

This is basically required for clueless (and even not so clueless) users. If there's a chat app I installed 3 years ago, with no intention of giving it camera access, and I suddenly need to use that app for a video call, I don't want to be stuck debugging broken camera issues for two hours. I'd much rather have the app tell me that it doesn't have camera access.

> This is basically required for clueless (and even not so clueless) users.

I can actually confess that this hit me. Almost nothing on my phone has permission to use my camera, including my web browser (why???). I assume this was done in a fit of pique upon discovering that the setting even existed.

Roll on (god knows how many years later) and I cannot get into the gym with the link I was emailed to have my browser read a QR because my browser is just a grey screen. It was only when the member of staff suggested permissions that I realised what was going on.

I'm the problem, it's me

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#382

Post by Perz1val » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:21 PM UTC

toast0 wrote: post #28

iamacyborg wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh that’s interesting, do you have any further context on that? I’ve not worked on a product with anywhere near that scale before so monitoring has always been whatever I can get from commercial push platforms

I mean... record the time we first send a push message, when a client connects have it tell you if it's because it got a push or user interactive start, check the time between push and connection, add that to your choice of time series graphing tool. Graph by platform, and you can see when the platforms are delaying pushes. Some of the delay will be ordinary things like their push service fell over or is unreliable (…

Hmm, there's just a few big messaging apps and just a few os vendors, weird that you couldn't have established special treatment for pushes about user to user messages

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#383

Post by moritzwarhier » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:31 PM UTC

Apple and Google are pushing push notifications?

No way!

Pun aside, it makes sense for a notification framework including a notification delivery network to be built into these mobile OSes, because the alternative (letting applications run arbitrary background services) is usually worse.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#384

Post by iamacyborg » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:33 PM UTC

vkou wrote: post #376

alexlesuper wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ridesharing apps are the most annoying about this. Yes I want to be notified when my uber driver is almost here to pick me up. No, I don't want a notification about yet another sale.

Have you looked at the Uber app recently? 90% of it is promotionshit. I am just looking for a fucking taxi. Are there any VCs looking to give away a few billion dollars to disrupt the ossified, wasteful, poor customer experience taxi app market?

> Are there any VCs looking to give away a few billion dollars to disrupt the ossified, wasteful, poor customer experience taxi app market?

Waymo are rolling out, slowly. No one'll be in a real position to compete against them.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#385

Post by wazoox » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #370

wazoox wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAICT any TOTP app (FreeOTP+, Aegis...) works just fine with Microsoft services (or Google, etc). You don't actually need to install several TOTP apps.

Microsoft Authenticator is not standard TOTP, but their own private flavor.

I've used FreeOTP+ to connect to my customers' Microsoft Teams for years without any trouble.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#386

Post by monkpit » Thu, May 28, 2026, 4:52 PM UTC

wavemode wrote: post #365

alexlesuper wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ridesharing apps are the most annoying about this. Yes I want to be notified when my uber driver is almost here to pick me up. No, I don't want a notification about yet another sale.

It baffles me that they do this. I have to disable push notifications from Lyft entirely, so instead they send me ride updates as text messages, which surely must cost them way more money. Why not just introduce a "ride updates only" push notification category and stop this madness?

It needs to be enforced by the OS or by law. Like how you get transactional emails without getting marketing spam. I want the same for notifications.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#387

Post by bossyTeacher » Thu, May 28, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

Swizec wrote: post #367

bossyTeacher wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you probably have no dependents and never been oncall then if you are on no disturb. For many people, having to poll the state of multiple ongoing tasks is time consuming itself or/and focus breaking enough that some apps are deserving of having notifications. Manually polling multiple items as you go around your day is stealing valuable mental bandwidth that could be used in better things.

Oh I’m on essentially permanent 2nd tier oncall and occasionally 1st tier. Pagerduty has an exception configured. If you message me on slack it shows up on my home screen and I will probably notice in the next 15 minutes or so. I find polling less disruptive because my phone or watch are almost always nearby. Being in control of when to get interrupted feels better than having stuff constantly pop up while you’re doi…

You know it is not a binary option, right? You can select what apps you want notifications from and most apps have at least two types of notifications you can toggle.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#388

Post by toast0 » Thu, May 28, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

Perz1val wrote: post #382

toast0 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean... record the time we first send a push message, when a client connects have it tell you if it's because it got a push or user interactive start, check the time between push and connection, add that to your choice of time series graphing tool. Graph by platform, and you can see when the platforms are delaying pushes. Some of the delay will be ordinary things like their push service fell over or is unreliable (…

Hmm, there's just a few big messaging apps and just a few os vendors, weird that you couldn't have established special treatment for pushes about user to user messages

Well... Blackberry wasn't very interested in increasing our push quota (but they eventually did). Apple is Apple ... getting them to make exceptions is very hard. Android push problems were more often on-device, which Google can't really help with; even when it was their software, they're not going to set it up to make exceptions. Nokia and Microsoft did try to be helpful with pushes... but their platforms are gone. Nokia S60 never had push, but those devices were very good at staying connected to our servers.

All that said, it's not like the platform developers are fully in the wrong when they're reducing pushes. It does have an impact on battery life, and if users aren't acting on them quickly, maybe the platform shouldn't either, even if there's risks when delaying communication.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#389

Post by davidgh » Thu, May 28, 2026, 5:20 PM UTC

My frustration is with services like Uber, Bolt, Airbnb, etc. where you need the push for core services and then the provides use them to slip in spam.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#390

Post by mannanj » Thu, May 28, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC

lanerobertlane wrote: post #24

If my phone interrupts me, it should either mean someone genuinely needs my attention right now or it should not be disrupting me at all. That's my notification set up. Apps allowed to receive push notifications Phone, Messages, Whatsapp, Apple Health, [brand] bank. That concludes the list. There is no reason any other app needs to be able to instantly ping me. Most apps are not notifying you because something matter…

"Notifications are like alarms other people set for you"

Naval Ravikant said this years ago and it stuck with me. Taking a page from your book, I have 0 notifications. I practice notification 0 and have done it for about a half decade now, and it's absolutely liberating and freeing. I found I needed to remove the apps from my phone Home Screen to feel this, as otherwise even their icon presence when opening my phone triggers dopamine loops.

When I need to be pinged, I use boundaries and expectations set with those who could interrupt what I'm doing with something important enough. Those people get to know where I'm at, how to reach me, etc and mostly what I do to help them is set them as contacts so my phone lets their calls through beyond voicemail, and I have physical locations accessible to them + times through the day where I'll check in.