7 ms·

He's right. Apple has been strangling web app progress on iOS for many years. They wanted to ensure that web apps could never compete with native apps on the Ap

He's right. Apple has been strangling web app progress on iOS for many years. They wanted to ensure that web apps could never compete with native apps on the App Store, because they can extract their 30% fee. Now that Apple are forced to permit third party browser engines, web apps would suddenly be a lot more powerful. Apple just won't have that, so they're disabling a useful feature for everyone. I think this will backfire on them. Downgrading their own feature offerings to spite the competition is only going to fuel more animosity by everyone: users, businesses, developers, and legislators. I feel quite firmly that their proposal to comply with the Digital Markets Act is non-compliant. The DMA requires free interoperability, and Apple has imposed a very anti-competitive fee. Once this is eliminated, developers will be free to distribute whatever native apps they wish, and at this stage there are a lot of developers who will jump to any other app store.

steve1977 3y ago
I’ve always been vocal against web apps and pro native apps. Actions like this and also the direction Apple is taking with SwiftUI actually makes me interested in web apps again.
- CuriouslyC 3y ago
  Web apps will win eventually, there's only so much chrome and flash you can stuff in a native app and with WebASM/WebGPU becoming more robust the performance difference between native and webapp for things short of stuff like games is not really meaningful.
  - Towaway69 3y ago
    From a technological point of view you're quite right but there are financial interests in creating gatekeeper-based app stores. It becomes worse since the gatekeepers are also those that sell us the mobile devices to access the app stores. It comes down to marketing. As longer there isn't a largish corporation marketing alternatives to native apps, the current situation won't change much - in the short term.
- szasamasa 3y ago
  I can assure you now it is totally possible to create the same standalone UX on iPhone from the web more securely than using a native app... if Apple is forced to allow at least other browser engines to use web capabilities securely (just like they could do this on macOS or any OS is capable) is it easy to create good web UX, not... most web desgners are not real programmers and most websites are terrible, I do not really use many web apps but plenty of them might be terrible now, too but it all comes down to the developer behind the product... if you get less native offerings in the future (there are areas where native is better, it is actually also a good bot protection to require native apps) then your good programmers simply deliver good web apps to you and it actually will be the same UX only cheaper interestingly enough, if everybody has to pay the apple tax and it is the user who pays it in the end, developers may just stay by native, no competitive pressure one area is that smaller innovative apps from even sole developers may never come to realisation because it is expensive to pay android and ios developers... I just checked lichess... it is a mixed website that is not responsive (on smaller screens terrible) but uses webassembly for stockfish, that is a plus still one of the biggest expense is 1 or 2 app developers, if they did not get 500k donations they might not even exist because of app store restrictions... that would be a loss actually they should have just invest that money to create a responsive design and maybe some offline functionality and they could deploy "apps" on iPhones and Android and actually on all desktops... but you might just want to use lichess as tabs there, one tab for analysis, one for broadcasts etc... that is a good example how we might lose great small projects like lichess... and why we only have 2 greats chess sites, one getting 100 million dollar from subscriptions... it is simply difficult to create a cross platform solution even if the stockfish ai is free and open source one monopoly creates others...
edhelas 3y ago
So you mean that Apple is not doing things for the Greater Good and is actually a company that tend to build gold prisons around their customers to prevent to get as much money they can from them ? Nahhh, I don't buy that. - Sent from my iPhone
withinboredom 3y ago
Just to make a supporting argument to this... I introduced my son to neal.fun this morning and he asked "can you make this easier for me to get to?" and I was like, "sure, there's some way to pin it to the home screen." I know this feature exists and I've even written code to support this feature ... yet I spent nearly 5 minutes looking for the button. Hiding it in the share sheet is downright stupid.
- jasonjayr 3y ago
  Apple could choose to make the option front and center. Firefox has it as a primary option on the main menu. The reason that devs don't target or improve it is the friction Apple (and Google to a degree) they put in front of utilizing PWA/web apps.
  - jsnell 3y ago
    Chrome on Android has "Install App" in the main menu. It allows for sites to trigger an install flow without going any browser menus (you can e.g. have an "Install" button on a site, and clicking it will diredctly open a PWA installation prompt). In addition to that, Android supports PWAs in the Play Store. It supports other browsers, and doesn't restrict them from installing PWAs or providing alternate installation flows. I really don't understand the equivalency you're drawing here. Apple are a uniquely bad guy in this respect, it's not a difference of degree, it's a difference of kind.
    - jasonjayr 3y ago
      Google's implementation is nice, I agree, but I'm talking about richer APIs for PWAs, on parity with native apps. I imagine Google could, now that Apple is being forced to allow multiple browsers, have a 'Chrome launcher' for PWAs on iOS. It can't put it on the home screen, but it could present itself as a 'Folder' of apps, that are all web based.
- interpol_p 3y ago
  It's pretty well hidden to the point of "why do they bother supporting this feature?"
dubcanada 3y ago
As much as I would love to agree, the general population really does not care about features like "home screen web apps". Nobody outside of HN even knows what they are. Everyone just goes on the app store and downloads random website app. Even if it is just a browser app that renders a website. Apple would have to eliminate something that people actually care about for any boycott Apple to happen.
- lenkite 3y ago
  The same argument could have been used against the anti-competitive practices of Microsoft in 2001 for illegally monopolizing the web browser. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor.... Your analogous dismissal: The general user doesn't really care about features like the web browser. Everyone just goes to a website and browses. Microsoft would have to eliminate something that people actually care about.
- edhelas 3y ago
  That's because... everything was made from de beginning to push people to go to the App Store.
  - formerly_proven 3y ago
    No, I use iOS and friends in part because I want good, well-made apps that work well and integrate into the OS well - and not poorly made webapps that don't have an address bar. To that end I dislike all the faux-native iOS apps that are just a webview with a menu. It's always quite obvious when people do that. So even if I would've known about HSWAs being a thing (and not just "bookmarks on the home screen", which is approximately the exact same thing, but with an address bar), I wouldn't have cared to use them. Like evidently 99.99% of people. Yes, every thread on this has one or two people saying how badly this impacts them, yet, they are always vague about what these were used for. I have yet to see a single concrete example.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
tempodox 3y ago
> Within Apple’s explanation of why it has ended support for web apps in the EU, the company admits there’s a technical solution to the security issues problem — but it simply chose not to implement it. I think this is called malicious compliance. I hope the EU slaps Apple with severe penalties.
Someone 3y ago
> The DMA requires free interoperability, and Apple has imposed a very anti-competitive fee. From comments I read, quite a few people want it to require free interoperability, but I don’t see how it does. I even think it sort-of explicitly allows gatekeepers to keep charging for access. The pre-amble, point 62 starts with “For software application stores, online search engines and online social networking services listed in the designation decision, gatekeepers should publish and apply general conditions of access that should be fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory.” so that point is about application stores. Its second paragraph starts (emphasis added) “PRICING or other general access conditions should be considered unfair if they lead to an imbalance of rights and obligations imposed on business users or confer an advantage on the gatekeeper which is disproportionate to the service provided by the gatekeeper to business users or lead to a disadvantage for business users in providing the same or similar services as the gatekeeper.” To me, that points to them at least considering that. Can you point me to where https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj “requires free interoperability”? If you think article 6.7 says that, I disagree. IMO, it only talks about access to SDKs, specs of device ports, ability to make the same system calls as the applications of the gatekeeper can make, etc. Here’s article 6.7: “The gatekeeper shall allow providers of services and providers of hardware, free of charge, effective interoperability with, and access for the purposes of interoperability to, the same hardware and software features accessed or controlled via the operating system or virtual assistant listed in the designation decision pursuant to Article 3(9) as are available to services or hardware provided by the gatekeeper. Furthermore, the gatekeeper shall allow business users and alternative providers of services provided together with, or in support of, core platform services, free of charge, effective interoperability with, and access for the purposes of interoperability to, the same operating system, hardware or software features, regardless of whether those features are part of the operating system, as are available to, or used by, that gatekeeper when providing such services.”
- Gareth321 3y ago
  > If you think article 6.7 says that, I disagree. IMO, it only talks about access to SDKs, specs of device ports, ability to make the same system calls as the applications of the gatekeeper can make, etc. It doesn't mention "SDK" or "system call" anywhere in the text. A6.7 uses plain language, not technical, to require "effective interoperability." It doesn't place limitation on that, as you just implied there are. I've no doubt Apple will attempt to argue that "effective interoperability" is in fact "limited interoperability," but they will fail. The text is crystal clear on intent: > A1.1: The purpose of this Regulation is to contribute to the proper functioning of the internal market by laying down harmonised rules ensuring for all businesses, contestable and fair markets in the digital sector across the Union where gatekeepers are present, to the benefit of business users and end users. Charging for "effective interoperability" is clearly contrary to both the letter and spirit of this Act. It's important to remember too that the EU operates under the principle of the spirit of the law, as opposed to the U.S. which operates under the letter of the law. Judges have a very short fuse when it comes to semantic games over here. I am heartened to read that Vestager has repeatedly urged gatekeepers to test their business plans with developers prior to the March 7 deadline, suggesting she is using the feedback of competitors to form the basis for both determining suitable compliance, and further legislative changes, for which the DMA provides swift provision.
onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
> I think this will backfire on them. How? In the Apple consumer's eye, Apple can do no wrong. The Apple consumer will always blame any problem on some other company or government.
madeofpalk 3y ago
I don’t believe Apple “strangles” Safari to promote their App Store and protect its 30% cut. There’s a mountain of web capabilities that Apple lead the charge and either invented the specs on, or adopted before others, on to make more native-like experiences for the web. I think things like backdrop-filter, position: sticky, and css snap points do a whole lot more to make websites feel like native app than stuff like WebMIDI. I think there's plenty of 'malicious compliance' and pettiness in Apple's recent DMA stuff, but I do not think removing chromeless home screen bookmarks was one of them. I think they took a strict interpretation of the regulations and don't really care too much about them so just removed them. I think Apple just has a different philosophy and priorities for their web platform, putting a higher value on privacy, performance, and efficiency than Chrome.
- szasamasa 3y ago
  sure :)
turquoisevar 3y ago
How do you reconcile this claim regarding Apple’s intent to crush web apps with their increased investment in supporting PWAs over the last four years up to and including the upcoming Safari release and recruiting top talent such as Jen Simmons to achieve this? If I were aiming to prevent web apps from competing with my App Store, I wouldn’t be telling a bunch of highly paid engineers to directly work against that goal, much less be recruiting celebrity engineers at a premium and contributing to and creating specs that help web apps provide a more native-like experience.

steve1977 3y ago

I’ve always been vocal against web apps and pro native apps. Actions like this and also the direction Apple is taking with SwiftUI actually makes me interested in web apps again.

CuriouslyC 3y ago
Web apps will win eventually, there's only so much chrome and flash you can stuff in a native app and with WebASM/WebGPU becoming more robust the performance difference between native and webapp for things short of stuff like games is not really meaningful.
- Towaway69 3y ago
  From a technological point of view you're quite right but there are financial interests in creating gatekeeper-based app stores. It becomes worse since the gatekeepers are also those that sell us the mobile devices to access the app stores. It comes down to marketing. As longer there isn't a largish corporation marketing alternatives to native apps, the current situation won't change much - in the short term.
szasamasa 3y ago
I can assure you now it is totally possible to create the same standalone UX on iPhone from the web more securely than using a native app... if Apple is forced to allow at least other browser engines to use web capabilities securely (just like they could do this on macOS or any OS is capable) is it easy to create good web UX, not... most web desgners are not real programmers and most websites are terrible, I do not really use many web apps but plenty of them might be terrible now, too but it all comes down to the developer behind the product... if you get less native offerings in the future (there are areas where native is better, it is actually also a good bot protection to require native apps) then your good programmers simply deliver good web apps to you and it actually will be the same UX only cheaper interestingly enough, if everybody has to pay the apple tax and it is the user who pays it in the end, developers may just stay by native, no competitive pressure one area is that smaller innovative apps from even sole developers may never come to realisation because it is expensive to pay android and ios developers... I just checked lichess... it is a mixed website that is not responsive (on smaller screens terrible) but uses webassembly for stockfish, that is a plus still one of the biggest expense is 1 or 2 app developers, if they did not get 500k donations they might not even exist because of app store restrictions... that would be a loss actually they should have just invest that money to create a responsive design and maybe some offline functionality and they could deploy "apps" on iPhones and Android and actually on all desktops... but you might just want to use lichess as tabs there, one tab for analysis, one for broadcasts etc... that is a good example how we might lose great small projects like lichess... and why we only have 2 greats chess sites, one getting 100 million dollar from subscriptions... it is simply difficult to create a cross platform solution even if the stockfish ai is free and open source one monopoly creates others...

edhelas 3y ago

So you mean that Apple is not doing things for the Greater Good and is actually a company that tend to build gold prisons around their customers to prevent to get as much money they can from them ? Nahhh, I don't buy that. - Sent from my iPhone

withinboredom 3y ago

Just to make a supporting argument to this... I introduced my son to neal.fun this morning and he asked "can you make this easier for me to get to?" and I was like, "sure, there's some way to pin it to the home screen." I know this feature exists and I've even written code to support this feature ... yet I spent nearly 5 minutes looking for the button. Hiding it in the share sheet is downright stupid.

jasonjayr 3y ago
Apple could choose to make the option front and center. Firefox has it as a primary option on the main menu. The reason that devs don't target or improve it is the friction Apple (and Google to a degree) they put in front of utilizing PWA/web apps.
- jsnell 3y ago
  Chrome on Android has "Install App" in the main menu. It allows for sites to trigger an install flow without going any browser menus (you can e.g. have an "Install" button on a site, and clicking it will diredctly open a PWA installation prompt). In addition to that, Android supports PWAs in the Play Store. It supports other browsers, and doesn't restrict them from installing PWAs or providing alternate installation flows. I really don't understand the equivalency you're drawing here. Apple are a uniquely bad guy in this respect, it's not a difference of degree, it's a difference of kind.
  - jasonjayr 3y ago
    Google's implementation is nice, I agree, but I'm talking about richer APIs for PWAs, on parity with native apps. I imagine Google could, now that Apple is being forced to allow multiple browsers, have a 'Chrome launcher' for PWAs on iOS. It can't put it on the home screen, but it could present itself as a 'Folder' of apps, that are all web based.
interpol_p 3y ago
It's pretty well hidden to the point of "why do they bother supporting this feature?"

dubcanada 3y ago

As much as I would love to agree, the general population really does not care about features like "home screen web apps". Nobody outside of HN even knows what they are. Everyone just goes on the app store and downloads random website app. Even if it is just a browser app that renders a website. Apple would have to eliminate something that people actually care about for any boycott Apple to happen.

lenkite 3y ago
The same argument could have been used against the anti-competitive practices of Microsoft in 2001 for illegally monopolizing the web browser. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor.... Your analogous dismissal: The general user doesn't really care about features like the web browser. Everyone just goes to a website and browses. Microsoft would have to eliminate something that people actually care about.
edhelas 3y ago
That's because... everything was made from de beginning to push people to go to the App Store.
- formerly_proven 3y ago
  No, I use iOS and friends in part because I want good, well-made apps that work well and integrate into the OS well - and not poorly made webapps that don't have an address bar. To that end I dislike all the faux-native iOS apps that are just a webview with a menu. It's always quite obvious when people do that. So even if I would've known about HSWAs being a thing (and not just "bookmarks on the home screen", which is approximately the exact same thing, but with an address bar), I wouldn't have cared to use them. Like evidently 99.99% of people. Yes, every thread on this has one or two people saying how badly this impacts them, yet, they are always vague about what these were used for. I have yet to see a single concrete example.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]

tempodox 3y ago

> Within Apple’s explanation of why it has ended support for web apps in the EU, the company admits there’s a technical solution to the security issues problem — but it simply chose not to implement it. I think this is called malicious compliance. I hope the EU slaps Apple with severe penalties.

Someone 3y ago

> The DMA requires free interoperability, and Apple has imposed a very anti-competitive fee. From comments I read, quite a few people want it to require free interoperability, but I don’t see how it does. I even think it sort-of explicitly allows gatekeepers to keep charging for access. The pre-amble, point 62 starts with “For software application stores, online search engines and online social networking services listed in the designation decision, gatekeepers should publish and apply general conditions of access that should be fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory.” so that point is about application stores. Its second paragraph starts (emphasis added) “PRICING or other general access conditions should be considered unfair if they lead to an imbalance of rights and obligations imposed on business users or confer an advantage on the gatekeeper which is disproportionate to the service provided by the gatekeeper to business users or lead to a disadvantage for business users in providing the same or similar services as the gatekeeper.” To me, that points to them at least considering that. Can you point me to where https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2022/1925/oj “requires free interoperability”? If you think article 6.7 says that, I disagree. IMO, it only talks about access to SDKs, specs of device ports, ability to make the same system calls as the applications of the gatekeeper can make, etc. Here’s article 6.7: “The gatekeeper shall allow providers of services and providers of hardware, free of charge, effective interoperability with, and access for the purposes of interoperability to, the same hardware and software features accessed or controlled via the operating system or virtual assistant listed in the designation decision pursuant to Article 3(9) as are available to services or hardware provided by the gatekeeper. Furthermore, the gatekeeper shall allow business users and alternative providers of services provided together with, or in support of, core platform services, free of charge, effective interoperability with, and access for the purposes of interoperability to, the same operating system, hardware or software features, regardless of whether those features are part of the operating system, as are available to, or used by, that gatekeeper when providing such services.”

Gareth321 3y ago
> If you think article 6.7 says that, I disagree. IMO, it only talks about access to SDKs, specs of device ports, ability to make the same system calls as the applications of the gatekeeper can make, etc. It doesn't mention "SDK" or "system call" anywhere in the text. A6.7 uses plain language, not technical, to require "effective interoperability." It doesn't place limitation on that, as you just implied there are. I've no doubt Apple will attempt to argue that "effective interoperability" is in fact "limited interoperability," but they will fail. The text is crystal clear on intent: > A1.1: The purpose of this Regulation is to contribute to the proper functioning of the internal market by laying down harmonised rules ensuring for all businesses, contestable and fair markets in the digital sector across the Union where gatekeepers are present, to the benefit of business users and end users. Charging for "effective interoperability" is clearly contrary to both the letter and spirit of this Act. It's important to remember too that the EU operates under the principle of the spirit of the law, as opposed to the U.S. which operates under the letter of the law. Judges have a very short fuse when it comes to semantic games over here. I am heartened to read that Vestager has repeatedly urged gatekeepers to test their business plans with developers prior to the March 7 deadline, suggesting she is using the feedback of competitors to form the basis for both determining suitable compliance, and further legislative changes, for which the DMA provides swift provision.

onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago

> I think this will backfire on them. How? In the Apple consumer's eye, Apple can do no wrong. The Apple consumer will always blame any problem on some other company or government.

madeofpalk 3y ago

I don’t believe Apple “strangles” Safari to promote their App Store and protect its 30% cut. There’s a mountain of web capabilities that Apple lead the charge and either invented the specs on, or adopted before others, on to make more native-like experiences for the web. I think things like backdrop-filter, position: sticky, and css snap points do a whole lot more to make websites feel like native app than stuff like WebMIDI. I think there's plenty of 'malicious compliance' and pettiness in Apple's recent DMA stuff, but I do not think removing chromeless home screen bookmarks was one of them. I think they took a strict interpretation of the regulations and don't really care too much about them so just removed them. I think Apple just has a different philosophy and priorities for their web platform, putting a higher value on privacy, performance, and efficiency than Chrome.

szasamasa 3y ago
sure :)

turquoisevar 3y ago

How do you reconcile this claim regarding Apple’s intent to crush web apps with their increased investment in supporting PWAs over the last four years up to and including the upcoming Safari release and recruiting top talent such as Jen Simmons to achieve this? If I were aiming to prevent web apps from competing with my App Store, I wouldn’t be telling a bunch of highly paid engineers to directly work against that goal, much less be recruiting celebrity engineers at a premium and contributing to and creating specs that help web apps provide a more native-like experience.