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Warning, unpopular opinion incoming: Cross platform is, frankly, overrated. Depending on the market you're aiming for you have a very limited set of platforms

Warning, unpopular opinion incoming: Cross platform is, frankly, overrated. Depending on the market you're aiming for you have a very limited set of platforms that matter and directly targeting a native look and feel, as well as accounting for hardware and OS constraints, will always produce a better experience. Games? Target Windows and the consoles (web isn't a "real" solution on them anyway!), test on Proton if you care about Linux, and Mac isn't worth your time. Office software? Windows. Any kind of appliance (emulation station, kodi, etc), Linux. Developer tools? Linux and Windows. Bullshit addictive eyeball farming social media platform? Mobile. Artsy stuff? Mac-first and probably also Windows if you feel like it. Even so, people were targeting many more platforms than exist today throughout the 80s and early 90s with native ports for each (or a custom VM target, see: SCUMM, Z-machine, Another World/Out of This World) and they had to deal with assembly and a lot fewer standard APIs and no universal toolkits. And they did it with fewer developers, worse tooling, and no Stack Overflow to copy-paste from. I don't really think having multiple native ports is the herculean task so many developers make it out to be.

robbrown451 5y ago
I think your opinion is unpopular for a reason. You haven't given any reason why an app developer would want to rule out a subset of their potential audience. You seem to feel that users either a) have money to spend on redundant devices or b) fall neatly into groups. In my case, I do music apps. They are educational, fun, and inspire creativity. They run best on a computer (screen size, speed being the main reasons) but work on mobile. There is zero reason I can think of that I should pick Mac vs. Windows. If they are running on a phone or tablet, there is zero reason I should pick iOS or Android. So why should I have to pick just one? How is it better that, for technical reasons, I should be subdividing users like this? Your unpopular opinion doesn't really cover this.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
  I did give a reason, maybe it was too subtle: the majority of your market is on one or maybe two devices and focusing on a better experience on those devices will make your users' lives better as opposed to cobbling together some compromised jank interface in the name of capturing a few outliers.
  - mthoms 5y ago
    A few outliers? The mobile market share is about 50:50 iOS vs. Android (at least in North America).
    - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
      But mobile is an outlier use case for a whole lot of things you might make software for. What's the mobile market for CAD software? High-end photo editing or audio work? Programming?
      - mthoms 5y ago
        And desktop is an outlier use case for lots of things. What point are you making?
        AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
        I don't disagree. I'm saying stop caring so much about achieving some 'universal' and just focus on the most important platform(s) for what your application does, and make your application fit those platforms as best it can.
        robbrown451 5y ago
        Your advice seems targeted at app developers, and for that, maybe it is good advice. (depends on the product, really. Way back in 1996 Hotmail proved that web based apps could compete with native apps, for email apps anyway) But this discussion is not about what app developers should do today, given the current state of browsers. It is about whether the browser makers should support enhanced capabilities. This is different. If the browser makers did support more, of course, your advice would become even less likely to be good advice, since you could make it "fit those platforms" just as well. I mean, maybe you feel that an email apps that runs on a web page is somehow lesser than one that runs natively. Like, you have to go to a bookmark rather than click an icon, so that is going to feel out of place. I say people have gotten used to that a long time ago. Now it is just a matter of supporting all the things they might expect in the app.
thekyle 5y ago
> Developer tools? Linux and Windows I think it's more like Linux and Mac, and Windows users can use it via WSL if they want.
- vips7L 5y ago
  It’s not that hard to write cross platform code, especially when most developer tools are for the terminal.

robbrown451 5y ago

I think your opinion is unpopular for a reason. You haven't given any reason why an app developer would want to rule out a subset of their potential audience. You seem to feel that users either a) have money to spend on redundant devices or b) fall neatly into groups. In my case, I do music apps. They are educational, fun, and inspire creativity. They run best on a computer (screen size, speed being the main reasons) but work on mobile. There is zero reason I can think of that I should pick Mac vs. Windows. If they are running on a phone or tablet, there is zero reason I should pick iOS or Android. So why should I have to pick just one? How is it better that, for technical reasons, I should be subdividing users like this? Your unpopular opinion doesn't really cover this.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
I did give a reason, maybe it was too subtle: the majority of your market is on one or maybe two devices and focusing on a better experience on those devices will make your users' lives better as opposed to cobbling together some compromised jank interface in the name of capturing a few outliers.
- mthoms 5y ago
  A few outliers? The mobile market share is about 50:50 iOS vs. Android (at least in North America).
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
    But mobile is an outlier use case for a whole lot of things you might make software for. What's the mobile market for CAD software? High-end photo editing or audio work? Programming?
    - mthoms 5y ago
      And desktop is an outlier use case for lots of things. What point are you making?
      - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
        I don't disagree. I'm saying stop caring so much about achieving some 'universal' and just focus on the most important platform(s) for what your application does, and make your application fit those platforms as best it can.
        robbrown451 5y ago
        Your advice seems targeted at app developers, and for that, maybe it is good advice. (depends on the product, really. Way back in 1996 Hotmail proved that web based apps could compete with native apps, for email apps anyway) But this discussion is not about what app developers should do today, given the current state of browsers. It is about whether the browser makers should support enhanced capabilities. This is different. If the browser makers did support more, of course, your advice would become even less likely to be good advice, since you could make it "fit those platforms" just as well. I mean, maybe you feel that an email apps that runs on a web page is somehow lesser than one that runs natively. Like, you have to go to a bookmark rather than click an icon, so that is going to feel out of place. I say people have gotten used to that a long time ago. Now it is just a matter of supporting all the things they might expect in the app.

thekyle 5y ago

> Developer tools? Linux and Windows I think it's more like Linux and Mac, and Windows users can use it via WSL if they want.

vips7L 5y ago
It’s not that hard to write cross platform code, especially when most developer tools are for the terminal.