The web browser is the least closed most open distribution for software services ever. Anyone anywhere can publish and billions can access it without numerous gate keepers in the way.
It isn't the only solution out there. You can publish to the various app stores and abide by all their rules and regulations and upkeep requirements.
You can be confined to Linux desktop.
You can still get to the desktop via your own distribution. You can also side load Android and avoid the store.
Some developers and teams don't need the crutches. Type systems are also an encumbrance that comes with a non zero amount of issues. They slow development velocity down for a theoretical trade-off boon.
I've seen a type system take down a production system where a simple coercion would have functioned just fine. Literally the only thing wrong was the type defined and the code refused to run.
The "browsers aren't operating systems" ship has sailed long ago, exhibit a: electron apps.
Think of it this way. When feature parity of browser sandbox closes on everything a desktop app might want, you no longer need to build with electron but can simply ship 5-15MB of js+css and use the stock browser instead.
Similar on mobile.
Which will result in:
Smaller downloads.
Lower memory footprint.
Faster launch.
The more low-level access browsers are required to expose for application development, the worse things will be in almost every dimension, but especially security and performance.
I'm curious, how does adding notifications effect security negatively exactly? Performance?
All this functionality is already available for apps including the security model. Nothing new is happening here. App security is an issue, but it's one big tech is already dumping resources into solving.
But, frankly, browsers have some of the best management features for culling analytics, telemetry, watching the traffic and requests being made. It's many times easier for me to see what a web app is doing on the network, and write something to stop it, as compared to a native app.
So what type of app are you writing that has to accept in app purchases and are push notifications the only thing stopping you from having a much worse web app than a native app?
Do they have to be? Who knows? But since 2007, Apple, Palm, Blackberry and Microsoft have all at one point or the other have said you don’t need native mobile apps and the web was good enough. It never was.
Facebook tried the whole cross platform web app in a wrapper and decided it wasn’t good enough. Even while Google is extolling then virtues of its own cross platform tooling, it’s moving toward apps that use native frameworks.
Ahh yes, the infamous Facebook failure. Anyone can write a bad app. That's not necessarily a technology failure. But it's easier to blame the tech than to admit they did something badly.
Everyone wants web apps to help sell hardware, right up until your app store grows into a money maker. Then the incentives are different.
Regardless, today's mobile systems are much better, web browsers are much better. It is much easier to write a web app that is functionally identical to native than it used to be.
Modern reality. Conversation rates for PWAs are higher than mobile apps because there is less friction in the installation process. Load times are often lower, which can be an overall superior experience. If I'm a small shop, trying to get on someone's mobile device, these items matter a lot. Also development costs are much lower when you can share code for your mobile app and your website.
The value add of being in the mobile stores is pretty minimal. Discovery is poor, search is poor, then there is constant churn in policies, submission process, APIs, development environments/languages, fees, etc. In contrast to this, the browsers hold very very high backwards compatibility. Churn will be in the support libraries or framework you adopt and not fundamental to the platform.
2. Developers were clamoring for native apps each time. Not the mobile platforms. You act as if the modern web development environment isn’t a clusterfuck of complexity compared to modern IDEs for native apps.
3. Both Apple and Google have initiatives where you can have small instantly installable “applet” equivalents that make downloads fast and the apps are more responsive.
4. Cost is lower for the developer. But at the cost of a much worse user experience.
5. Browsers might have “higher backwards compatibility”. But the dependency hell and ever changing landscape of the front end framework of the week is real.
1) That's a totally different number... Apples and oranges. Conversation in this case is getting an icon on the users phone as opposed to sale. Mobile stores have really really low conversion rates.
2) Assumes facts not in evidence. This is not a universal opinion.
3) Still has the gate keepers, yet another platform to write for, etc etc. Lower friction might help vs PWAs, that's something at least.
4) Assumes facts not in evidence.
5) Showing your ignorance here.
Front end has been stable for a while. Old stuff still works if you prefer it. Lots and lots of sites still do.
The mobile shill is real... There are reasons to pick mobile over something else. But just shilling the tool and showing your tech bigotry isn't a good way to pick solutions. I'm out.
2. Really? Were you not around when they called Steve Jobs “pretty sweet solution” of web apps a “shit sandwich” in 2007, or when developers complained about non native SDKs on both WebOS and RIMs newer platforms? Are you really claiming that native apps are not more performant than web apps?
3. And those “gatekeepers” allow more monetization than the web ever has.
4. Are you saying that I’m not constantly getting GitHub messages about a security vulnerability somewhere deep down in a dependency chain for an open source project that I contribute to? It’s a popular company sponsored open source project.
There is a lot of money in porn. A lot of motivation to attempt to carve out an innocent seeming narrative.
I was addicted to porn for decades. I didn't always look or watch it but it was tied to lust which I fed and fed.
Crawling out of the deep dark pit was hard, really hard. Probably the hardest thing I've ever done. I had a supportive spouse that supported me and helped me, which was a big help. I'm now free over 6 years and have a pretty good view.
Only after I had loosed the last few hooks in my soul did I begin to see what my life was missing. How it had contributed to my shame, hollow worthlessness, and straight up selfishness. How my "love" for my spouse was a pitiful thing that finally bloomed into something real.
You don't need a study too see the effects, just one person who's walked the path can tell you what they were and what's different.
People who are addicted can't see what they are missing as they usually got involved so young they don't remember not feeling that way. Often they know our at least feel that something is wrong. But they can't really see the whole of it either without the real perspective of the other side.
Ignore your fellows ringing the warning bells at your peril.
There is a lot of money in Alcohol as well. However some people get addicted to it (“Alcoholics”). There is also a lot of money in gambling, cigarettes etc. etc. Same story.
Good examples. We still struggle with all of them as a society. Porn is arguably more impactful than all of them with it's ability to destroy marriages.
It is apparently the opposite. I can’t remember where I read it but prostitution/porn actually saves marriages. Many marriages are sex-less and without an alternative a lot of marriages would collapse. Also, alcohol kills people every single day. Divorce doesn't usually do that :)
It's interesting how you can look down on front end for being new and naive while suggesting that Google is a fine reliable tech stack provider.
I'm the opposite of everything about this post. A very experienced dev (>20 years professional experience) that has moved primarily to the front end recently in my career (gradually over 4 years). I won't touch flutter simply because the sole vendor and essential dependency is Google.
Fads are present in every corner of development. As is "not invented here" or the general draw to green field.
If you're looking for a response, you're not really giving me much to respond to. Why do you think Google doesn't provide a "reliable tech stack" ? In any case, I wasn't suggesting that specifically (though I tend to agree with it), only that they have a coherent ergonomic vision by competent engineers.
That's fair. I feel more confident about Google's OSS (like flutter) surviving than I do about Google's consumer products. The flutter community is very strong, and as far as offerings go, it's (imo) the strongest product that abstracts UI/UX development over web and mobile, and the demand for that abstraction is very real.
Plus having Dart (which feels a bit like Java, but less verbose) as the foundation language raises the bar in terms of library code quality (compared to Javascript at least)
BTW, nice to have these kinds of pro and con conversations about random tech. I don't get it at work as much as I'd like.
A lot of open source projects die when their corporate investor closes shop. The community is often just dependants who want to use the tech but don't have the ability to keep it running. And it is usually not big enough to come up with the funding for a foundation to run maintenance and development.
Flutter is very ambitious as a project. I have more direct experience with other similar projects like react native, which really struggles despite the investments.
It isn't the only solution out there. You can publish to the various app stores and abide by all their rules and regulations and upkeep requirements.
You can be confined to Linux desktop.
You can still get to the desktop via your own distribution. You can also side load Android and avoid the store.
Browser apps are, by far, the easiest.