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The situation was slightly more complicated. Half of the original launch apps on the phone were first built as JS web apps. Most were completely rewritten to be
by xenadu02 4y ago
The situation was slightly more complicated. Half of the original launch apps on the phone were first built as JS web apps. Most were completely rewritten to be native apps before launch (and the rest after launch) because it was clear that the native experience was superior.
Only later was the decision made to ship a public SDK. Web apps were announced because that's the only thing third parties could use. There was no public API to speak of, just a collection of internal APIs and one-offs in individual apps.
- zozbot234 4y agoYou know what other phone OS ran exclusively web-based JS apps? Firefox OS. And it was a dismal failure. Pivoting to native apps on the early iPhone models was absolutely the right call.
- afavour 4y agoI wouldn’t assume that Firefox OS failed where iOS succeeded just because of the use of web features. There were hundreds of other factors involved.
- esprehn 4y agoAs someone close to that situation, Firefox OS's failure had nothing to do with being web based beyond the fact that it was incompatible with the two dominant mobile platforms. Ex. If you can't run the Android or iOS YouTube app, what you have left is the web one... which could be amazing, but is hardly a fully functional PWA because Google would rather you used the native app. Firefox OS would have failed all the same had it been based on Qt, or even if it was based on Java without the Android runtime and SDK.