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Probably the weirdest thing about the way Paul Kinlan writes and talks about "the web" and "native" is that he's really just talking about "Chrome" and "Android

Probably the weirdest thing about the way Paul Kinlan writes and talks about "the web" and "native" is that he's really just talking about "Chrome" and "Android." For example, see that chart in his "The table stakes" section? It clearly states that while the web "KINDA" had offline mode in 2014, in 2015 he upgraded that answer to "YES," by which he means that Service Workers became available on Chrome and Firefox. But Service Workers aren't available on any browser provided by Apple or Microsoft. http://caniuse.com/#feat=serviceworkers http://caniuse.com/#feat=serviceworkers says < 60% of browser share supports SWs today, in 2016. Apple didn't announce SWs in iOS 10, so earliest we can hope for is 2017, maybe 2018. MS will ship SWs for Edge later this year, but Edge is still a minority browser on Windows (because no one on Windows 7 can upgrade to it without upgrading to Windows 10). Less than 70% of users will have what Kinlan thinks are 2015's "table stakes" this year. And in the subsequent table, look at "Single click install and launch." In 2016, "Native: YES." Here, he's talking about Instant Apps for Android. But iOS doesn't support that at all. Perhaps they never will! And did you "know" that the web just got Auth and Payments in 2016? Of course you didn't know that, because it's not even remotely true. Maybe Apple will capture significant mobile-web payment share with the new iOS 10 Apple Pay API, but even Android Pay is struggling, and Chrome's new autofill APIs are even less established. The auth story is the most fictional of all. We've had the ability to login with Facebook or Google for years, but only in 2016 did Chrome ship their Nth attempt at getting you to authenticate using Chrome APIs. So "now" we have auth? Even though nobody uses those Chrome APIs, and everybody just logs in with password or Facebook?

kinlan 10y ago
I take your point and to some extent I am certainly hedging on the API fronts, but at this point we know it is technically a solved problem with rough consensus on the path for all browsers modulo deployment. The platform for a broad set of users has the capabilities and that is a good thing and that is something everyone can build to. I am also hedging that Apple will move towards a friction-less install model; personally I am not convinced that Instant Apps for Android is the right thing but I am more concerned that the intent is there. Are we going to wait until the platform is completely uniform until we take advantage of any of these things? Some will, some won't. We are already seeing those that build progressively in terms of taking advantage of newer parts of the stack are doing well with those elements. I would say that the brunt of my article still holds valid even if you disagree on the platform capabilities, we are catching up with native platforms but we need excel in where the web is best, and I think that is embedability of content (although that seems like a lost art) is one core part where we need to do a better job and ease of interaction (i.e, no install).

kinlan 10y ago

I take your point and to some extent I am certainly hedging on the API fronts, but at this point we know it is technically a solved problem with rough consensus on the path for all browsers modulo deployment. The platform for a broad set of users has the capabilities and that is a good thing and that is something everyone can build to. I am also hedging that Apple will move towards a friction-less install model; personally I am not convinced that Instant Apps for Android is the right thing but I am more concerned that the intent is there. Are we going to wait until the platform is completely uniform until we take advantage of any of these things? Some will, some won't. We are already seeing those that build progressively in terms of taking advantage of newer parts of the stack are doing well with those elements. I would say that the brunt of my article still holds valid even if you disagree on the platform capabilities, we are catching up with native platforms but we need excel in where the web is best, and I think that is embedability of content (although that seems like a lost art) is one core part where we need to do a better job and ease of interaction (i.e, no install).