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Why? Isn't the web basically the perfect fully virtualized and sandboxed environment with a highly standardized and open API and a sophisticated, accessible UI

by shawnz 3y ago

Why? Isn't the web basically the perfect fully virtualized and sandboxed environment with a highly standardized and open API and a sophisticated, accessible UI toolkit, with elaborate development tools built right in, like we always dreamed of? Isn't the web basically the perfect OS?

jjoonathan 3y ago
Yes, and most importantly: nobody owns it. Sure, we all complain about Chrome and its outsized influence, but at the end of the day the standards are more open than not and Safari and Firefox mostly work most of the time on most of the pages. That's a stark contrast to, say, .NET vs Cocoa or Android vs Apple app stores.
- dylan604 3y ago
  >mostly work most of the time on most of the pages well, that sounds perfectly reasonable that only some pages are not standards compliant. :facepalm:
  - jjoonathan 3y ago
    "Comply or we will break your shit" works better in closed ecosystems. I'll take a little mess over a 30% tax and heavy-handed tempramental moderation any day of the week.
JohnFen 3y ago
> Isn't the web basically the perfect OS? I don't think so at all. Web-based applications tend to suck, and it seems to me that much of the reason is because the browser is very imperfect as an OS.
- nolist_policy 3y ago
  And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. And don't forget shopping online, there are a few small web shops out there with great UX. And you can use 20 year old websites just fine, the web has great backwards compatibility too. Web apps don't have to suck.
  - salawat 3y ago
    >And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. Which has 0 to do with the virtues of the Web as OS and much more to do with catharting the pain and frustration induced by sharing the digital world with people with shockingly bad points of view through acting in kind. A game nobody wins; alas...
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. I think if HN counts as a web app, then "web app" has no meaningful definition. > Web apps don't have to suck. Maybe, maybe not. All I know is that the ones I've used (and have to use at work) do suck.
    - jowea 3y ago
      It is on the web, and it is interactive, i.e. not just a static blog. The average social media site is clearly a web app, right? What is HN missing? Not looking like it's from the early web 2.0 era?
      - JohnFen 3y ago
        > The average social media site is clearly a web app, right? I never considered them as such, no. Those (including HN) are just ordinary websites with some amount of interactivity. To me, a "web app" is a thing that replicates a normal application in web form. Things like GMail, Office, etc. In other words, they aren't things that uniquely leverage the web, they're things that are using the web as a shortcut to platform independence. But perhaps the definition has changed, and I need to be much more explicit and specific instead of using the term "web app". I could buy that, but it also means that I don't actually know what a "web app" is anymore.
        shawnz 3y ago
        This seems like an artificially restrictive definition that necessarily excludes anything that you might actually enjoy using. Doesn't it just naturally make sense that the software you enjoy using most is the software that's designed idiomatically around the platform it runs on? If "web app" is defined to mean "software not meant for the web, but shoehorned onto it" then of course all web apps will suck.
shwaj 3y ago
If it were, then people wouldn’t bother writing native applications.
jowea 3y ago
Not fully disagreeing, but the web feels more heavy on RAM and other resources than native software. Also, the only programming language being Javascript, which is just starting to sort of change with WebAssembly is also far from ideal. Some other stuff like storage is also comparatively recent AFAIK.

by shawnz 3y ago

jjoonathan 3y ago

Yes, and most importantly: nobody owns it. Sure, we all complain about Chrome and its outsized influence, but at the end of the day the standards are more open than not and Safari and Firefox mostly work most of the time on most of the pages. That's a stark contrast to, say, .NET vs Cocoa or Android vs Apple app stores.

dylan604 3y ago
>mostly work most of the time on most of the pages well, that sounds perfectly reasonable that only some pages are not standards compliant. :facepalm:
- jjoonathan 3y ago
  "Comply or we will break your shit" works better in closed ecosystems. I'll take a little mess over a 30% tax and heavy-handed tempramental moderation any day of the week.

JohnFen 3y ago

> Isn't the web basically the perfect OS? I don't think so at all. Web-based applications tend to suck, and it seems to me that much of the reason is because the browser is very imperfect as an OS.

nolist_policy 3y ago
And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. And don't forget shopping online, there are a few small web shops out there with great UX. And you can use 20 year old websites just fine, the web has great backwards compatibility too. Web apps don't have to suck.
- salawat 3y ago
  >And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. Which has 0 to do with the virtues of the Web as OS and much more to do with catharting the pain and frustration induced by sharing the digital world with people with shockingly bad points of view through acting in kind. A game nobody wins; alas...
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > And yet you are posting this on HN, which one could argue is a Web application. I think if HN counts as a web app, then "web app" has no meaningful definition. > Web apps don't have to suck. Maybe, maybe not. All I know is that the ones I've used (and have to use at work) do suck.
  - jowea 3y ago
    It is on the web, and it is interactive, i.e. not just a static blog. The average social media site is clearly a web app, right? What is HN missing? Not looking like it's from the early web 2.0 era?
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      > The average social media site is clearly a web app, right? I never considered them as such, no. Those (including HN) are just ordinary websites with some amount of interactivity. To me, a "web app" is a thing that replicates a normal application in web form. Things like GMail, Office, etc. In other words, they aren't things that uniquely leverage the web, they're things that are using the web as a shortcut to platform independence. But perhaps the definition has changed, and I need to be much more explicit and specific instead of using the term "web app". I could buy that, but it also means that I don't actually know what a "web app" is anymore.
      - shawnz 3y ago
        This seems like an artificially restrictive definition that necessarily excludes anything that you might actually enjoy using. Doesn't it just naturally make sense that the software you enjoy using most is the software that's designed idiomatically around the platform it runs on? If "web app" is defined to mean "software not meant for the web, but shoehorned onto it" then of course all web apps will suck.

shwaj 3y ago

If it were, then people wouldn’t bother writing native applications.

jowea 3y ago

Not fully disagreeing, but the web feels more heavy on RAM and other resources than native software. Also, the only programming language being Javascript, which is just starting to sort of change with WebAssembly is also far from ideal. Some other stuff like storage is also comparatively recent AFAIK.