I don't get why people think Android is not safe and will start censoring apps any day, but somehow the "browser" is safe and the best place to write apps.
Discussion
Dos the phone OSes have functionality in place to block specific websites or traffic?
Brainwashing !! Good marketing is another one for this belief.
Apple and Google will go after PWA revenue also. That loophole is a myth.
Browsers are made by Apple, Google and Mozilla.
💯
Also webapps are an order of magnitude slower and more memory heavy and prone to leaks than native apps.
It's a silly suggestion to say everybody should just move to PWAs.
Imagine that just because Apple has some bullshit requirements on their app store we should give up computers entirely, never again touch processors, memory, bytes, and should instead just operate on a fake virtual environment provided to us by the same corporations that we are supposedly fighting.
Why do you hate Lynx?
Writing web apps is the same as living in a pod.
That's a good point, I hadn't thought of it quite that way.
As a web app developer I usually look at it from the perspective that making my app available at a URL makes it very easy for other's to access.
A lot of people (including me) are afraid of installing untrusted software on their bare metal machines from strangers, and browsers overcome that by being, well, a pod.
But I see why people like to develop for iOS or Android and I use some of the Android stuff. I feel left out of the iOS stuff because I'm not an Apple guy anymore. The web pod stuff is available to everyone.
Mobile OSs have sandboxed app environments. The fear of installing non “bare metal machines” originates in desktop operating systems. Which are all fucking trash and need a rethink but just nobody has gone and put in the work to make a modern desktop OS that addresses this. We need to define an ISA so that I can run any x86 app on any x86 machine without giving it access to the entire system. That we have to have 3 fucking versions of an app that runs on the same hardware is insane. It’s this nonsense that led to running everything in the browser seem like a good ideas (it’s not).
#Native2.0
I guess it’s 2 versions now given that ARM chips are popular now. Anyway its is just some pipe dream shit.
Practically speaking, we need a new open source OS that is designed with all the stuff that we’ve learnt over the last 50-something years.
We don’t use computers the same way we did when unix was designed. And the internet didn’t exist then.
End of rant. Maybe.
no bro, keep going 🔥
Fuchsia OS looks like someone has gone and done the work. But it’s gimped because the UI stuff runs in Dart VM. Wtf why? Dart is mehhh. But maybe the kernel, Zircon, is worth a look. It’s open source, but it’s also a Google project so who knows what dance is required to contribute.
You can place an entire cloud infrastructure behind a simple PWA application. By doing so, you can overcome the performance limitations imposed by individual phones.
While the primal architecture may be somewhat controversial, its advanced nature cannot be denied, offering limitless possibilities.
Browser engines, React Native with extra steps?
Web apps are not necessarily slower than mobile apps.
True, there are a lot of bloated web apps, but skilled developers who care about performance can write web apps that you would not be able to distinguish from native apps in performance.
The only people suggesting web apps are front end web developers that don’t really give a shit how slow or insecure stuff is.
🤣🤣🤣
Seems less likely, judging by precedent. Apps are frequently banned. Sites less so.
They talking about side loading and stuff?
Cause they probably never actually tried to get any real app to run inside browser restrictions. Massive pain in the balls.
What are the restrictions within browsers that make it hard to develop apps for them?
I don’t get how what apple is doing, taking 30% cut and deciding what you can or cannot have on your device, is legal. How is it different from what microsoft was doing with windows and internet explorer?
Chromium is open source you can turn website into chromium app thus PWAs.
Because they've only seen iOS for years & extend their perspective to the Android ecosystem.
iOS will never have the FOSS options Android has.
Most Anfroid users probably don't explore these options or are restricted on their device.
Don't switch from IPhone to Samsung folks.
So, what is your suggestion?
You will.
Android is less likely to ban apps because side loading apps is always an option.
So, in the worst case, even if they can the app from app store, you can side load them.
Also, you can switch to a Huawei phone and bypass Google altogether
There's AOSP based #GrapheneOS which is peak freedom and privacy!
Performance is an issue
Android and web apps are both fast, secure and unlikely to be censored. It's iOS which is the problem, as Apple not only censors native apps, but also intentionally cripples its browser to limit web apps.
Cause I hate phones altogether. I do not understand why would anyone want to interact with Internet through this small screen and your fat thumbs.
So I prefer web apps because I can run them on normal devices like my desktop. The CLI/TUI apps are better but I can see why it is not for everyone.