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IPhone =/= Debian app

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Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#51

Post by derefr »

mikecane wrote: post #8
mortenjorck wrote: post #2

Yes, just like the dot com boom, this growth is unsustainable. But again, just like the dot com boom, once the market has matured to blow away the chaff, what remains will have proven pretty game-changing.

I keep wondering why Jobs keeps pushing HTML5. He too must realize the unsustainability of it all. A collapse has to happen -- and then how many "real" apps will remain for sale? And how many devs will migrate to the web where they don't have to have the approval of Apple or Google or any other hardware maker in order to create and publicize/sell something?

Jobs never liked the idea of Apps in the first place (probably because he knew it was unsustainable); he was fully prepared to go with a pure-webapp strategy until developers revolted. He's probably trying to get back out of that market as quickly as possible.

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#52

Post by einarvollset »

zaphar wrote: post #43
einarvollset wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe I did, but you still missed mine and added zero additional value to the conversation. So let me spoonfeed you my point: The OP claims that 99.99% of all websites back in the day were shit, just like 99.99% of all iphone apps today are shit. He then makes a remark that suggests that Debian is a superior platform because the number of debian apps is small/manageable. Now, I pointed out that out of the vast majori…

I don't think he missed your point at all. Would you say that GCC as one of the debian apps others here have mentioned was less successful? It arguably helps power Facebook, Ebay, Google, Amazon,... and any number of other of those sites you mentioned. Or perhaps Python? is it less successful? Or perhaps you defined successful in terms of revenue only? In which case that's a very narrowly defined term and the case co…

Dude that makes no sense, sorry. Re-read my comment; my point is: high number of apps does not correlate negatively with importance of platform or value of whatever is created on that platform.

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#53

Post by pyre »

aboodman wrote: post #50
korch wrote: post #46

While I agree with this point completely, I also think bitching about Apple's iPhone and Ipad "apps" is a moot point. 5 years from now it's all going to be html5, and all of these apps will run on any mobile device web browser. Apple now has such a head start on their app platform that pretty much the only reasonable strategy their competitors can do is collude and standardize on html5 for all apps. Then Apple has a…

Ah, 3d games and image manipulation. The last resort of all native arguments. This is going to change pretty rapidly with native client I think.

That went over my head. By 'native client,' are you making a reference to the fact that the push to make all of our apps run on a server is a swing of the pendulum back to the 'mainframe' days and that some day people will be expounding the virtues of writing software to run on the client as the 'new thing?' Or is 'native client' a reference to some new browser technology that I'm unaware of (which is possible)?

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#54

Post by pyre »

einarvollset wrote: post #52
zaphar wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think he missed your point at all. Would you say that GCC as one of the debian apps others here have mentioned was less successful? It arguably helps power Facebook, Ebay, Google, Amazon,... and any number of other of those sites you mentioned. Or perhaps Python? is it less successful? Or perhaps you defined successful in terms of revenue only? In which case that's a very narrowly defined term and the case co…

Dude that makes no sense, sorry. Re-read my comment; my point is: high number of apps does not correlate negatively with importance of platform or value of whatever is created on that platform.

But it doesn't correlate positively either. The 'article' is in response to someone claiming that having X apps created in Y years obviously means that a platform is 'more quality' than another, which is rubbish logic.

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#55

Post by pyre »

dman wrote: post #37
codeflo wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I deeply disagree about iOS representing a good future for software. Now that's a point worth discussing. iOS is locked down to the point where I would almost call it unusable -- we don't disagree here. However, I'm also convinced that some steps in that direction are needed to keep the "general-purpose computer" viable as a mass-market device. A computing environment that's open enough so that software can be usef…

Stallman has a nice fable about locking computers down - http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

He did say that it has to work in the absence of a central authority. It's hard for a central authority to control your device when it doesn't rely on a central authority.

Maybe we just need to re-imagine the operating-system level security model in a way that tries to tackle the security issues that we have today.

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#56

Post by Raphael »

pyre wrote: post #53
aboodman wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, 3d games and image manipulation. The last resort of all native arguments. This is going to change pretty rapidly with native client I think.

That went over my head. By 'native client,' are you making a reference to the fact that the push to make all of our apps run on a server is a swing of the pendulum back to the 'mainframe' days and that some day people will be expounding the virtues of writing software to run on the client as the 'new thing?' Or is 'native client' a reference to some new browser technology that I'm unaware of (which is possible)?

new tech: http://code.google.com/p/nativeclient/

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#57

Post by [deleted] »

pyre wrote: post #53
aboodman wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, 3d games and image manipulation. The last resort of all native arguments. This is going to change pretty rapidly with native client I think.

That went over my head. By 'native client,' are you making a reference to the fact that the push to make all of our apps run on a server is a swing of the pendulum back to the 'mainframe' days and that some day people will be expounding the virtues of writing software to run on the client as the 'new thing?' Or is 'native client' a reference to some new browser technology that I'm unaware of (which is possible)?

[deleted]

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#58

Post by rakslice »

mralbie wrote: post #6

These worthless apps are also a cost to Apple. It is getting harder and harder to find quality apps on the App Store. The Store itself is now (a) the 'Featured' page, (b) the 'Top Ten' lists, and (c) Apple's 'Collections'. The more difficult it is to find quality apps the more difficult it will be for the ecosystem as a whole to improve. Are there other examples of online stores with vast selections which genuinely h…

Why does everyone discount the idea of people finding apps through the search box? Are the users assumed to be unimaginative and unresourceful? Is the long tail too flat for anyone to make a living off of?

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#59

Post by Splines »

rakslice wrote: post #58
mralbie wrote: post #6

These worthless apps are also a cost to Apple. It is getting harder and harder to find quality apps on the App Store. The Store itself is now (a) the 'Featured' page, (b) the 'Top Ten' lists, and (c) Apple's 'Collections'. The more difficult it is to find quality apps the more difficult it will be for the ecosystem as a whole to improve. Are there other examples of online stores with vast selections which genuinely h…

Why does everyone discount the idea of people finding apps through the search box? Are the users assumed to be unimaginative and unresourceful? Is the long tail too flat for anyone to make a living off of?

Maybe it's just me, but the process I use to determine what software I choose is not done in the store. Research via reading reviews and recommendations from others is usually the way I go about it.

The problem I have in the App Store (wrt. finding apps that are "free floating") is that I don't know what's out there, and it's difficult to predict what will show up when I type in a specific query.

I'm a gamer, so let's look at games. Typically, for my 360 and PC, I'm well aware of new games that are on the horizon. Big name publishers and even the smaller ones typically receive publicity well in advance of release, and on release day/week there is usually something I can find on metacritic that someone else has written about that game.

OTOH, in the App Store, I have very little idea on the quality of gameplay for new games released that day. Finding reviews outside of the App Store for games developed by one-man-shops is incredibly difficult.

Take the game "Red Conquest" as an example. I heard about it in an online web forum. I never saw it in any App Store category list, and a search for the term "RTS" is bound to contain so much fluff that I still wouldn't have found it. It's a game that I think exemplifies the lost-in-the-shuffle problem in the App Store. (FWIW, I love this game. It's brutally hard, but you can tone down the difficulty to make it manageable. Small things, like the fact that it boots in less than 5 seconds, or that it has bluetooth/wifi multiplayer, make a big difference).

To summarize, it's difficult to search using the search box because you don't know what you're looking for.

Re: IPhone =/= Debian app

#60

Post by rakslice »

What's more volatile than a discussion with a group of enthusiasts with chips on their shoulders made of pure sodium? A discussion that pits two such groups against each other.

When it comes to binary compatibility, Debian's answer is basically the same as the App Store's: Use only our official packages and you won't have to worry about compatibility.

With all the flamey comparisons about the contents of the iPhone App Store and Official Debian Repositories, who develops for each, and what their motivations are, what's getting lost is that in each case what connects the developers with officialdom is some kind of approval process. By investigating the App Store's approval process, the Debian project can get a lot of ideas about what they might want to add to their own approval process (and what they might want to remove from it).

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