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The patchy and expensive internet access that many people around the world experience really emphasises the importance of offline or native apps. There's a rele

The patchy and expensive internet access that many people around the world experience really emphasises the importance of offline or native apps. There's a relentless (and in my view unnecesary) push by many technology companies to run everything online as if it's some natural progression we should all be moving towards. Some of us, even with broadband access, don't want to run apps in the cloud, (where everything we do is gleefully tracked and recorded). It's clearly to the benefit of many companies to push for an "online first" approach, but I feel it's unsuitable for many apps. I'm not convinced it's a better experience for users either.

rodgerd 13y ago
> I'm not convinced it's a better experience for users either It's a weird situation where we have vast power available on our local environments and burn it all to run JavaScript VMs to access huge server farms for functionality which in many cases was already available in local applications.
- null_ptr 13y ago
  It's all about moving the software market from an owning model to a renting model. If you depend on their online service to always be around and available to you in order to access your data and get things done, they have a tighter leash on you. Not to mention that cloud apps make it that much easier to data mine usage, pander advertisements, and squeeze pennies out of users at every opportunity.
AdrianRossouw 13y ago
I'm the opposite. I'm south african, but I don't want to have to download your native application to get locked into yet another walled garden. Most of the apps I want to use don't make sense without internet access anyway.
- null_ptr 13y ago
  How do native applications lock you into a walled garden and web applications don't? It's the opposite. Native applications mean you own the data you work with instead of surrendering it to a remote server you have no control over. It means you will be able to use that data even after the provider decides that the application is not profitable any more and they take it offline.
  - waps 13y ago
    I think the argument is that every native application is effectively something akin to facebook's walled garden. 1) sharing data between apps is near-impossible, unless format converters are written (they never are) and explicit manual steps are taken. 2) linking between apps is impossible (e.g. you configure an address for a client then click/tap on it to navigate to said client when the application is not made by microsoft). 3) searching across apps is impossible. You can't just go to google.com, type in what you remember and have it show you the app. 4) native apps are expensive, because they never have a huge market (compared to online apps). 5) native apps are really badly supported. 6) you can't give anyone else access to your data (easily, just look at how long it took microsoft's army of developers to give office some semblance of real sharing. And it's still not up to par). 7) anyone you want to give access to a doc now has to buy your (expensive) mobile app. I'm not saying you're wrong, just that you are forgetting quite a few facts here. Native apps are usually self-contained, small, unmaintained things. Yes, that does have some advantages, but it also has large disadvantages. I would even agree with the "ads are good for you" argument to some extent : these companies are "spying" on you in order to attempt to create (theoretically) win-win economic transactions. Essentially they show you stuff you want, in order to make you want to buy/have/rent/... it. That is good for you (you get "value" in the economic sense), the other side gets some money, and a small "tax" is paid to the intermediary. Economic activity goes up, and it becomes easier to get a job, ... etc. Of course this argument only holds for pay-for-transaction ads (ie. not for banner ads, not for things like facebook, essentially only for google's model).
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 13y ago
      So, you can easily export data from any web service and import it into a competing web service? And how exactly would the same code that does that exporting and importing on the server side not work on the client side? Other than that, I think you are mostly confusing cause and effect - none of those are results of technical limitations of "native apps" per se, but rather an effect of the marketing push towards "the cloud". After all, Firefox is a "native app" - as you might have noticed, it's an "expensive small, unmaintained and badly supported thing with very few users".
ekwogefee 13y ago
Shameless plug... I'm African. Cameroonian to be more precise. I grew frustrated with slow download speeds over the "cloud" and the recent obsession over "syncing". I personally prefer normal file transfers over syncing. I created my own tool that does file and folder transfers over a LAN... without Internet. My solution is P2P (no servers), has faster download speeds compared to the Internet, can work even with ad-hoc Wi-Fi hotspots, and is cross-platform (Windows Desktop, Linux, Mac OSX, iOS, Android, Windows Phone 8) . You should try Feem. http://tryfeem.com http://tryfeem.com
- vanderZwan 13y ago
  I guess the ehm... how to put it nicely... "Eurocentricness" (?) of the screenshots are a deliberate choice and a real life example of the things you have to put up with as an African programmer?
  - ekwogefee 13y ago
    Exactly. The "Eurocentricness" of my screenshots is a deliberate choice. I try to hide that I'm African as much as I can. I prefer email support over voice so that our users and customers don't have to deal with my heavy west african accent. Paypal is also blocked in my country (Cameroon), but I've succeeded to get an account set up for me in Europe. Why go through all of that trouble ? I believe the best path for an African entrepreneur is to build something that can compete and be sold at a global level. Right now, 73% of our users are in the USA.
kisielk 13y ago
I'm living in Malawi for a couple of a months and I totally agree the cloud features and automatic software updates on my computer have become a huge nuisance. Often the internet connection is slow (even on Skyband EVDO) and automatic updaters or cloud sync can easily suck up all my bandwidth. Sometimes I find my internet totally sucking only to find out there's some app like iCloud photo sync trying to download some photos from one of my contact's streams. Or at one point Mac OS decided to download a sizeable XCode update in the background. These features are a big convenience back in Canada, but really frustrating when travelling and using slow connections. I really wish there was one setting somewhere to turn off all background syncing and downloading. So far the best solution I've found is to install Little Snitch and just manually approve connections.

rodgerd 13y ago

> I'm not convinced it's a better experience for users either It's a weird situation where we have vast power available on our local environments and burn it all to run JavaScript VMs to access huge server farms for functionality which in many cases was already available in local applications.

null_ptr 13y ago
It's all about moving the software market from an owning model to a renting model. If you depend on their online service to always be around and available to you in order to access your data and get things done, they have a tighter leash on you. Not to mention that cloud apps make it that much easier to data mine usage, pander advertisements, and squeeze pennies out of users at every opportunity.

AdrianRossouw 13y ago

I'm the opposite. I'm south african, but I don't want to have to download your native application to get locked into yet another walled garden. Most of the apps I want to use don't make sense without internet access anyway.

null_ptr 13y ago
How do native applications lock you into a walled garden and web applications don't? It's the opposite. Native applications mean you own the data you work with instead of surrendering it to a remote server you have no control over. It means you will be able to use that data even after the provider decides that the application is not profitable any more and they take it offline.
- waps 13y ago
  I think the argument is that every native application is effectively something akin to facebook's walled garden. 1) sharing data between apps is near-impossible, unless format converters are written (they never are) and explicit manual steps are taken. 2) linking between apps is impossible (e.g. you configure an address for a client then click/tap on it to navigate to said client when the application is not made by microsoft). 3) searching across apps is impossible. You can't just go to google.com, type in what you remember and have it show you the app. 4) native apps are expensive, because they never have a huge market (compared to online apps). 5) native apps are really badly supported. 6) you can't give anyone else access to your data (easily, just look at how long it took microsoft's army of developers to give office some semblance of real sharing. And it's still not up to par). 7) anyone you want to give access to a doc now has to buy your (expensive) mobile app. I'm not saying you're wrong, just that you are forgetting quite a few facts here. Native apps are usually self-contained, small, unmaintained things. Yes, that does have some advantages, but it also has large disadvantages. I would even agree with the "ads are good for you" argument to some extent : these companies are "spying" on you in order to attempt to create (theoretically) win-win economic transactions. Essentially they show you stuff you want, in order to make you want to buy/have/rent/... it. That is good for you (you get "value" in the economic sense), the other side gets some money, and a small "tax" is paid to the intermediary. Economic activity goes up, and it becomes easier to get a job, ... etc. Of course this argument only holds for pay-for-transaction ads (ie. not for banner ads, not for things like facebook, essentially only for google's model).
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 13y ago
    So, you can easily export data from any web service and import it into a competing web service? And how exactly would the same code that does that exporting and importing on the server side not work on the client side? Other than that, I think you are mostly confusing cause and effect - none of those are results of technical limitations of "native apps" per se, but rather an effect of the marketing push towards "the cloud". After all, Firefox is a "native app" - as you might have noticed, it's an "expensive small, unmaintained and badly supported thing with very few users".

ekwogefee 13y ago

Shameless plug... I'm African. Cameroonian to be more precise. I grew frustrated with slow download speeds over the "cloud" and the recent obsession over "syncing". I personally prefer normal file transfers over syncing. I created my own tool that does file and folder transfers over a LAN... without Internet. My solution is P2P (no servers), has faster download speeds compared to the Internet, can work even with ad-hoc Wi-Fi hotspots, and is cross-platform (Windows Desktop, Linux, Mac OSX, iOS, Android, Windows Phone 8) . You should try Feem. http://tryfeem.com http://tryfeem.com

vanderZwan 13y ago
I guess the ehm... how to put it nicely... "Eurocentricness" (?) of the screenshots are a deliberate choice and a real life example of the things you have to put up with as an African programmer?
- ekwogefee 13y ago
  Exactly. The "Eurocentricness" of my screenshots is a deliberate choice. I try to hide that I'm African as much as I can. I prefer email support over voice so that our users and customers don't have to deal with my heavy west african accent. Paypal is also blocked in my country (Cameroon), but I've succeeded to get an account set up for me in Europe. Why go through all of that trouble ? I believe the best path for an African entrepreneur is to build something that can compete and be sold at a global level. Right now, 73% of our users are in the USA.

kisielk 13y ago

I'm living in Malawi for a couple of a months and I totally agree the cloud features and automatic software updates on my computer have become a huge nuisance. Often the internet connection is slow (even on Skyband EVDO) and automatic updaters or cloud sync can easily suck up all my bandwidth. Sometimes I find my internet totally sucking only to find out there's some app like iCloud photo sync trying to download some photos from one of my contact's streams. Or at one point Mac OS decided to download a sizeable XCode update in the background. These features are a big convenience back in Canada, but really frustrating when travelling and using slow connections. I really wish there was one setting somewhere to turn off all background syncing and downloading. So far the best solution I've found is to install Little Snitch and just manually approve connections.