This kinda begs the question. Yeah, writing a smartphone app is already painful, and doing it that way on the device would be ridiculously more painful. Is that an inherent property of the form factor, or the result of systematically orienting the system towards consumption?

I say the latter. I used to program with great facility in BASIC on my calculator in high school. I was not even the only one who could do this. The input methods available were much less rich than what a smartphone can provide, not to mention the display. Now, in 2023, the easiest way to write simple programs on my phone is by emulating that calculator. Come on!