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> Think of it like this: If Hacker News required a fat client to function on your desktop, would you actually be here at all? HN essentially is a service that
by geezerjay 8y ago
> Think of it like this: If Hacker News required a fat client to function on your desktop, would you actually be here at all?
HN essentially is a service that provides only a couple of text views to list and read submittions and their discussions, and requires zero processing or interaction. That's hardly a challenging problem that requires a fat client.
If however we were discussing an application that required significant data processing, access to your personal data, or even access to photo ir video input... You'd hardly be able to implement something with HTML+CSS.
Case in point: twitter is very usable as a website but instagram is not.
- code_duck 8y agoThey wouldn’t have to change much about Instagram to make it into Twitter.
- geezerjay 8y agoIf you take away those features then you cease to have instagram. Instagram users only use instagram because it provides access to those functionalities.
- code_duck 8y agoWhat functionality are you referring to? The only one I can think of is photo editing. It’s not that difficult to make a photo editor in the browser. The only problem is performance. It would’ve been harder when Instagram was originally launched.
- bgarbiak 8y agoInstagram is perfectly usable as a website, at least on an iPhone. I guess some features might be missing, but the core stuff is there: browsing, adding photo, filters, stories.
- sosborn 8y agoHow do you post a photo on instagram in a web browser? I thought that was reserved for the app.
- syrrim 8y agoAdd a file input -> the users taps it -> ios asks if they want to use an existing photo or take a new one -> take a new photo. Result on android may differ.
- sosborn 8y agoInteresting, they don’t seem to allow this on the desktop browser. Changing the user-agent yo a mobile browser exposes it. What a strange decision.
- laurentl 8y agoI don’t use Instagram so can’t check the code, but I would guess they use something like <input type="file" accept="image/*" capture> Which does what you’d expect on a mobile device (launch the camera) but behaves differently on desktops (opens a file upload dialog). They may have decided that this behavior would confuse users.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- geezerjay 8y agoHow do you ensure that a client only sees a picture/video once and can't save it?
- da_chicken 8y ago> That's hardly a challenging problem that requires a fat client. That's irrelevant. It doesn't matter that making a fat client for HN isn't necessary; that's completely beside the point. You're looking for reasons to ignore the stated premise of an analogy rather than accepting that the premise would be true. It's like this. Say you were beginning to explain how network services work with an anecdote: "Say you need to go to the market to get a carton of milk." Suddenly your listener stops you and says, "But I don't like milk." If your response to the above paragraph is, "But I don't know how network services work," then, congratulations, you can look forward to an exciting career in either comedy or politics, depending on whether or not you were serious.
- geezerjay 8y ago> That's irrelevant. It doesn't matter that making a fat client for HN isn't necessary; that's completely beside the point. If that's your take then you've completely missed the whole point. The functionalities made available to mobile applications are the reason why they exist. Developers don't work on mobile applications for the sake of working on mobile applications. They are paid to develop clients that take advantage of the features made available through a specific type of platform. Otherwise their customers wouldn't be spending their cash looking for specialized technical solutions. > You're looking for reasons to ignore the stated premise of an analogy rather than accepting that the premise would be true. The premise is patently false, and you're just complaining that others noticed the premise is false. > It's like this. Say you were beginning to explain how network services work with an anecdote: "Say you need to go to the market to get a carton of milk." Suddenly your listener stops you and says, "But I don't like milk." No, it's like you've missed the whole point along with all the reasons why your network service does not work, and instead of acknowledging all the holes in your reasoning you've decided to complain that someone found flaws.
- rjsw 8y agoI would suggest that quite a few people write mobile applications because their managers tell them to do it. This is totally independent of whether the use case requires a mobile application.
- notSupplied 8y agoOn mobile, you don't use a fat client for HN? I've even paid money for an app (MiniHack) to have a nicer experience on mobile.
- geezerjay 8y agoTruth be told, a full blown mobile app isn't needed to tweak the UI or provide different views.