Almost all of those have been solved by Android's PWA implementation. I can go to an enabled site and add it to my apps list. After that, it looks and acts like any other app on the device [except that it doesn't take up any space on my phone :)]
It might take if distributed as TWA, given that then it gets FFI access to Android APIs. :)
However PWAs still fail short of stuff like 3D capabilities, given how limited they are versus the actual APIs, e.g. WebGL 2.0 vs OpenGL ES 3.2.
Re:Are apps even that relevant anymore?
by pwinnski on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @10:06AM
(#24341825)
I keep hearing this, but it is not as if native applications are sitting still while PWAs catch up. By the time PWAs hit current native application levels of functionality--if they ever do--native applications will be operating at a higher level of functionality yet again.
I've got some PWAs on my phone, and they're great. They're also very simple compared to many native apps I use. And I think that will likely be the case for some time to come, and maybe forever on iOS for security reasons.
iOS has PWA too although severely limited, notably in the areas of webcam and push support. And other proprietary phone features like contact lists.
Re:Are apps even that relevant anymore?
by phone8675309 on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @06:50PM
(#24348052)
Another possible reason: being able to take a cut of every transaction that goes through the app ecosystem
But the market spoke, and now Apple seems to be very much on the other side of things along with nearly every company out there.
Some possible reasons: Bookmarks to websites get buried in long ever-growing lists of bookmarks, while installed apps take up precious visual screen space. Users are generally more tolerant of an app taking a couple of seconds to load than a website, and less tolerant of subsequent navigation taking time, and apps tend to match those expectations more closely than web pages. And maybe apps still deliver functionality that websites can't, or can't as easily. Oh, and an app, once downloaded, usually keeps working consistently, while websites often are updated or completely disappear.
For whatever reason, people seem to prefer apps to websites, and I'm not sure I see that changing much.