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I 1000th this. Native mobile dev pretty much doesn't make sense for most early stage startups anymore. I sunk in thousands in launching an MVP for my product wi

I 1000th this. Native mobile dev pretty much doesn't make sense for most early stage startups anymore. I sunk in thousands in launching an MVP for my product with the help of an outsourced team, only to run into slow(er) and costlier dev cycles, maintaining 2 code bases, designing for 2 platforms, app store rejections, users not applying the latest updates, Android users recycling apps when they run out of memory, device fragmentation (on Android) issues, and an overall lack of agility in making updates to the app. If you want to iterate fast, fuhgedaboutit. Granted some of the problems I've outlined are not about the path chosen for app development, but you should be aware (and scared) of these if you're looking to build an app. I've literally taken to replacing some tabs in the app with web views and serving light, responsive HTML5 through them. Unless your app is a game, or you already have found product/market fit AND have a large eng team and the resources (aka $$$) at your disposal, probably makes no sense to develop native any more. Looking at Airbnb and Instagram ditching native dev too, I'm not even sure of the latter case.

aliston 10y ago
I'm not sure its fair to say that they are "ditching" native dev. React native works well for some flows, but is still lacking when it comes to a lot of more complex animations, non-standard views and basically most things that make you really go "wow." Those companies are using it where appropriate, but large portions of the apps are still native.
- blizkreeg 10y ago
  Fair enough (pun intended). But for the majority of startups, I'd still wager they don't need those premature 'wow' effects.
  - goodells 10y ago
    I would argue that in some cases (certainly not all), a little bit of strategically placed "wow" may be vital for some startups to grow - small things that make users love a product and show others. The vast majority of users will not sympathize with the reasons a developer would choose to use something like a web view in a native app.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
  - whatevorama 10y ago
    I was going to focus on ReactNative my the more I read about the more I realized I am better off native, at least for now. Exactly because I do a lot of animations and I am all about interaction. If your product looks bad or "dated" it's not going to connect with users, not in the aread I am focusing on. If your product is about that extra pop, then I think Native might be best.
    - JasmineDover 10y ago
      Ladies and getlemen please lend me your audience, I want to talk about something that I am just very excited about; We had a small restaurant and in my apartment I had a bad credit. It became very though for us, because people do not want to loan; banks and other financial institution do not want to loan money to us because of my bad credit. So I needed to find someone that was very linient and also could pay really quick to us, so we wanted to add on to our restaurant in otherwords we needed an $80,000 loan which was really difficult at that time. So a friend of mine 'Sarah William' said checkout: tenterdenfundsplc@yahoo.com and i was like okay.. thou I didn't believe because I already lost $4,300 to scams and she said' just email or call/ text: +18027369174 and they will get back to you quick, I did exactly as she said. that day I got a response, the next day I got funded, it was that fast. I was blown away and I couldnt believe how quick it was, this guys are really fast. anyways thank you guys at Tenterden Funding Plc. I couldt have done it without you, thank you for saving us the hassle. And I just want you guys to know that you can contact them aswell if you are having issues regarding finance
- htormey 10y ago
  I'm a long term native developer who's been doing react native contacting for the past 6 months. One big issue that you run into is if you need to do long running background tasks (network polling, bluetooth, music, etc) you basically need to write native code to handle it. Complex animations and non standard view's aren't that bad to implement.
  - rorykoehler 10y ago
    Just about to implement react native app with network polling. Do you have any links/tips to share re best practices?
    - htormey 10y ago
      If you are just doing polling when your app is in the foreground, you should not have to write any native code. All of the polling can be handled in your actions. If you need to poll in the background when the phones screen is locked, then you will need to write native code. Writing native code to do this isn't that hard (react native docs are good), it's just annoying that you will have duplicate business logic for Android/iOS.
rokhayakebe 10y ago
Looking at Airbnb and Instagram ditching native Any sources for this? I would like to read up on it.
- FLGMwt 10y ago
  I think the quoted might be referring to Instagram's use of React Native and Airbnb's hint of exploring it (can't determine what they do). So perhaps this is clarified as native app development for native app (as opposed to a cross-platform framework/shim).
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - afro88 10y ago
    Didn't Instagram just do a big refactor of their iOS app, and release an iOS OSS framework with their new feed code? https://realm.io/news/tryswift-ryan-nystrom-refactoring-at-scale-lessons-learned-rewriting-instagram-feed/ https://realm.io/news/tryswift-ryan-nystrom-refactoring-at-s...
- htormey 10y ago
  I spoke to a few people at Airbnb about this. Supposedly about 10-20% of the app is React native. I really doubt that Instagram have ditched all of their Native code for React native.
  - rorykoehler 10y ago
    The airbnb ios app is awful and getting worse. I am constantly running into inconsistent state issues. No problems on Android so far though.
- enra 10y ago
  We don't have much written up about yet, but 90% of our recent Trips functionality was built in RN [1] and there are some bits in this talk as well [2]. 1: https://twitter.com/spikebrehm/status/799338174979842050 https://twitter.com/spikebrehm/status/799338174979842050 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npwa3ZmG9VQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npwa3ZmG9VQ
crgt 10y ago
This is why technical cofounders that can build a native mobile MVP make sense.
- blizkreeg 10y ago
  I am technical, it's just that native dev is not my forte. But that's besides the point. It is less about the money, more about the huge overhead of building one.
zappo2938 10y ago
Netflix is running React native across all devices.
- error54 10y ago
  Not true. Our Android and iOS apps are native. We are however looking into React Native. Source - I'm an engineer at Netflix.
  - zappo2938 10y ago
    Sorry. I was under the impression after watching this video Netflix was using React across all devices. [0] [0] https://youtu.be/eNC0mRYGWgc?t=23m50s https://youtu.be/eNC0mRYGWgc?t=23m50s
    - tracker1 10y ago
      React is not the same as React Native... there's enough similarities to share a name. React is the base (afaik) for all web-based client interactions, which also includes a lot of TV/Webtop interfaces, but not necessarily Android and iOS. Given the shift towards Flux and Falcore, React Native may make sense for the iOS/Android, and potentially in Windows/Ubuntu as well (speculating). Disclaimer, I don't work there, but did go through the interview process last year, I wasn't enthusiastic about moving to California at the time.
    - error54 10y ago
      No worries! Tracker1 is correct that all browser based UI is built using React. Other platforms may be doing their own explorations into React but I can't speak to that since those are outside of my domain of expertise. I can say that my team loves React so we're definitely looking into React Native.
  - onebot 10y ago
    Are you guys hiring? ;)
    - 10y ago

aliston 10y ago

I'm not sure its fair to say that they are "ditching" native dev. React native works well for some flows, but is still lacking when it comes to a lot of more complex animations, non-standard views and basically most things that make you really go "wow." Those companies are using it where appropriate, but large portions of the apps are still native.

blizkreeg 10y ago
Fair enough (pun intended). But for the majority of startups, I'd still wager they don't need those premature 'wow' effects.
- goodells 10y ago
  I would argue that in some cases (certainly not all), a little bit of strategically placed "wow" may be vital for some startups to grow - small things that make users love a product and show others. The vast majority of users will not sympathize with the reasons a developer would choose to use something like a web view in a native app.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- whatevorama 10y ago
  I was going to focus on ReactNative my the more I read about the more I realized I am better off native, at least for now. Exactly because I do a lot of animations and I am all about interaction. If your product looks bad or "dated" it's not going to connect with users, not in the aread I am focusing on. If your product is about that extra pop, then I think Native might be best.
  - JasmineDover 10y ago
    Ladies and getlemen please lend me your audience, I want to talk about something that I am just very excited about; We had a small restaurant and in my apartment I had a bad credit. It became very though for us, because people do not want to loan; banks and other financial institution do not want to loan money to us because of my bad credit. So I needed to find someone that was very linient and also could pay really quick to us, so we wanted to add on to our restaurant in otherwords we needed an $80,000 loan which was really difficult at that time. So a friend of mine 'Sarah William' said checkout: tenterdenfundsplc@yahoo.com and i was like okay.. thou I didn't believe because I already lost $4,300 to scams and she said' just email or call/ text: +18027369174 and they will get back to you quick, I did exactly as she said. that day I got a response, the next day I got funded, it was that fast. I was blown away and I couldnt believe how quick it was, this guys are really fast. anyways thank you guys at Tenterden Funding Plc. I couldt have done it without you, thank you for saving us the hassle. And I just want you guys to know that you can contact them aswell if you are having issues regarding finance
htormey 10y ago
I'm a long term native developer who's been doing react native contacting for the past 6 months. One big issue that you run into is if you need to do long running background tasks (network polling, bluetooth, music, etc) you basically need to write native code to handle it. Complex animations and non standard view's aren't that bad to implement.
- rorykoehler 10y ago
  Just about to implement react native app with network polling. Do you have any links/tips to share re best practices?
  - htormey 10y ago
    If you are just doing polling when your app is in the foreground, you should not have to write any native code. All of the polling can be handled in your actions. If you need to poll in the background when the phones screen is locked, then you will need to write native code. Writing native code to do this isn't that hard (react native docs are good), it's just annoying that you will have duplicate business logic for Android/iOS.

rokhayakebe 10y ago

Looking at Airbnb and Instagram ditching native Any sources for this? I would like to read up on it.

FLGMwt 10y ago
I think the quoted might be referring to Instagram's use of React Native and Airbnb's hint of exploring it (can't determine what they do). So perhaps this is clarified as native app development for native app (as opposed to a cross-platform framework/shim).
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- afro88 10y ago
  Didn't Instagram just do a big refactor of their iOS app, and release an iOS OSS framework with their new feed code? https://realm.io/news/tryswift-ryan-nystrom-refactoring-at-scale-lessons-learned-rewriting-instagram-feed/ https://realm.io/news/tryswift-ryan-nystrom-refactoring-at-s...
htormey 10y ago
I spoke to a few people at Airbnb about this. Supposedly about 10-20% of the app is React native. I really doubt that Instagram have ditched all of their Native code for React native.
- rorykoehler 10y ago
  The airbnb ios app is awful and getting worse. I am constantly running into inconsistent state issues. No problems on Android so far though.
enra 10y ago
We don't have much written up about yet, but 90% of our recent Trips functionality was built in RN [1] and there are some bits in this talk as well [2]. 1: https://twitter.com/spikebrehm/status/799338174979842050 https://twitter.com/spikebrehm/status/799338174979842050 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npwa3ZmG9VQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npwa3ZmG9VQ

crgt 10y ago

This is why technical cofounders that can build a native mobile MVP make sense.

blizkreeg 10y ago
I am technical, it's just that native dev is not my forte. But that's besides the point. It is less about the money, more about the huge overhead of building one.

zappo2938 10y ago

Netflix is running React native across all devices.

error54 10y ago
Not true. Our Android and iOS apps are native. We are however looking into React Native. Source - I'm an engineer at Netflix.
- zappo2938 10y ago
  Sorry. I was under the impression after watching this video Netflix was using React across all devices. [0] [0] https://youtu.be/eNC0mRYGWgc?t=23m50s https://youtu.be/eNC0mRYGWgc?t=23m50s
  - tracker1 10y ago
    React is not the same as React Native... there's enough similarities to share a name. React is the base (afaik) for all web-based client interactions, which also includes a lot of TV/Webtop interfaces, but not necessarily Android and iOS. Given the shift towards Flux and Falcore, React Native may make sense for the iOS/Android, and potentially in Windows/Ubuntu as well (speculating). Disclaimer, I don't work there, but did go through the interview process last year, I wasn't enthusiastic about moving to California at the time.
  - error54 10y ago
    No worries! Tracker1 is correct that all browser based UI is built using React. Other platforms may be doing their own explorations into React but I can't speak to that since those are outside of my domain of expertise. I can say that my team loves React so we're definitely looking into React Native.
- onebot 10y ago
  Are you guys hiring? ;)
  - 10y ago