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I wrote a post about this a while back: http://dangrover.com/2010/05/29/indie-developers-and-crossing-the-app-store-chasm/ http://dangrover.com/2010/05/29/indie

I wrote a post about this a while back: http://dangrover.com/2010/05/29/indie-developers-and-crossing-the-app-store-chasm/ http://dangrover.com/2010/05/29/indie-developers-and-crossin... When I speak of the triumph of the app, I don't mean it as a synonym for "program." That definition has become archaic. I'm talking about "the app" as the unit of software in popular perception. It is the monad. It is the atom. It is the cell. It is the brick. Software is abstract. An app is concrete. Apps obey basic laws. You can install or uninstall their functionality completely. Apps are indivisible. Apps do not come with other apps, they stand alone. Apps do not touch other apps' data without being allowed. In short, the term "app" could best be defined, more broadly, as the finest, most granular level of control over the computing experience that most users can consistently and comfortably exercise.

moultano 16y ago
It's amazing how far desktop machines have been from dragging and dropping icons to install/uninstall software. OSX was the closest to this I think, and hopefully they'll get closer? I tend to just assume now that the longer I have a desktop machine, the more miscellaneous bits of old programs will be scattered throughout the system.
- dangrover 16y ago
  Well, what's nice about the way OS X does it is that dragging the icon isn't a proxy for a bunch of magical installing/uninstalling. You're literally dragging the app from one location in the filesystem to another. But I think the iOS model is good too because the abstraction is not leaky (in the same way that package managers and and installer/uninstallers on windows are)
  - gaelian 16y ago
    I've been using Hazel with OS X for a while now to further facilitate my bordering on obsessive compulsive desire to keep my machine clean. Hazel takes care of preference files etc. that can be left over after trashing a piece of software on OS X. I still remember the moment it dawned on me that my new Mac didn't have a registry, I think I almost shed a tear of joy.
    - glhaynes 16y ago
      I tend to prefer that old preference files be left around - they don't cause me any harm (not even a feeling of clutter, since it's not like I'm poking around ~/Library/Preferences all the time) and if I ever reinstall the app, I'm right back where I was. I can understand that it does bother some folks, though.
      - gaelian 16y ago
        I can indeed understand your sentiment also. Hence my description of my behavior bordering on something close to OCD. I think I get that "feeling of clutter" a lot more easily than many people :P For whatever reason though, I guess I don't really reinstall apps very often. Once I decide to remove something, it's almost always after pondering the issue for a little while and making a decision that I very rarely go back on. The only time I can remember reinstalling something on my Mac was Filezilla. I got myself a new FTP client, removed Filezilla as I didn't think I'd be using it anymore and then found out that my new FTP client had a bug that prevented proper connectivity via FTPS. So I went back to Filezilla and as luck would have it, Filezilla's preferences are stored in ~/.filezilla and they were all still there (because I didn't know about this directory). That was a small time saver. I suspect a great deal of my attitude towards being (likely overly) careful about what I install/uninstall and what's left behind afterwards comes from my many years as a Windows user. I remember it even took me a while to figure out that you can usually just drag stuff to the Applications folder to install on a Mac, I kept thinking to myself "I'm missing something, it can't be this simple..."
  - sshumaker 16y ago
    In theory. But in fact, many apps do leave stuff behind, even when you delete them out of your applications directory. Hence the need for programs like AppZapper.
    - hexley 16y ago
      I wouldn't say there's a need...

moultano 16y ago

It's amazing how far desktop machines have been from dragging and dropping icons to install/uninstall software. OSX was the closest to this I think, and hopefully they'll get closer? I tend to just assume now that the longer I have a desktop machine, the more miscellaneous bits of old programs will be scattered throughout the system.

dangrover 16y ago
Well, what's nice about the way OS X does it is that dragging the icon isn't a proxy for a bunch of magical installing/uninstalling. You're literally dragging the app from one location in the filesystem to another. But I think the iOS model is good too because the abstraction is not leaky (in the same way that package managers and and installer/uninstallers on windows are)
- gaelian 16y ago
  I've been using Hazel with OS X for a while now to further facilitate my bordering on obsessive compulsive desire to keep my machine clean. Hazel takes care of preference files etc. that can be left over after trashing a piece of software on OS X. I still remember the moment it dawned on me that my new Mac didn't have a registry, I think I almost shed a tear of joy.
  - glhaynes 16y ago
    I tend to prefer that old preference files be left around - they don't cause me any harm (not even a feeling of clutter, since it's not like I'm poking around ~/Library/Preferences all the time) and if I ever reinstall the app, I'm right back where I was. I can understand that it does bother some folks, though.
    - gaelian 16y ago
      I can indeed understand your sentiment also. Hence my description of my behavior bordering on something close to OCD. I think I get that "feeling of clutter" a lot more easily than many people :P For whatever reason though, I guess I don't really reinstall apps very often. Once I decide to remove something, it's almost always after pondering the issue for a little while and making a decision that I very rarely go back on. The only time I can remember reinstalling something on my Mac was Filezilla. I got myself a new FTP client, removed Filezilla as I didn't think I'd be using it anymore and then found out that my new FTP client had a bug that prevented proper connectivity via FTPS. So I went back to Filezilla and as luck would have it, Filezilla's preferences are stored in ~/.filezilla and they were all still there (because I didn't know about this directory). That was a small time saver. I suspect a great deal of my attitude towards being (likely overly) careful about what I install/uninstall and what's left behind afterwards comes from my many years as a Windows user. I remember it even took me a while to figure out that you can usually just drag stuff to the Applications folder to install on a Mac, I kept thinking to myself "I'm missing something, it can't be this simple..."
- sshumaker 16y ago
  In theory. But in fact, many apps do leave stuff behind, even when you delete them out of your applications directory. Hence the need for programs like AppZapper.
  - hexley 16y ago
    I wouldn't say there's a need...