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The only true advantage the hybrid approach offers is improved interface performance, but that comes at the great cost of (1) increased complexity (multiple tec

The only true advantage the hybrid approach offers is improved interface performance, but that comes at the great cost of (1) increased complexity (multiple technologies, possibly multiple teams), (2) poor distribution and conversion (install require), (3) dealing with draconian app store approval bureaucracy, and (4) speed of tech and design iteration much slower than the web. The gap for this sweet spot is going to close very rapidly over the next year or so due to work being done by us at famo.us and engineers working on react/om. DHH, like others love to point out Facebook's decision to pull out of HTML5, but that is going to become a tired meme. One of the FB engineering managers, Dave Fetterman, who was instrumental in making the call to go with HTML5 and then reversed course towards native, is now the VP of engineering here at Famo.us. That's a testament to what's possible soon, since typically someone doesn't go back an revisit what many people popularly consider to be be a mistake unless there is real value there on the horizon. The fact that Fetterman is back working on this problem and that Pete Hunt and team at Facebook is actively working on react is testament to the performance that's now achievable without having to be a javascript neckbeard. If you were a web developer that left the web years ago for native land, or you have always been in native land and were waiting for the web to catch up, now is the time to start exploring what's possible. There will always be a use case for native technologies, but the web is going to gut a lot of the current use cases for native over the next 1-3 years. When that happens, there is going to be a glut of iOS and Android devs and a dearth of javascript developers who really know how to build great web apps. (disclaimer: I work for famo.us)

chadcf 13y ago
You guys need a little love on your page :) I've not heard of it before so I google it and get to what appears to be the home page, and am presented with a login box with zero info about what it is, or why I would want to register or log in in the first place. Plus 3 of the links in the header aren't linked to anything. Not the best first impression!
- malandrew 13y ago
  Yeah, it does need some love. We're aware and plan on really fixing it up over the next month or so. For the most part almost all engineers on the team are working on some fundamental part of our medium to long-term vision and we're mainly trying to bring all those parts together in a coherent way first. Another reason for its current state, is that the tech media and the community have been quite eager to take care of our positioning and messaging, so we haven't had to focus engineering effort on these areas too much in order to see adoption and growth. Improvements are coming. Look out for changes to the site over the next 1-2 months.
rimantas 13y ago
> but the web is going to gut a lot of the current use cases > for native over the next 1-3 years Yeah, I keep hearing this for the last three years or so. Web tech won't gut anything, except itself. It is not caching up it is falling behind, fast. Not a single problem what existed four years ago is solved, it seems that all the work is to get PoC implementation of some feature and then leave it in the half-baked state and move on. Fastclick.js, tap.js, need to say more?
- malandrew 13y ago
  FWIW, I've been doing the web app tech schtick since about 2010 and since about 2011, I've been pretty consistent on the 2014-2017 time frame. Everything is in a half-baked state because people start on a project, realize that other parts aren't good enough, so because they have work to get done, the move on to the tech that works for the job at hand. Things are finally getting to the point where web app tech has achieved "fitness for use" (the most accurate definition of quality I can think of), which means that library authors are no longer in a position where they have to maintain and grow a library in isolation while they wait for other libraries to catch up. On top of all that, what has also caught up is the money. There is now real solid VC money backing up companies that either create webapp tech or are betting on webapp tech as part of their strategy. With money, you have people who no longer need to depend on the goodwill of others to push things forward. Lastly, there's been a cambrian explosion in the general sophistication and knowledge level in the JavaScript community. NodeJS created a viable JavaScript environment free of all the bullshit that comes with myriad user agents. They made it possible for engineers coming from many other language communities (C/C++, Java, Python, Ruby, Perl, etc.) to really dig into the language and bring diversity of ideas and experience into the JavaScript community. That diversity is now jumping the network gap and becoming more common on the browser side of things. Does web app tech meet the conditions of "fitness for use" for all use cases of native? Certainly not. There are several areas where, as you correctly pointed out, it's falling behind. But this likely won't be the case in about 2017, when the only remaining difference between native and web is going to be a performance gap of at most 2x for certain uses. There are not a ton of use cases where a 2x performance difference makes the difference between something being fit for use or not, especially when you consider other benefits native can't achieve like distribution via hyperlink and incremental loading of non-content parts with use. One of the most important questions an engineer needs to ask is "Does it matter for my career whether I'm on the right side of technology when a fundamental shift happens?". For career engineers working in areas where native is likely to have an edge for years to come, it probably doesn't matter. But what happens if you're an engineer with an entrepreneurial bent like many on HN? Starting in 2008 and going into 2011, if you didn't have legit talent on your team for building iOS and Android apps, that was a problem for your business. Starting in 2015 and going through to 2017, the same will happen with web app tech. If you want to be in the right place at the right time, this is the year to actually start learning, so that you're well positioned for the next three years and opportunities shift. Fundamental changes happen. It's valuable to be able to time things to account for those changes.

chadcf 13y ago

You guys need a little love on your page :) I've not heard of it before so I google it and get to what appears to be the home page, and am presented with a login box with zero info about what it is, or why I would want to register or log in in the first place. Plus 3 of the links in the header aren't linked to anything. Not the best first impression!

malandrew 13y ago
Yeah, it does need some love. We're aware and plan on really fixing it up over the next month or so. For the most part almost all engineers on the team are working on some fundamental part of our medium to long-term vision and we're mainly trying to bring all those parts together in a coherent way first. Another reason for its current state, is that the tech media and the community have been quite eager to take care of our positioning and messaging, so we haven't had to focus engineering effort on these areas too much in order to see adoption and growth. Improvements are coming. Look out for changes to the site over the next 1-2 months.

rimantas 13y ago

> but the web is going to gut a lot of the current use cases > for native over the next 1-3 years Yeah, I keep hearing this for the last three years or so. Web tech won't gut anything, except itself. It is not caching up it is falling behind, fast. Not a single problem what existed four years ago is solved, it seems that all the work is to get PoC implementation of some feature and then leave it in the half-baked state and move on. Fastclick.js, tap.js, need to say more?

malandrew 13y ago
FWIW, I've been doing the web app tech schtick since about 2010 and since about 2011, I've been pretty consistent on the 2014-2017 time frame. Everything is in a half-baked state because people start on a project, realize that other parts aren't good enough, so because they have work to get done, the move on to the tech that works for the job at hand. Things are finally getting to the point where web app tech has achieved "fitness for use" (the most accurate definition of quality I can think of), which means that library authors are no longer in a position where they have to maintain and grow a library in isolation while they wait for other libraries to catch up. On top of all that, what has also caught up is the money. There is now real solid VC money backing up companies that either create webapp tech or are betting on webapp tech as part of their strategy. With money, you have people who no longer need to depend on the goodwill of others to push things forward. Lastly, there's been a cambrian explosion in the general sophistication and knowledge level in the JavaScript community. NodeJS created a viable JavaScript environment free of all the bullshit that comes with myriad user agents. They made it possible for engineers coming from many other language communities (C/C++, Java, Python, Ruby, Perl, etc.) to really dig into the language and bring diversity of ideas and experience into the JavaScript community. That diversity is now jumping the network gap and becoming more common on the browser side of things. Does web app tech meet the conditions of "fitness for use" for all use cases of native? Certainly not. There are several areas where, as you correctly pointed out, it's falling behind. But this likely won't be the case in about 2017, when the only remaining difference between native and web is going to be a performance gap of at most 2x for certain uses. There are not a ton of use cases where a 2x performance difference makes the difference between something being fit for use or not, especially when you consider other benefits native can't achieve like distribution via hyperlink and incremental loading of non-content parts with use. One of the most important questions an engineer needs to ask is "Does it matter for my career whether I'm on the right side of technology when a fundamental shift happens?". For career engineers working in areas where native is likely to have an edge for years to come, it probably doesn't matter. But what happens if you're an engineer with an entrepreneurial bent like many on HN? Starting in 2008 and going into 2011, if you didn't have legit talent on your team for building iOS and Android apps, that was a problem for your business. Starting in 2015 and going through to 2017, the same will happen with web app tech. If you want to be in the right place at the right time, this is the year to actually start learning, so that you're well positioned for the next three years and opportunities shift. Fundamental changes happen. It's valuable to be able to time things to account for those changes.