Ask HN: Why not have one app that does everything? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why not have one app that does everything?

There are too many apps, websites, services, etc. The fragmentation is overwhelming. I don't want a complex OS with hundreds of apps, each requiring their own credentials. I want a single unified interface which lets me communicate with people and machines, about the past and the future.

How come is nobody trying to build that unified experience, that "one app that does everything"? It seems like such an obvious next step, yet people seem to prefer making things increasingly more difficult.

Am I missing something?

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Because programs are finite in size and so is compuyer RAM and storage.

An app that does everything would be too big to run and crash the system because it takes up too much memory.

Think of the OS as a Swiss Army Knife and each program is a blade that does something. There is a limit of how many blades you can add and each blade has to fit into a small space to function.

The smaller the app the faster it loads. The bigger the app the slower it loads.

So you want different apps for different things.

The swiss army knife analogy is not a good one. Software is dynamic, unlike material tools. While a blade can't morph into a bottle opener, software can morph into pretty much anything.

There's no reason for having multiple apps when they all share 90% of features.

I tried to use something in the real world to explain something on a computer.

Actually 90% of the features come from using preexisting libraries like Node.js etc. The business logic and UI/UX are usually different between different apps.

Name two apps that don't share at least 50% of their business logic.

MS-Word and Wordperfect if they did there would be some kind of lawsuit.

Games that use Unreal Engine and games that use the Doom engine.

Same thing, different name, different code, different logic to solve the problems.

Edit: Why the downvotes? I gave some examples as requested. There are many different ways to solve a problem and they don't have to use the same algorithms to get the same results. If my examples are wrong, tell me why they are wrong.

Have you tried emacs?

Also, how would the same app:

- Help me design 3D models

- Help me write a poem

- Help me fight space aliens

- Help me balance my budget.

Those interfaces are all vastly different. The idea that they should be unified is misguided.

You mean, like a "browser" ?

The browser is not unified. Every website has its own unique and distinct UI. Believe it or not, but for a person to sell pizza online, they need to actually describe the position of pixels on the screen. That's insane.

Define "everything"

"Everything" was used for convenience, and is likely hyperbolic. Let's say 80% of all features you currently need in apps. It should be trivial to replace most CRUD-like apps, not so much specialized 3D or multimedia apps.

Things like Uber, Pizza Hut, Walgreens, Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Hacker News, Yelp, Netflix, Maps, Gmail, Slack, Trello, Pocket, Evernote, etc.

Google Now ;-)

Google Now doesn't let me hail a cab, order a pizza, sell my couch, etc.

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