6 ms·

I'm pretty sure Safari's features are intentionally crippled to keep their app ecosystem safe. See: web notifications.

by zajd 9y ago

alwillis 9y ago
I'm pretty sure Safari's features are intentionally crippled to keep their app ecosystem safe. See: web notifications. I’m pretty sure you'd be wrong. Apple announced that it's paid over $70 billion to app developers since the App Store became a thing in 2008 at today's WWDC keynote. This is the 30% Apple pays developers; so we're talking about $233 billion in gross transactions in less than 10 years. Apple is likely to be the first trillion dollar valuation company; I seriously doubt it's worried about web apps encroaching upon a fairly small part of it's revenue: http://fortune.com/2017/03/31/apple-trillion-dollar-company/ http://fortune.com/2017/03/31/apple-trillion-dollar-company/
- untog 9y ago
  I think that's a shortsighted way to look at it. The iPhone is as successful as it is because of the perception of exclusivity - the best, newest apps will always be on iPhone first. Whether they are free or cost $100 each doesn't really matter that much - it still means Apple is the premier mobile device bar none. If they enabled more progressive webapp features, we'd start to see a lot more cross platform webapps. That would not be in Apple's interest.
  - alwillis 9y ago
    The iPhone is as successful as it is because of the perception of exclusivity - the best, newest apps will always be on iPhone first. That argument might have worked in back in the day when the iPhone was only available on AT&T but not in a world where the iPhone is available to more people than it ever has been before. The iPhone is perhaps the single most successful product ever, with over 1 billion sold: http://www.asymco.com/2016/07/28/most-popular-product-of-all-time/ http://www.asymco.com/2016/07/28/most-popular-product-of-all... The total marketshare of Android is around 2 billion, but that's the total of Samsung, Motorola, HTC, LG, etc. None of them have individually sold a billion Android phones themselves. If they enabled more progressive webapp features, we'd start to see a lot more cross platform webapps. That would not be in Apple's interest. Do you think Apple cares more about selling a $700 iPhone or a 99¢ app? They have over a million native apps for iOS; what keeps that ecosystem strong is how Apple is able to innovate each year on new features for the iPhone, iPad and iOS, not by restricting what web apps can do. The most compelling features are things web apps aren't very good at anyway. I seriously doubt Tim Cook is losing sleep worrying about Service Workers and the like. People said the same thing about WebRTC and how it would compete with FaceTime. And now we have WebRTC in the new versions of macOS and iOS, so it's time to create reasons why other web features aren't there. Web apps have made a lot of progress but for the average user in a developed country, the user experience pales in comparison to native apps.
    - omnimus 9y ago
      They dont want to deal with potentional problems (like battery drain) of the web platform. They can ignore it exactly because of their appstore and aura of exellence. But in real world i know so many people who dont have single app on iphone. They cant even imagine what simple link could give them. This could go very wrong way for apple. Imagine their excelent app devs start to make webap version of their apps. Many of the beatifuly designed ones could work very easily on web platform. Suddenly it becomes trend and iphone app exclusivity is gone. Plus apple looses control over the market. I for one would like to be able to opt in for notifs for events of certain clubs, galleries etc. It feels like sms for your fans. Much faster than newsletter much less busy than social networks.
      - RodericDay 9y ago
        I'm one of those people. I don't like mucking around in the app-store, but I'd save a shortcut.
    - mrout 9y ago
      >That argument might have worked in back in the day when the iPhone was only available on AT&T but not in a world where the iPhone is available to more people than it ever has been before. The iPhone is incredibly expensive. While you and your rich software developer friends might have iPhones, the vast majority of phones sold are not iPhones. They're Android phones. You can get an Android phone for $50 or less. You cannot get an iPhone for much under $1000 in NZ.
  - alwillis 9y ago
    More proof that Apple isn’t crippling Safari--they announced full Web Assembly support today: https://webkit.org/blog/7691/webassembly/ https://webkit.org/blog/7691/webassembly/
  - alwillis 9y ago
    Apple sure is putting in a lot of effort into ES5 performance for a platform that they’re supposedly crippling, not to mention smoking Chrome and Firefox in the process: https://webkit.org/blog/7536/jsc-loves-es6/ https://webkit.org/blog/7536/jsc-loves-es6/
- reaperhulk 9y ago
  Apple pays devs 70% (and more on long-lived app subscriptions now). So that's $100B, not $233B.
- imron 9y ago
  Apple pays developers 70% (and keeps 30% for itself), which would be $100 billion in gross transactions.
  - alwillis 9y ago
    That's correct; I got that reversed.
- alwillis 9y ago
  I got my numbers mixed up--Apple pays developers 70%, so the total revenue is "only" $100 billion and not $233 billion.
- alwillis 9y ago
  Here's a link to a comment from a WebKit engineer responding to the notion that Apple deliberately omits features from Safari. Short answer--they don't: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14509746 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14509746
CharlesW 9y ago
Safari supports Web Notifications: http://caniuse.com/#feat=notifications http://caniuse.com/#feat=notifications Safari 11 supports WebRTC, Media Capture API, WebAssembly, WebCrypto API, drag-and-drop, and other interesting new features. If a crippled browser is their goal, they're doing quite an awful job of it.
- rictic 9y ago
  http://caniuse.com/#feat=push-api http://caniuse.com/#feat=push-api is the interesting notifications API, which allows notifying a user (with their permission) even when the app isn't open. Neither API is supported on iOS Safari, and desktop Safari only supports notifications while the app is open.
  - CharlesW 9y ago
    > Neither API is supported on iOS Safari, and desktop Safari only supports notifications while the app is open. Ah, thank you for explaining the difference.
  - shuckles 9y ago
    “push notifications can reach your users regardless of whether your website or Safari is open“ https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/NotificationProgrammingGuideForWebsites/PushNotifications/PushNotifications.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40013225-CH3-SW1 https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Ne...
    - bwhitty 9y ago
      "Registration requires an Apple developer license." Hmm, not the open web I'm familiar with.
      - kabes 9y ago
        That's a way for Apple to avoid abuse. Same thing like google requiring you to put an extension in the chrome store to enable screen capture.
pfooti 9y ago
The irony is that the only apps I could install on my iPhone 1 were javascript-powered html fragments. They launched with no app store or 3rd party binaries at all, and everything was to be done via js. Now when we are super close to really supporting progressive web apps, apple is holding back (potentially to protect that golden calf of an app store).

I'm pretty sure Safari's features are intentionally crippled to keep their app ecosystem safe. See: web notifications.

by zajd 9y ago

I'm pretty sure Safari's features are intentionally crippled to keep their app ecosystem safe. See: web notifications.

I'm pretty sure Safari's features are intentionally crippled to keep their app ecosystem safe. See: web notifications. I’m pretty sure you'd be wrong. Apple announced that it's paid over $70 billion to app developers since the App Store became a thing in 2008 at today's WWDC keynote. This is the 30% Apple pays developers; so we're talking about $233 billion in gross transactions in less than 10 years. Apple is likely to be the first trillion dollar valuation company; I seriously doubt it's worried about web apps encroaching upon a fairly small part of it's revenue: http://fortune.com/2017/03/31/apple-trillion-dollar-company/ http://fortune.com/2017/03/31/apple-trillion-dollar-company/

untog 9y ago
I think that's a shortsighted way to look at it. The iPhone is as successful as it is because of the perception of exclusivity - the best, newest apps will always be on iPhone first. Whether they are free or cost $100 each doesn't really matter that much - it still means Apple is the premier mobile device bar none. If they enabled more progressive webapp features, we'd start to see a lot more cross platform webapps. That would not be in Apple's interest.
- alwillis 9y ago
  The iPhone is as successful as it is because of the perception of exclusivity - the best, newest apps will always be on iPhone first. That argument might have worked in back in the day when the iPhone was only available on AT&T but not in a world where the iPhone is available to more people than it ever has been before. The iPhone is perhaps the single most successful product ever, with over 1 billion sold: http://www.asymco.com/2016/07/28/most-popular-product-of-all-time/ http://www.asymco.com/2016/07/28/most-popular-product-of-all... The total marketshare of Android is around 2 billion, but that's the total of Samsung, Motorola, HTC, LG, etc. None of them have individually sold a billion Android phones themselves. If they enabled more progressive webapp features, we'd start to see a lot more cross platform webapps. That would not be in Apple's interest. Do you think Apple cares more about selling a $700 iPhone or a 99¢ app? They have over a million native apps for iOS; what keeps that ecosystem strong is how Apple is able to innovate each year on new features for the iPhone, iPad and iOS, not by restricting what web apps can do. The most compelling features are things web apps aren't very good at anyway. I seriously doubt Tim Cook is losing sleep worrying about Service Workers and the like. People said the same thing about WebRTC and how it would compete with FaceTime. And now we have WebRTC in the new versions of macOS and iOS, so it's time to create reasons why other web features aren't there. Web apps have made a lot of progress but for the average user in a developed country, the user experience pales in comparison to native apps.
  - omnimus 9y ago
    They dont want to deal with potentional problems (like battery drain) of the web platform. They can ignore it exactly because of their appstore and aura of exellence. But in real world i know so many people who dont have single app on iphone. They cant even imagine what simple link could give them. This could go very wrong way for apple. Imagine their excelent app devs start to make webap version of their apps. Many of the beatifuly designed ones could work very easily on web platform. Suddenly it becomes trend and iphone app exclusivity is gone. Plus apple looses control over the market. I for one would like to be able to opt in for notifs for events of certain clubs, galleries etc. It feels like sms for your fans. Much faster than newsletter much less busy than social networks.
    - RodericDay 9y ago
      I'm one of those people. I don't like mucking around in the app-store, but I'd save a shortcut.
  - mrout 9y ago
    >That argument might have worked in back in the day when the iPhone was only available on AT&T but not in a world where the iPhone is available to more people than it ever has been before. The iPhone is incredibly expensive. While you and your rich software developer friends might have iPhones, the vast majority of phones sold are not iPhones. They're Android phones. You can get an Android phone for $50 or less. You cannot get an iPhone for much under $1000 in NZ.
- alwillis 9y ago
  More proof that Apple isn’t crippling Safari--they announced full Web Assembly support today: https://webkit.org/blog/7691/webassembly/ https://webkit.org/blog/7691/webassembly/
- alwillis 9y ago
  Apple sure is putting in a lot of effort into ES5 performance for a platform that they’re supposedly crippling, not to mention smoking Chrome and Firefox in the process: https://webkit.org/blog/7536/jsc-loves-es6/ https://webkit.org/blog/7536/jsc-loves-es6/
reaperhulk 9y ago
Apple pays devs 70% (and more on long-lived app subscriptions now). So that's $100B, not $233B.
imron 9y ago
Apple pays developers 70% (and keeps 30% for itself), which would be $100 billion in gross transactions.
- alwillis 9y ago
  That's correct; I got that reversed.
alwillis 9y ago
I got my numbers mixed up--Apple pays developers 70%, so the total revenue is "only" $100 billion and not $233 billion.
alwillis 9y ago
Here's a link to a comment from a WebKit engineer responding to the notion that Apple deliberately omits features from Safari. Short answer--they don't: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14509746 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14509746

CharlesW 9y ago

Safari supports Web Notifications: http://caniuse.com/#feat=notifications http://caniuse.com/#feat=notifications Safari 11 supports WebRTC, Media Capture API, WebAssembly, WebCrypto API, drag-and-drop, and other interesting new features. If a crippled browser is their goal, they're doing quite an awful job of it.

rictic 9y ago
http://caniuse.com/#feat=push-api http://caniuse.com/#feat=push-api is the interesting notifications API, which allows notifying a user (with their permission) even when the app isn't open. Neither API is supported on iOS Safari, and desktop Safari only supports notifications while the app is open.
- CharlesW 9y ago
  > Neither API is supported on iOS Safari, and desktop Safari only supports notifications while the app is open. Ah, thank you for explaining the difference.
- shuckles 9y ago
  “push notifications can reach your users regardless of whether your website or Safari is open“ https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/NotificationProgrammingGuideForWebsites/PushNotifications/PushNotifications.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40013225-CH3-SW1 https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Ne...
  - bwhitty 9y ago
    "Registration requires an Apple developer license." Hmm, not the open web I'm familiar with.
    - kabes 9y ago
      That's a way for Apple to avoid abuse. Same thing like google requiring you to put an extension in the chrome store to enable screen capture.

pfooti 9y ago

The irony is that the only apps I could install on my iPhone 1 were javascript-powered html fragments. They launched with no app store or 3rd party binaries at all, and everything was to be done via js. Now when we are super close to really supporting progressive web apps, apple is holding back (potentially to protect that golden calf of an app store).