I built a progressive web app and published it in three app stores

Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by rhacker on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:20PM (#16850148)

We're definitely at the point in history where we have to get out of these app stores. I get it if you're doing a game or something that's fine, stay in the app store. But I don't know how many times I've been extremely frustrated with a website telling me to get their app.

* They break my in-browser password store

* They introduce extremely complicated "app-only" device links for Oauth

* Updating your UI for most apps shouldn't require an app-store push (don't talk to me about ionic)

This is the same fight but different players that we're currently facing in getting away from Social Platforms.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by judah on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:37PM (#16850333)

Yep, I hear you. Unfortunately, the status quo today is, that's where the users are.

I love the free and opened web. I want it to win. I think it will win and eat native apps (PWAs are already making that happen.)

But the barriers to this right now are 1) app stores are where users are and 2) some mobile platforms (read: Apple) have a perverse incentive to cripple web apps so that submitting native apps to their store (and thus, paying them $99/year + 30% in-app purchases) is required to have a first-class experience.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by Silhouette on Monday April 16, 2018 @01:29PM (#16850883)

Unfortunately, the status quo today is, that's where the users are.

I've seen a few people make this argument, but no real data. Does anyone have any relevant stats about web vs. app store sales, perhaps the ratios between customer numbers and/or revenues through different channels, that they'd be willing to share?

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by judah on Wednesday April 18, 2018 @10:49AM (#16867812)

The number of registered users per day has tripled since I added my app to all 3 app stores. Most of the registrations come from Android.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by Silhouette on Wednesday April 18, 2018 @08:18PM (#16872401)

Interesting, thanks. Would you mind sharing whether your revenues changed by about the same factor?

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by briandear on Monday April 16, 2018 @01:53PM (#16851130)

Does the free and open web have support for augmented reality? On device security? On device machine learning? Accurate GPS? Accelerometers? What about low level graphics?

The “web” is great for websites and CRUD— not so good if you’re trying to go beyond that.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by mamcx on Monday April 16, 2018 @01:49PM (#16851081)

> 2) some mobile platforms (read: Apple)

You mean Google. Android webviews are VERY slow. Tha comnpound with the overall bad android OS (terrible privacy and security, terrible overal performance).

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by floatboth on Monday April 16, 2018 @02:29PM (#16851473)

> Android webviews are VERY slow

Huh?

Since KitKat I think, WebView is updatable (and is on the App Store), plus browsers like Chrome and Firefox can provide their own WebView implementation. Most people with non-ancient phones are probably using Chrome's engine in all WebViews.

And also, old engine doesn't even mean "slow".

Only Apple used to an actual problem here, because for a long long time there was no JS JIT in WebViews.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by mamcx on Monday April 16, 2018 @03:00PM (#16851739)

That is the theory. Hold a iPhone and and android and run the same web-browser apps and look for yourself.

I have tested several demos by ionic, framework7, etc... is amazing how slow are androids...

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by robocat on Monday April 16, 2018 @04:42PM (#16852574)

My guess is that the difference in speed is mostly due to hardware, not the browser.

Apple hardware benchmarks well beats Android hardware: http://browser.geekbench.com/mobile-benchmarks

Given Safari can optimise for a single GPU target (which is also probably faster), it is likely the speed differences are not due to the browsers per se.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by mamcx on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @04:14PM (#16861900)

And that is the reality for a large section of users.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by pier25 on Monday April 16, 2018 @05:36PM (#16853019)

Android webviews are WAY better. Not only in terms of performance but specially in terms of standard behaviour.

I've been dealing with UIWebView and WKWebView problems for over 3 years now, but Android webviews have given me zero problems.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by rrdharan on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:33PM (#16850288)

FWIW with iOS 11 re: your 1st point, the Safari/iCloud Keychain password store is available to native apps as well.

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-use-ios-11s-password-auto...

I've found it quite useful.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by rahoulb on Monday April 16, 2018 @01:15PM (#16850743)

As is Lastpass/1Password

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by throwaway_80bf3 on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:39PM (#16850363)

One of the ones I hate most is Reddit, which actually has a pretty good web interface. The worst part about their app is I can't search for words in threads.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by akmarinov on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:45PM (#16850422)

I'm actually on the other side of this - it's really easy to use their app to browse posts and read comments, where it's a bit more involved using the web interface.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by 333c on Monday April 16, 2018 @01:20PM (#16850786)

My experience with Reddit mobile web has been frustrating, because every page has a secondary loading period that is entirely unnecessary and seems to only be loading styling and JS libraries. The old Reddit mobile (i.reddit.com, I believe) was fairly simple HTML (though to be fair, it didn't look good) that loaded quickly and felt responsive.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by babuskov on Monday April 16, 2018 @12:48PM (#16850462)

I browse the mobile reddit all the time and constant nagging to use the app was a real PITA until I discovered that I don't have to press the link to hide the "browse with the app overlay". You can simply scroll down and it will go away.

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Re:I built a progressive web app and published it in three a... by gkya on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @07:36AM (#16857356)

> Updating your UI

This is what I hate with the current software development culture. It's not your UI once it's on my things, its MINE. You shouldn't be able to touch it once I have it.

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