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Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

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Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#491

Post by closeparen »

Tijdreiziger wrote: post #490
closeparen wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that Android is a compromise in terms of privacy is not incidental to but because of its prioritization of app developers' freedom.

Does not track. Windows before Windows 8 gave developers freedom, was private, and was the most popular computing platform on the planet.

There was nothing to stop any .exe from reading all your files and phoning home with them, which is even worse than Android. It was private insofar as your OEM and all the third party developers whose products you downloaded were trustworthy, which is not too far off of Android.

Lenovo was one of the more famous abusers of its freedom [0] so sticking with popular and well known consumer brands did not save you, just as I expect it doesn’t now with Android.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfish

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#492

Post by _trackno5 »

rnk wrote: post #450
stakhanov wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But his unwillingness to vote with his feet is the actual message here. He's basically saying: Here are the horrible things that Apple is doing to me and yet I'm still giving them my money and investing myself in their developer ecosystem. That's how much I love them, for some reason that remains unstated in the article. That's what the parent commenter alluded to: There's some really weird psychology happening here,…

There's no reason that Apple people can't move to Android, it's stubborn resistance. Just like Android people don't want to move to Apple for "reasons". But they love what they have. I use android but I want to figure out how to block Google from spying better.

Of course there are plenty of reasons not to move to android.

If you're used to Apple's ecosystem (laptop, tablet), your family also uses apple devices, etc it is not convenient to move to a platform that doesn't have all of the same conveniences.

Sure you may be able to get the same things done, but it's not convenient. doesn't mean people can't complain and want something better. People are allowed to just plain not like android. You don't give shit to people because they don't like to dress the same way you do.

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#493

Post by Tijdreiziger »

closeparen wrote: post #491
Tijdreiziger wrote: post #490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does not track. Windows before Windows 8 gave developers freedom, was private, and was the most popular computing platform on the planet.

There was nothing to stop any .exe from reading all your files and phoning home with them, which is even worse than Android. It was private insofar as your OEM and all the third party developers whose products you downloaded were trustworthy, which is not too far off of Android. Lenovo was one of the more famous abusers of its freedom [0] so sticking with popular and well known consumer brands did not save you, just…

OK, we are talking about two separate forms of privacy here.

You are talking about privacy from rogue app developers. I certainly laud Android (and iOS) for their approach here, and I agree that the situation is much better than on desktop operating systems.

I, on the other hand, am talking about privacy from the OS developer, i.e. from tracking that's built-in to the OS by the OS developer. The situation on Android is certainly much worse here than any other operating system.

(One could argue that the tracking is not built into the Android OS, but into Google's Play Services. Since all mainstream Android vendors ship Play Services, this is a distinction without difference.)

It is possible to make an OS which is private in both senses. De-Googled Android distributions and Flatpak/Snap prove this. So far, there has been no mainstream interest in this, though.

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#494

Post by blacklight »

Android has its big share of problems, but at least they allow you to build APKs that you can just run on your phone, and even use 3rd-party stores.

I've never understood the reasons that would push a developer to use an Apple device, given how unreasonably constrained they are.

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#495

Post by captn3m0 »

adql wrote: post #229
sramsay wrote: post #68

What bothers me about this -- and it bothered me enough to leave the platform -- is not fees, or "hobby computing," or "it's just for my own use," or trying to figure out why this or that would be in Apple's interest. What bothers me is that it feels like an offense against the entire notion of what a computer is. I am, of course, aware that many (perhaps most) computers in the world are effectively appliances, but a…

Yup, they are not "appliances", they are worse than that. My toaster doesn't care or complain at what I toast, my oven doesn't want $99 pizza baking license nor it doesn't want me to pay extra just because I cooked something for someone else in it.

Cory Doctorow’s Unauthorized Bread warns about such a future; https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-...

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#496

Post by yosef123 »

JustSomeNobody wrote: post #91
yosef123 wrote: post #9

They do this to discourage users from installing 3rd party apps. I know it is still greedy, but that's the reasoning behind it.

There are TONS of 3rd party apps in the app store. This has nothing to do with 3rd party apps. It has to do with side loading open source / hobby apps.

I meant installing 3rd party apps through other means than the app store

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#497

Post by pallas_athena »

rchaud wrote: post #461
superkuh wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The casual use of the word "sideloading" is dangerous to society. It is literal newspeak with the intent to eliminate even the idea of "installing" and make it so people cannot even think of applications outside of a corporation (or institution's) walled garden. Users installing applications is the default. Walled gardens are the weird dangerous thing.

Even the concept of 'installing' is rapidly disappearing. Most smartphone users aren't installing new apps or downloading music files. Most computer users don't install anything besides Microsoft Office, and in a lot of cases, it comes pre-installed and only requires activation. Video games seem to be an outlier, as the enormous size of most games means it can't be streamed well just yet.

> Video games seem to be an outlier, as the enormous size of most games means it can't be streamed well just yet.

Stadia worked great until Google did its thing...

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#498

Post by aembleton »

sixstringtheory wrote: post #380
jakub_g wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When I can't copy MY photos out of MY device, without uploading it to Apple's cloud. Wait, what? (Not an Apple user - genuinely curious)

They probably mean from an iOS device to a PC/Android. It can be done without using iCloud, but you’ll need a macOS machine or special iOS app to do it.

Can't you just send them on Signal or upload to Dropbox?

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#499

Post by account42 »

aembleton wrote: post #498
sixstringtheory wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They probably mean from an iOS device to a PC/Android. It can be done without using iCloud, but you’ll need a macOS machine or special iOS app to do it.

Can't you just send them on Signal or upload to Dropbox?

That's just using some other company's cloud. Why would you want to involve any third party for transferring files between your devices.

Re: Apple doesn’t want you developing hobby apps

#500

Post by aembleton »

irrational wrote: post #379
PedroBatista wrote: post #128

The relationship some developers have with Apple should be a case-study with multiple PhD thesis in psychology. Not even in movies I've seen so many cases of children desperately chasing their emotionally unavailable parent. Apple is a trillion dollar company, it's the "parent" who sells you +$40 dongles for everything. "Hobbies" are only good if they make them money AND doesn't increase their risk or any liability.…

I agree, but... in my experience Android and Android devices suck in comparison to iOS and iPhones. Why can't anyone else create a true competitor to iOS and iPhone that is as open as Android? Is it because of Apple patents? Is it because they assume that if a company as large as Google couldn't do it then nobody can do it? Is it just developers are such a small part of the general populace that there is no money in…

> Why can't anyone else create a true competitor to iOS and iPhone that is as open as Android?

What is it about Android and Android devices that sucks? Does this apply to all Android devices? For example Samsung and Pixel phones get regular updates but the others don't.

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