7 ms·

Don’t agree, but to each their own. The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version, in my opini

Don’t agree, but to each their own. The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version, in my opinion. Lots of people hate Electron apps, which suggests to me that my preference for native apps isn’t unique. Web apps can ask for your location or microphone the same way native apps can. Just reject it, there’s nothing that says you have to accept on either platform, so to say that’s a negative for native apps is odd. The biggest downside of native apps is you can’t customize them with extensions or user styles like you can with websites.

thwarted 1y ago
Mobile apps are so limited compared to an actual web browser's interface. The reddit mobile app only lets you view one topic/conversation at a time. Same with the IMDB app; it's impossible to do any research, like comparing actors or movies, using the IMDB mobile app because the flows are all captive and there's very limited ways to navigate between the resources. With a browser, I can open up multiple sets of content at once. So many mobile apps are just fixed views and offer no compelling interface for anything but the extremely limited way they want (force) you to use their app. The fact that a browser allows multiple tabs and can do bookmarking makes up for (works around) the relatively lack luster interfaces both website and mobile apps have.
- dpkirchner 1y ago
  Mobile IMDB is not the best example -- simply navigating backwards causes a page reload, or at least a long stall and jitter as the page scrolls you around. I'd prefer an app experience (however I just use the Letterboxd app instead.) Tabs are a big win for mobile web, I agree. I just don't think it outweighs the annoyance of navigating the app in more traditional ways.
VoidWarranty 1y ago
The reason I believe the web experience is inferior is because companies put more resources into apps at the expense of the web. Apps break often. They need a lot of support. Everything must be constantly updated. You never know when Samsung or Apple will push an update that breaks things because of some esoteric policy shift or setting change. But the web? If you do it right, maintenence is much easier. If things do break: users can try different browsers or devices to get around instead of being bricked. I can't be the only one who _never _ updates software on my phone until I absolutely have to. Everything is so brittle. I'm sick of being gaslit that apps make that better. Despite it's own horrible implementations, the web is far more stable.
- bitpush 1y ago
  > The reason I believe the web experience is inferior is because companies put more resources into apps at the expense of the web. The main reason is just a single company - Apple. They have been hell bent on nerfing Safari so that they can continue their rent seeking behavior on App Store. If Spotify has a functional mobile website, they cant take 30% cut from their app. The way Apple does is 2 fold. 1) deliberating not investing $$ into Safari 2) claiming that you'll get malware from internet. Both are hypocritical.
  - mvanbaak 1y ago
    Google play store is no better
    - h4ck_th3_pl4n3t 1y ago
      In this discussion, both can be bad faith actors. It's not a defensive argument about "but he did it too"! That's not how you get to a better solution to the problem at hand. On iOS there is no effective way to install sideloaded apps, therefore this rent seeking behavior is even more hostile to the user.
  - scarface_74 1y ago
    Yes that’s why there are so many great PWAs on Android and companies don’t make apps for Android and instead tell their users to use the web app… And Spotify hasn’t had in app purchasing of subscriptions on iOS for over a decade. Apple has never once said you would get malware by using Safari.
    - bitpush 1y ago
      Spotify was an example, but since you were harping on it. Why is it that on desktop everyone uses spotify.com to listen to music, purchase subscription but when it comes to iPhone, we have to install an app from the App Store. Who do you think is stopping from that happening?
fiddlerwoaroof 1y ago
I agree with you: I always use native apps where they exist, on mobile or desktop and only use web apps if I’m forced too.
montroser 1y ago
The author is not contesting that the app experience is better. Yeah, the web experience is worse -- because the product people are treating the entire web presence as a _marketing surface_ for the app. So, the web version is basically an ad for the app. This is true of Reddit, Yelp, and others. How could it not be worse? It's too bad because it's not like the web is incapable of providing a beautiful ux for those products. But then so why do you think these companies employ massive teams of devs, for Android, and then again for iOS, reimplementing their functionality on every platform? All that to provide you with that sweet extra smooth native "feel", 2% nicer than the web could do? No, it's not for you...
- dylan604 1y ago
  > No, it's not for you... This is key. Companies pushing apps is not for your benefit. It's so they can further monetize you right under your nose and with your full permission by accepting their EULA. This is just a furtherance of the if you don't pay for the product you are the product.
  - charcircuit 1y ago
    Companies still have to provide value for them to attract users. It's cynical to only look at the value the company gets and ignoring the value users and advertisers get.
    - immibis 1y ago
      Companies have to provide the perception of providing value.
    - johnnyanmac 1y ago
      I argue that this decade shows you do not have to provide value. You capture the market yester-decade and then you can hold the users hostage as you do any and everything to appeal to shareholders and advertisers. This is indeed a short term strategy, but tech companies right now are thinking very short term.
yownie 1y ago
it doesn't seem like you even read the relatively short post since: "The native app experience for every app noted in the article" doesn't make any sense, the article lists none. "Lots of people hate Electron apps, which suggests to me that my preference for native apps isn’t unique." again......what does this have to do with the article at all? Aren't you merely reinforcing the articles point? " Just reject it, there’s nothing that says you have to accept on either platform, so to say that’s a negative for native apps is odd." Except that most app's would stop working if anyone confined them to the minimum amount of data required, case in point any scooter app that won't let you rent unless you have google location services turned on vs just regular GPS. OPs point is that app are a walled garden of functionality that lock users in because of expedience for living life.
- jjulius 1y ago
  >"The native app experience for every app noted in the article" doesn't make any sense, the article lists none. At the risk of nitpicking, the second paragraph mentions Reddit, LinkedIn and Pinterest.
opan 1y ago
>The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version, in my opinion. Lots of people hate Electron apps, which suggests to me that my preference for native apps isn’t unique. I want native programs on my PC, and fewer apps on my phone. I get all my apps from F-Droid. If I need to use Steam chat or view the menu at Taco Bell, mobile website it is. I am not gonna put their proprietary software on my phone. This also brings up another interesting difference. There is no desktop program for Taco Bell, that would be super weird. I think other comments already addressed that, but a lot of mobile apps are basically just the website. A game like Luanti or some sort of Tetris is something I'd want native in both places (desktop and mobile). Games in browsers are a mess.
Tadpole9181 1y ago
If this was actually done, let's say as a government-imposed requirement, we may actually see some innovation in browser usage and the release of new UI frameworks.
amarshall 1y ago
Many of the “native” apps on mobile app stores are React Native, though.
- singpolyma3 1y ago
  Why quotes? React native is native
- wiseowise 1y ago
  React Native uses native ui.
Rebelgecko 1y ago
For me, the last straw with the Amazon app was when it started injecting ads into the Android text selection UI
- Intermernet 1y ago
  That sounds like a potential attack vector. Similar to copy/pasting commands from web pages. I'm surprised it's allowed, but I suppose it's also very tricky to fix.
johnnyanmac 1y ago
That's partially by design. Apple makes it a pain to make proper PWA's, and companies with websites make extremely intrusive elements to ruin the mobile website in order drive to the app. Which is easier to monetize and harder to adblock, I imagine. Some places outright disable the mobile view for the app. More simply, I don't need an app for every website I visit. a bookmark is much more lightweight than downloading yet another app to clutter my drawer.
- singpolyma3 1y ago
  I'm not apple lover, but safari support for PWAs is pretty good. What do you think is missing?
  - judah 1y ago
    I work on PWABuilder, Microsoft's open source dev tool that packages PWAs for app stores. I can say with certainty Apple has been hostile to PWAs. Unlike Google Play and Microsoft Store, iOS App Store doesn't allow publishing PWAs. (You instead have to build a native web view app to load your PWA.) And many of the PWA features just don't work on mobile Safari.
    - singpolyma3 1y ago
      Which "many" features don't work?
tootie 1y ago
Honestly haven't noticed this. What I have noticed is that few if any apps implement a "find text on this page" which I use constantly in browser.
aflag 1y ago
Isn't the mobile app of Reddit just using electron as well?
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
cosmic_cheese 1y ago
With exception to Reddit, I generally prefer apps to sites because mobile process management is considerably nicer than browser tab management. App processes are sorted in order of most recent use, keeping the most relevant ones at hand, and those that aren’t used for a while just silently go away without much fuss. In comparison browser tabs aren’t organized unless the user does that themselves, and so with each web app tab management overhead increases. Some browsers have an idle tab auto-close feature, but that closes the wrong tab (usually a page with info pertinent to something I’m working on) quite often. “Installing” PWAs can be an ok-ish workaround, but the problem there is that a lot of sites don’t have the little bit of manifest magic that makes saving to home screen “install” a PWA instead of just opening a browser tab.
radley 1y ago
> The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version I've found it to be the opposite. Perhaps if you're heavily involved on Reddit, LinkedIn, etc., then it's more convenient. But I only go to those sites via a search link. Why would I want to spend time and effort installing the app, just to see the same content I just landed on? It's a huge red flag when websites push their app so intrusively. It means the app has little value and will be just as bad or worse when you use it.
Zak 1y ago
People who know what Electron is and profess hatred for it are usually mostly annoyed by the fact that it bundles all of Chrome, giving the app an absurd memory and storage footprint relative to its functionality. People don't complain the same way when apps are made with Tauri.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
meehai 1y ago
Tbh, the web won the application platform mostly because it's a standard. Everybody knows html, css and a little JS. On the other hand, for mobile apps, there is still a device-specific mentality. Imagine web apps being built with a different flavor for all the major browsers... I hope that the same level of standardization comes to mobile apps too with the option to use more device-specific features on top of the generic UI.
BrtByte 1y ago
But I think a lot of the frustration comes from how aggressively companies push the app, even when the web version is perfectly serviceable for casual use
wiseowise 1y ago
[dead]

thwarted 1y ago

Mobile apps are so limited compared to an actual web browser's interface. The reddit mobile app only lets you view one topic/conversation at a time. Same with the IMDB app; it's impossible to do any research, like comparing actors or movies, using the IMDB mobile app because the flows are all captive and there's very limited ways to navigate between the resources. With a browser, I can open up multiple sets of content at once. So many mobile apps are just fixed views and offer no compelling interface for anything but the extremely limited way they want (force) you to use their app. The fact that a browser allows multiple tabs and can do bookmarking makes up for (works around) the relatively lack luster interfaces both website and mobile apps have.

dpkirchner 1y ago
Mobile IMDB is not the best example -- simply navigating backwards causes a page reload, or at least a long stall and jitter as the page scrolls you around. I'd prefer an app experience (however I just use the Letterboxd app instead.) Tabs are a big win for mobile web, I agree. I just don't think it outweighs the annoyance of navigating the app in more traditional ways.

VoidWarranty 1y ago

The reason I believe the web experience is inferior is because companies put more resources into apps at the expense of the web. Apps break often. They need a lot of support. Everything must be constantly updated. You never know when Samsung or Apple will push an update that breaks things because of some esoteric policy shift or setting change. But the web? If you do it right, maintenence is much easier. If things do break: users can try different browsers or devices to get around instead of being bricked. I can't be the only one who _never _ updates software on my phone until I absolutely have to. Everything is so brittle. I'm sick of being gaslit that apps make that better. Despite it's own horrible implementations, the web is far more stable.

bitpush 1y ago
> The reason I believe the web experience is inferior is because companies put more resources into apps at the expense of the web. The main reason is just a single company - Apple. They have been hell bent on nerfing Safari so that they can continue their rent seeking behavior on App Store. If Spotify has a functional mobile website, they cant take 30% cut from their app. The way Apple does is 2 fold. 1) deliberating not investing $$ into Safari 2) claiming that you'll get malware from internet. Both are hypocritical.
- mvanbaak 1y ago
  Google play store is no better
  - h4ck_th3_pl4n3t 1y ago
    In this discussion, both can be bad faith actors. It's not a defensive argument about "but he did it too"! That's not how you get to a better solution to the problem at hand. On iOS there is no effective way to install sideloaded apps, therefore this rent seeking behavior is even more hostile to the user.
- scarface_74 1y ago
  Yes that’s why there are so many great PWAs on Android and companies don’t make apps for Android and instead tell their users to use the web app… And Spotify hasn’t had in app purchasing of subscriptions on iOS for over a decade. Apple has never once said you would get malware by using Safari.
  - bitpush 1y ago
    Spotify was an example, but since you were harping on it. Why is it that on desktop everyone uses spotify.com to listen to music, purchase subscription but when it comes to iPhone, we have to install an app from the App Store. Who do you think is stopping from that happening?

fiddlerwoaroof 1y ago

I agree with you: I always use native apps where they exist, on mobile or desktop and only use web apps if I’m forced too.

montroser 1y ago

The author is not contesting that the app experience is better. Yeah, the web experience is worse -- because the product people are treating the entire web presence as a _marketing surface_ for the app. So, the web version is basically an ad for the app. This is true of Reddit, Yelp, and others. How could it not be worse? It's too bad because it's not like the web is incapable of providing a beautiful ux for those products. But then so why do you think these companies employ massive teams of devs, for Android, and then again for iOS, reimplementing their functionality on every platform? All that to provide you with that sweet extra smooth native "feel", 2% nicer than the web could do? No, it's not for you...

dylan604 1y ago
> No, it's not for you... This is key. Companies pushing apps is not for your benefit. It's so they can further monetize you right under your nose and with your full permission by accepting their EULA. This is just a furtherance of the if you don't pay for the product you are the product.
- charcircuit 1y ago
  Companies still have to provide value for them to attract users. It's cynical to only look at the value the company gets and ignoring the value users and advertisers get.
  - immibis 1y ago
    Companies have to provide the perception of providing value.
  - johnnyanmac 1y ago
    I argue that this decade shows you do not have to provide value. You capture the market yester-decade and then you can hold the users hostage as you do any and everything to appeal to shareholders and advertisers. This is indeed a short term strategy, but tech companies right now are thinking very short term.

yownie 1y ago

it doesn't seem like you even read the relatively short post since: "The native app experience for every app noted in the article" doesn't make any sense, the article lists none. "Lots of people hate Electron apps, which suggests to me that my preference for native apps isn’t unique." again......what does this have to do with the article at all? Aren't you merely reinforcing the articles point? " Just reject it, there’s nothing that says you have to accept on either platform, so to say that’s a negative for native apps is odd." Except that most app's would stop working if anyone confined them to the minimum amount of data required, case in point any scooter app that won't let you rent unless you have google location services turned on vs just regular GPS. OPs point is that app are a walled garden of functionality that lock users in because of expedience for living life.

jjulius 1y ago
>"The native app experience for every app noted in the article" doesn't make any sense, the article lists none. At the risk of nitpicking, the second paragraph mentions Reddit, LinkedIn and Pinterest.

opan 1y ago

>The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version, in my opinion. Lots of people hate Electron apps, which suggests to me that my preference for native apps isn’t unique. I want native programs on my PC, and fewer apps on my phone. I get all my apps from F-Droid. If I need to use Steam chat or view the menu at Taco Bell, mobile website it is. I am not gonna put their proprietary software on my phone. This also brings up another interesting difference. There is no desktop program for Taco Bell, that would be super weird. I think other comments already addressed that, but a lot of mobile apps are basically just the website. A game like Luanti or some sort of Tetris is something I'd want native in both places (desktop and mobile). Games in browsers are a mess.

Tadpole9181 1y ago

If this was actually done, let's say as a government-imposed requirement, we may actually see some innovation in browser usage and the release of new UI frameworks.

amarshall 1y ago

Many of the “native” apps on mobile app stores are React Native, though.

singpolyma3 1y ago
Why quotes? React native is native
wiseowise 1y ago
React Native uses native ui.

Rebelgecko 1y ago

For me, the last straw with the Amazon app was when it started injecting ads into the Android text selection UI

Intermernet 1y ago
That sounds like a potential attack vector. Similar to copy/pasting commands from web pages. I'm surprised it's allowed, but I suppose it's also very tricky to fix.

johnnyanmac 1y ago

That's partially by design. Apple makes it a pain to make proper PWA's, and companies with websites make extremely intrusive elements to ruin the mobile website in order drive to the app. Which is easier to monetize and harder to adblock, I imagine. Some places outright disable the mobile view for the app. More simply, I don't need an app for every website I visit. a bookmark is much more lightweight than downloading yet another app to clutter my drawer.

singpolyma3 1y ago
I'm not apple lover, but safari support for PWAs is pretty good. What do you think is missing?
- judah 1y ago
  I work on PWABuilder, Microsoft's open source dev tool that packages PWAs for app stores. I can say with certainty Apple has been hostile to PWAs. Unlike Google Play and Microsoft Store, iOS App Store doesn't allow publishing PWAs. (You instead have to build a native web view app to load your PWA.) And many of the PWA features just don't work on mobile Safari.
  - singpolyma3 1y ago
    Which "many" features don't work?

tootie 1y ago

Honestly haven't noticed this. What I have noticed is that few if any apps implement a "find text on this page" which I use constantly in browser.

aflag 1y ago

Isn't the mobile app of Reddit just using electron as well?

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

cosmic_cheese 1y ago

With exception to Reddit, I generally prefer apps to sites because mobile process management is considerably nicer than browser tab management. App processes are sorted in order of most recent use, keeping the most relevant ones at hand, and those that aren’t used for a while just silently go away without much fuss. In comparison browser tabs aren’t organized unless the user does that themselves, and so with each web app tab management overhead increases. Some browsers have an idle tab auto-close feature, but that closes the wrong tab (usually a page with info pertinent to something I’m working on) quite often. “Installing” PWAs can be an ok-ish workaround, but the problem there is that a lot of sites don’t have the little bit of manifest magic that makes saving to home screen “install” a PWA instead of just opening a browser tab.

radley 1y ago

> The native app experience for every app noted in the article is better and smoother than the mobile web version I've found it to be the opposite. Perhaps if you're heavily involved on Reddit, LinkedIn, etc., then it's more convenient. But I only go to those sites via a search link. Why would I want to spend time and effort installing the app, just to see the same content I just landed on? It's a huge red flag when websites push their app so intrusively. It means the app has little value and will be just as bad or worse when you use it.

Zak 1y ago

People who know what Electron is and profess hatred for it are usually mostly annoyed by the fact that it bundles all of Chrome, giving the app an absurd memory and storage footprint relative to its functionality. People don't complain the same way when apps are made with Tauri.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

meehai 1y ago

Tbh, the web won the application platform mostly because it's a standard. Everybody knows html, css and a little JS. On the other hand, for mobile apps, there is still a device-specific mentality. Imagine web apps being built with a different flavor for all the major browsers... I hope that the same level of standardization comes to mobile apps too with the option to use more device-specific features on top of the generic UI.

BrtByte 1y ago

But I think a lot of the frustration comes from how aggressively companies push the app, even when the web version is perfectly serviceable for casual use

wiseowise 1y ago

[dead]