6 ms·

Google is building Chrome apps support for Android and iOS

91 points by hackhackhack 13y ago

nakedrobot2 13y ago
I have not for the life of me been able to imagine the purpose of building a Chrome app. Now I can.... but wait... isn't it just a "lipstick on the pig" html5 web app?
- tjohns 13y ago
  There are three reasons I really like Chrome apps: They can run in a windowed/chrome-less mode (no navigation bar), you can write offline HTML5 apps that actually work, and discoverability via the Chrome web store. And as somebody else mentioned, it gives you access to the USB JavaScript APIs, which is pretty cool.
- drcode 13y ago
  Yes, but this pig NEEDS more lipstick. It would be great to have a major company supply a fully cross-platform html5 app framework.
  - wmf 13y ago
    Adobe PhoneGap?
    - lnanek2 13y ago
      The article actually says it is using Apache Cordova which is Adobe PhoneGap. I wish they would just contribute to the project directly, though. There's already quite a bit of bullshit platforms built on top of PhoneGap, like a business applet one by HP, and using the actually thing is always better.
      - iclelland 13y ago
        As a matter of fact, most of the engineers on this project are regular committers to the Cordova project. (Cordova is the underlying project, btw -- PhoneGap is Adobe's build system built on top of it) We're very committed to the Cordova platform, and we're very active in pushing it forward. Though there are a lot of individuals, and companies, involved, I suspect that, by any measure, Google is one of the top contributors to Cordova these days.
        judk 13y ago
        In another view, PhoneGap is the trademark that Adobe bought. Cordova is the (not so) new name given to the PhoneGap product when the product moved to Apache and the branding went to Adobe. I have an app in the Android Market (er, Play Store) built with the old open source PhoneGap.
  - _random_ 13y ago
    Or just forget the pig with lipstick and get the hot model - Xamarin.
    - icebraining 13y ago
      No Linux? No thanks.
      - programminggeek 13y ago
        Xamarian is based on Mono, which has had Linux support since forever.
        icebraining 13y ago
        Yes, but Xamarin Studio isn't supported on Linux: https://bugzilla.xamarin.com/show_bug.cgi?id=142 https://bugzilla.xamarin.com/show_bug.cgi?id=142
        andyjohnson0 13y ago
        Have you tried MonoDevelop? Its still being actively enhanced by Xamarin. http://monodevelop.com/ http://monodevelop.com/
        icebraining 13y ago
        We were talking about mobile apps; how can you build those with MonoDevelop on Linux?
- turing 13y ago
  I wouldn't be at all surprised if this was combined with PNaCl down the line.
- DanAndersen 13y ago
  I found it useful to use Chrome's USB API to create a viewer to connect the Oculus Rift with remotely-hosted WebGL apps: https://github.com/DanAndersen/cupola https://github.com/DanAndersen/cupola It lets me feed in head-tracking data from the Rift, while avoiding the latency that you'd get from using something like WebSockets. I'd use something like vr.js, but that's an NPAPI plugin and Chrome is retiring those. Unfortunately Windows-only (and maybe Linux with some adjustment) so far, since the USB API doesn't yet properly work with HID devices on OSX.
- niggasbalting 13y ago
  Since 2002 half of everyone who's reached the age of 12 has learned enough HTML, CSS, Javascript, and can recognize PHP well enough to throw a basic, buggy website together. Suddenly, a trip to "chrome://extensions/" means these semi-non-developers can write an app for their Chromebook(or even PC) without having to install or compile anything, let alone commit themselves to mastering a programming language. It shouldn't mean much for large projects, but it does mean companies can hire less-skilled "programmers" to churn out minimally viable products whether that be for bootstrapped start-ups or to satisfy the demand from businesses that want to say "look I have a presence on mobile."
  - msoad 13y ago
    I coded C++ in "large projects" and now coding JavaScript in another large project. Language itself doesn't mean anything for defining "skilled programmers". Skilled programmers are not limited to language nor platform. You are calling out people who started learning programming with HTML and CSS and telling them they are not programmers but you don't realize that your first program with BASIC was basically same shitty code copied from your book and you were thinking you were a "programmer". I don't know you are skilled or not but I know you are not "professional".
  - pkulak 13y ago
    How delightfully elitist and condescending of you.
    - niggasbalting 13y ago
      Yeah, I need to work on my tone, because that came across exactly the opposite of how I intended.
  - olalonde 13y ago
    I feel the same way about 3D printing. Now everyone and their mother can produce 3D objects without even committing themselves to mastering industrial design. And companies can now prototype half assed products cheaply without having to invest millions of dollars. This is truly a sad era...
_random_ 13y ago
"hybrid native apps" - oh, I thought it was something worthy like PNaCl.
msoad 13y ago
Google knows that future of mobile apps are web. Web technologies can get better and better to some point that it doesn't make sense to build native apps because it costs too much for most data driven apps. With Google, Microsoft and Mozilla betting on web, who has a doubt that web will win? ...oh... do you remember Steve Jobs was suggesting all apps for iPhone should be web apps? He was way ahead of his time.
- fidotron 13y ago
  No, Google needs the future of mobile apps to be the web, which is very different. Unfortunately, while they're doing this they're simultaneously changing the web into something which removes the very things which allow them to monetise it successfully today. A web of WebGL based client apps which just ping servers for JSON objects of a custom nature will be even more impenetrable to massive data mining than the current JS infested mess out there, which was one of the many justifiable criticisms rightly thrown at Java applets back in the late 90s. The opportunity to rewrite the browser in itself and thus remove the HTML/CSS entirely will prove far too tempting.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - bad_user 13y ago
    You're exaggerating. I think WebGL is awesome. In combination with HTML5 audio and video, we can finally get rid of Flash and Silverlight and Java Applets or whatever crappy plugin that people have been using to distribute games and audio/video on the web. This is a good thing. The only reason for why we are seeing less and less usage of these plugins is because WebGL and the other parts of HTML5 are finally taking off, in combination with native mobile apps built on non-standard, often proprietary platforms. These proprietary platforms (e.g. iOS, Google's Play Services, etc...) are far more dangerous for the open web, than whatever ends up being standardized in W3C. Those Chrome apps can and will be built mostly with HTML, CSS and Javascript. They will for the same reason that many people keep building HTML, CSS and Javascript today - for all the bitching and moaning about it, it's actually quite convenient and easy to build something functional and cross-platform and worry free, plus there's a huge knowledge base built around these technologies. On rewriting the browser to have a small core and a UI built on top of web technologies, I think that will be awesome and from what I've been reading, Mozilla is already working on a next-gen Firefox that does it. I'm far more worried about Dart VM or PNaCL, because in order to improve the web, Google is trying to replace Javascript with their own non-standard technologies, relying on their big market share to do that (sound familiar?). Which is why I'm happy that Mozilla exists to bring some balance with Asm.js and Firefox OS and the like. As proof, Mozilla forced Google's hand to include Asm.js in their optimization targets and that popular Unreal Engine demo works quite well right now in Chrome. So we still have healthy competition in the browser space and good things will come out of it.
jfoster 13y ago
Difficult to be certain, but I suspect TNW may have based this off a HN submission I made yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6838530 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6838530 This isn't a complaint. I just find it interesting to consider that news outlets might be watching HN's /newest page closely.
hamxiaoz 13y ago
Down the road, do you think will chrome packaged apps support 3rd party dlls?
chroem 13y ago
Thank god. I'll take anything over the current Android application framework.
eonil 13y ago
R.I.P. Android developers. Google finally decided where to go.
- pjmlp 13y ago
  What was to be expected since they placed Android under ChromeOS steering?
  - eonil 13y ago
    Though I am not sure that I understood your intention… I think Google will eventually kill Android from Android+Chrome stack. Just like MS did on DOS for Windows. Chrome on Android is just a temporal form, and there's no reason not to run Chrome directly on the hardware. (why do they stick to PNaCL which never be adopted by competitors?) Actually Chrome was born to do that from first. And since they decided to go Chrome, Android is just an obstacle to interact to hardware from Chrome as an OS. In my imagination, even on the best scenario, the future of Android is the MS-DOS on Windows. An emulation layer on top of Chrome OS.
gimlids 13y ago
Just use Flash.
rounak 13y ago
I don't think Apple would allow this in the App Store. It disallows apps that have their own apps/widgets.
- abrowne 13y ago
  They're using Apache Cordova (PhoneGap), so they will run under iOS webkit (Safari w/o JIT) on iOS.

91 points by hackhackhack 13y ago

I have not for the life of me been able to imagine the purpose of building a Chrome app. Now I can.... but wait... isn't it just a "lipstick on the pig" html5 web app?

tjohns 13y ago
There are three reasons I really like Chrome apps: They can run in a windowed/chrome-less mode (no navigation bar), you can write offline HTML5 apps that actually work, and discoverability via the Chrome web store. And as somebody else mentioned, it gives you access to the USB JavaScript APIs, which is pretty cool.
drcode 13y ago
Yes, but this pig NEEDS more lipstick. It would be great to have a major company supply a fully cross-platform html5 app framework.
- wmf 13y ago
  Adobe PhoneGap?
  - lnanek2 13y ago
    The article actually says it is using Apache Cordova which is Adobe PhoneGap. I wish they would just contribute to the project directly, though. There's already quite a bit of bullshit platforms built on top of PhoneGap, like a business applet one by HP, and using the actually thing is always better.
    - iclelland 13y ago
      As a matter of fact, most of the engineers on this project are regular committers to the Cordova project. (Cordova is the underlying project, btw -- PhoneGap is Adobe's build system built on top of it) We're very committed to the Cordova platform, and we're very active in pushing it forward. Though there are a lot of individuals, and companies, involved, I suspect that, by any measure, Google is one of the top contributors to Cordova these days.
      - judk 13y ago
        In another view, PhoneGap is the trademark that Adobe bought. Cordova is the (not so) new name given to the PhoneGap product when the product moved to Apache and the branding went to Adobe. I have an app in the Android Market (er, Play Store) built with the old open source PhoneGap.
- _random_ 13y ago
  Or just forget the pig with lipstick and get the hot model - Xamarin.
  - icebraining 13y ago
    No Linux? No thanks.
    - programminggeek 13y ago
      Xamarian is based on Mono, which has had Linux support since forever.
      - icebraining 13y ago
        Yes, but Xamarin Studio isn't supported on Linux: https://bugzilla.xamarin.com/show_bug.cgi?id=142 https://bugzilla.xamarin.com/show_bug.cgi?id=142
        andyjohnson0 13y ago
        Have you tried MonoDevelop? Its still being actively enhanced by Xamarin. http://monodevelop.com/ http://monodevelop.com/
        icebraining 13y ago
        We were talking about mobile apps; how can you build those with MonoDevelop on Linux?
turing 13y ago
I wouldn't be at all surprised if this was combined with PNaCl down the line.
DanAndersen 13y ago
I found it useful to use Chrome's USB API to create a viewer to connect the Oculus Rift with remotely-hosted WebGL apps: https://github.com/DanAndersen/cupola https://github.com/DanAndersen/cupola It lets me feed in head-tracking data from the Rift, while avoiding the latency that you'd get from using something like WebSockets. I'd use something like vr.js, but that's an NPAPI plugin and Chrome is retiring those. Unfortunately Windows-only (and maybe Linux with some adjustment) so far, since the USB API doesn't yet properly work with HID devices on OSX.
niggasbalting 13y ago
Since 2002 half of everyone who's reached the age of 12 has learned enough HTML, CSS, Javascript, and can recognize PHP well enough to throw a basic, buggy website together. Suddenly, a trip to "chrome://extensions/" means these semi-non-developers can write an app for their Chromebook(or even PC) without having to install or compile anything, let alone commit themselves to mastering a programming language. It shouldn't mean much for large projects, but it does mean companies can hire less-skilled "programmers" to churn out minimally viable products whether that be for bootstrapped start-ups or to satisfy the demand from businesses that want to say "look I have a presence on mobile."
- msoad 13y ago
  I coded C++ in "large projects" and now coding JavaScript in another large project. Language itself doesn't mean anything for defining "skilled programmers". Skilled programmers are not limited to language nor platform. You are calling out people who started learning programming with HTML and CSS and telling them they are not programmers but you don't realize that your first program with BASIC was basically same shitty code copied from your book and you were thinking you were a "programmer". I don't know you are skilled or not but I know you are not "professional".
- pkulak 13y ago
  How delightfully elitist and condescending of you.
  - niggasbalting 13y ago
    Yeah, I need to work on my tone, because that came across exactly the opposite of how I intended.
- olalonde 13y ago
  I feel the same way about 3D printing. Now everyone and their mother can produce 3D objects without even committing themselves to mastering industrial design. And companies can now prototype half assed products cheaply without having to invest millions of dollars. This is truly a sad era...

_random_ 13y ago

"hybrid native apps" - oh, I thought it was something worthy like PNaCl.

msoad 13y ago

Google knows that future of mobile apps are web. Web technologies can get better and better to some point that it doesn't make sense to build native apps because it costs too much for most data driven apps. With Google, Microsoft and Mozilla betting on web, who has a doubt that web will win? ...oh... do you remember Steve Jobs was suggesting all apps for iPhone should be web apps? He was way ahead of his time.

fidotron 13y ago
No, Google needs the future of mobile apps to be the web, which is very different. Unfortunately, while they're doing this they're simultaneously changing the web into something which removes the very things which allow them to monetise it successfully today. A web of WebGL based client apps which just ping servers for JSON objects of a custom nature will be even more impenetrable to massive data mining than the current JS infested mess out there, which was one of the many justifiable criticisms rightly thrown at Java applets back in the late 90s. The opportunity to rewrite the browser in itself and thus remove the HTML/CSS entirely will prove far too tempting.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- bad_user 13y ago
  You're exaggerating. I think WebGL is awesome. In combination with HTML5 audio and video, we can finally get rid of Flash and Silverlight and Java Applets or whatever crappy plugin that people have been using to distribute games and audio/video on the web. This is a good thing. The only reason for why we are seeing less and less usage of these plugins is because WebGL and the other parts of HTML5 are finally taking off, in combination with native mobile apps built on non-standard, often proprietary platforms. These proprietary platforms (e.g. iOS, Google's Play Services, etc...) are far more dangerous for the open web, than whatever ends up being standardized in W3C. Those Chrome apps can and will be built mostly with HTML, CSS and Javascript. They will for the same reason that many people keep building HTML, CSS and Javascript today - for all the bitching and moaning about it, it's actually quite convenient and easy to build something functional and cross-platform and worry free, plus there's a huge knowledge base built around these technologies. On rewriting the browser to have a small core and a UI built on top of web technologies, I think that will be awesome and from what I've been reading, Mozilla is already working on a next-gen Firefox that does it. I'm far more worried about Dart VM or PNaCL, because in order to improve the web, Google is trying to replace Javascript with their own non-standard technologies, relying on their big market share to do that (sound familiar?). Which is why I'm happy that Mozilla exists to bring some balance with Asm.js and Firefox OS and the like. As proof, Mozilla forced Google's hand to include Asm.js in their optimization targets and that popular Unreal Engine demo works quite well right now in Chrome. So we still have healthy competition in the browser space and good things will come out of it.

jfoster 13y ago

Difficult to be certain, but I suspect TNW may have based this off a HN submission I made yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6838530 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6838530 This isn't a complaint. I just find it interesting to consider that news outlets might be watching HN's /newest page closely.

hamxiaoz 13y ago

Down the road, do you think will chrome packaged apps support 3rd party dlls?

chroem 13y ago

Thank god. I'll take anything over the current Android application framework.

eonil 13y ago

R.I.P. Android developers. Google finally decided where to go.

pjmlp 13y ago
What was to be expected since they placed Android under ChromeOS steering?
- eonil 13y ago
  Though I am not sure that I understood your intention… I think Google will eventually kill Android from Android+Chrome stack. Just like MS did on DOS for Windows. Chrome on Android is just a temporal form, and there's no reason not to run Chrome directly on the hardware. (why do they stick to PNaCL which never be adopted by competitors?) Actually Chrome was born to do that from first. And since they decided to go Chrome, Android is just an obstacle to interact to hardware from Chrome as an OS. In my imagination, even on the best scenario, the future of Android is the MS-DOS on Windows. An emulation layer on top of Chrome OS.

gimlids 13y ago

Just use Flash.

rounak 13y ago

I don't think Apple would allow this in the App Store. It disallows apps that have their own apps/widgets.

abrowne 13y ago
They're using Apache Cordova (PhoneGap), so they will run under iOS webkit (Safari w/o JIT) on iOS.