Right. The web was originally meant for, and is still intended for HTML document sharing. Thankfully, HN is a basic, sensible site that doesn't cause cancer of the eye. Let most web developers around it and it would be.

That said, as the parent suggested, when it comes to opening my Gmail via Safari or the app, like everything beyond a simple document- I'm going to pick the app everytime.

...except when I'm on desktop.

GMail via web, every time.

That will change soon with Windows 10. If you're on Linux you have no choice. And if you personally had to maintain Gmail on the web, you couldn't do it yourself. Enormous time put into an application such as Gmail. So suggesting you'd build Gmail on the web vs an app is disingenuous to suggest. It's quite an edge case for many reasons.

If I had to personally maintain GMail app, I couldn't do it myself, either. I don't see how this is remotely relevant.

I'm not suggesting I'd build GMail one way or another. I'm saying that since GMail web is available to me on my desktop, where I spend the majority of my day, that's how I prefer to use it. It's nice to also have an app, but that's way less percent of my time. And I think reading and typing in GMail is way nice on my desktop.

Sure, it's an edge case, but so is Reddit, so is HN, so is G+, so is Facebook, so is CNN, so is Github, so is StackOverflow, so is xkcd, so is news.google.com...

I spend way more time on those sites on my desktop than I ever would in their corresponding apps.

Add all those edge cases up, not to mention all the websites those things link to, and it's a HUGE part of my day. Apps? Sure. I like em.

And sure, when I'm on mobile, any given content is probably nicer in an app. But sharing, mixing, quickly browsing... web wins hand-down for me.

I wouldn't even know how to take a page from my CNN app (unless they give me a web URL) and discuss it on my Reddit app. Do you?

Again you're back to what we've already established the web is ideal for. It's original intended purpose- simple document sharing. It's been doing this since the early 90s.

While sharing info on Wikipedia is great, where the web fails is competing with native apps. Other than sharing HTML text documents (and there are projects working to replace that too), it doesn't get chosen over native apps.

Also, I'd still say that you'd come a lot closer to being able to maintain a Gmail-style app on iOS, than you ever could on the web. As a 1 man operation. Plenty of people actually do personally maintain email native apps alone on mobile. But unless you go with basic HTML or little to no features, I don't think 1 person is keeping a web email client up to date for all browsers, all the time.

The reason you prefer using webapps on the desktop, is simply because that's where you are all day. At a desk. If you were in anything but a desk job, it'd be the complete opposite. It's not an issue of superiority, it's a matter of convenience. For most people, that convenience is flipped and the experience is equal or better. Which is why native apps are winning.

Why do I get to target iOS only with my email client on the one hand, but I have to support "all browsers" on the other? Stop stacking the deck, ok?

> If you were in anything but a desk job, it'd be the complete opposite.

...and if I were a banana, I'd probably prefer sunshine. I'm saying there are cases for me where the web is way better, even on mobile.

You can't prove to me that's not true, because it is. It's like you're trying to talk me out of observational data on my own life experience.

I just said iOS as an example. I didn't mean to make it appear I was stacking the deck, you could use Xamarin and target all platforms if you wanted. That's still easier than supporting all browsers over time. All browsers over time with a complex app like Gmail? Forget it.

But the issue I was trying to convey is that you're an edge case and in an increasingly marginal pool as time goes on. Most people aren't sitting at the computer all day, and even if they do (we'll say so for sake of argument), they stay off personal email at work (a good idea). And they use their phone yet still. That's what I do. I'm at a desk all day as well, and never login to personal stuff on my work network/machine. That's where iOS gets its use.

for many of those, they're not apps they're websites. Apps are for repeat use of aomething more complicated than reading documents. Usually websites with a lot of JavaScript are better off as apps.

LinkedIn I have an app, and it's usually better than the website except for some features they maddeningly haven't carried over. Dice too. The rest I would use a website.

This isn't contradictory to my point that apps are the future of how we interact with the web. In effect apps are about a proliferation of user agents - rather than a single hugely popular type of user agent (the browser) and a handful of busy singular agents (the crawler). I am not saying the Web is going away, I'm saying HTML browsers are becoming relatively less important. They're not going away they're just not where the money and growth is.