The app is dead, long live the web app.
The recent gold rush of companies implementing native mobile applications largely reminds me of the desktop application market about 10 years ago. History, it seems, is in the current process of repeating itself, and the benefits and lessons we’ve learned from the growth and adoption of the humble web application seem to be largely forgotten. The decision in many cases as to whether developers should be building web applications which work on mobile devices, or native applications for particular platforms, seems to be driven by the shiny marketing opportunity and associated bragging rights that native applications bring with them.
Once a market leader releases a native app – well, you can pretty much guarantee that there will be a competitors marketing department jumping up and down wondering why they too aren’t able to discuss the wonders of push notifications and shiny interfaces around the water cooler with their peers.
Has the software world gone mad?
Lets just remind ourselves how mobile software development seems to be rolling at the minute shall we?
1) Client has a website – decides they need a mobile presence. Seems logical. In the future, web access will largely be through a mobile browsing device, so no surprise the client wants to be where the crowd is.
2) Client requests that they need it to work on the iPhone. iPhone is what everyone is going crazy over. Right?
3) Supplier builds a native iPhone application. Bills the client, client is happy. Marketing department say. “Oooh. Shiny.” ,”Oooooh iPhone app”.
4) The smartphone mobile market moves on a bit. Google come out with a new device. Marketing department say “Can we get our mobile app for this Androthingy?”
5) Client requests another application that works on Android. Client sells a kidney, pays for the Android version. Marketing department say “Oooh. Shiny. Ooooh Google. Uhgh. Kidney”
6) The portable device market moves on a bit. Apple decide to launch the iPad. The early adopter marketing department all buy one, and then complain about the user experience on a bigger device. Time for another new application me thinks…
7) Client requests that the original iPhone app, should really work on the iPad too. He returns to the developer, sells his other kidney, and gets a brand new iPad version.
8) The business changes. Google release an iPad beater. All apps need an update. Client throws himself off the nearest bridge.
We seem to have got ourselves into a scenario where every website under the sun think that the only way they can receive market penetration in the mobile market is through the app store. The hilarious thing is, is that the majority of these apps have no additional functionality which couldn’t be implemented through a web application, and in many cases are about 10 times the price, both from a development and maintainance perspective.
Ooh, but its all about the user experience, and more responsive user interface, I hear you cry.
Sure. There are plenty of times when applications require processing power, and computation to deliver the user experience that we need to get the job done.
9 times out of 10 - browsing web based content using a mobile device as a thin client isn’t one of them.
We’ve already seen the impact that technologies such as AJAX have brought to the web application market, and this problem of a more responsive experience is only likely to become more diminished over time. Lets not forget the Chrome 10 now comes with built in hardware acceleration for graphics, and HTML5 opens up a whole new window of opportunity – which many developers have already embraced. Push notifications? We got the tech for that sort of shit too.
In case you need reminded. Here are the advantages of mobile web applications (and indeed traditional web apps) over native ones. Particularly for those of you thinking you want to recreate your website in app form.
1) Distribution. How are you planning on deploying your native app? You are going to have to market it through the app store, get it approved, and possibly come up with a marketing strategy to let people know they need to download it. Mobile application is ‘just there’. When someone visits your site, detect the user agent. Away you go.
2) Speed of deployment. Got a new version? How are you getting that out the door? Will your system work with people running two different versions if they can’t be arsed to upgrade? I’ve lost track of the number of stagnant mobile applications in the marketplace that either don’t have the budget to keep them as up to date as the main website, or think of it as an afterthought that they will eventually get around to sorting out. In my experience the user experience on mobile applications gets left in the dust long after the browser based has evolved.
3) Piracy. If your application generates revenue, and you’ve given the code to the client..someone is gonna crack it open or free. Controlling the source leaves you less vulnerable.
4) Platform Independance. Build a mobile application right, and it will run on anything. Regardless of platform. It also stops you having to worry about chasing your tail when a new device hits the market. If it’s got a web browser, your work is largely done. Yes browser compatibility can be an issue, but give me a browser bug over recreating from scratch an entire program any day of the week.
5) Generally lower costs – Good Web application programmers. Dime a dozen. Good native application developers. Harder to find. The difference in cost of developing a native app versus a web app is normally polls apart. That said, give me a reliable mobile web app over a glitchy native one any day of the week – so you’d better be prepared to fork out the dough for the good guys.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m as passionate about a well developed native application as the next guy. It just seems that its time to sit down and see what can’t be achieved in a mobile browser environment before you decide to pursue headlong a development path that will likely wind up where we already are with the desktop environment – with all processing being done on a remote server, and the device being nothing more than a dumb client.
linky
posted:March 18, 2011 12:40 pm
This was the most informative and entertaining post I have read in a while. Keep up the great work!
Nicole
linky
posted:March 18, 2011 1:41 pm
Spot on! I was asked to create an iPhone app for a site that I created last year and I made a similar argument, that with some CSS changes, I could do the same thing for very little $ and future enhancements would be much, much easier.
Matt
linky
posted:March 19, 2011 12:23 am
Awesome stuff. Just having this discussion at work. Everyone is wanting to throw more money at an iPad only app. Yet we could easily replicate it on the web using inhouse resources. People are just going crazy to get on the band wagon. Buzz word marketing.
HTML Codes Dude
linky
posted:June 6, 2011 11:58 am
Totally agree on this. iPhones are not owned by everyone, and the app store is full of rubbish. Most apps only used a few times. Nobody ever quotes this in their marketing. “our app was downloaded 1 million times” sounds good, but how many times was it used? and did the user think, “this app is rubbish”. Show me an iPhone user who doesn’t use their browser on a regular basis though.
And the cost… What about Blackberry, what about Symbian, What about Windows Phone 7? When you cover all of them with bespoke native coded apps, you’re getting into some serious cost – and then needing to test against new firmware releases, reiterating all versions, updating them, convincing users to update etc.
And all the buzz around iPhones – they’re not that special, they are just shiny enough to have got some of the late adpoters on board with the idea that access to web-based info and services from your pocket is good. It only takes one manufacturer to release a device that does something very different, or looks very different to all the others for the entire mobile world to shift. The Motorola Razr did this before the iPhone came along, could be anyone else next.
With just 1-2 years between end-user device upgrades, is it really a safe bet to put all your eggs in the iPhone basket? Personally, I switched to Android a while back and am not looking back – compared to new Android devices like the Samsung Galaxy S II and LG Optimus 2x, the iPhone looks like an antique.. even Blackberry is catching up too, and who knows how Nokia might up the game for the rather sleek but currently overlooked WP7. Delivering webapps or just well-designed mobile views of sites and services can cover all of these devices, and ensure rapid and simple updates too – not to mention avoiding paying a massive slice of any revenue generated to a ‘m-retailer’ such as Apple, Google, RIM or Microsoft.
Spassmonkey