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Comment by bryanlarsen | Hacker News Reader

Packaged web apps are the worst of both worlds: the inconvenience of apps and the speed of web sites.

But the article isn't talking about packaged web apps, it's talking about browsers, and has an interesting redefinition of that term.

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What is the inconvenience of apps?

Needing to install, open and update an application to use a service as opposed to the 'convenience' of just entering a URL in a browser.

Web page does not need opening? Interesting… Updates happen automatically now.

After installing it, you need to open it (ok, it's easy). Updates frequently require approval of new permissions (android).

But the alternative seems to be browser exposing APIs for all those permissions through Javascript and the end-user not really having any control over that. Perhaps I'm just naive about it, since I really don't do Javascript-based development, but this seems to be a worse idea than apps.

Web pages don't require uninstalling when you decide they're not worth it.

Having to install them, remember what screen and folder it's in, etc.

How much work is installing the app? Single tap? The same of less than opening a web page? No need to remember screen and folder, just use global search on your phone.

Similar, but web pages are usable before fully "installed". Data has repeated shown that users quickly abandon websites that don't load extremely fast. Apps are like that, but even slower.

It's simple, when you want to do X, you want to do X, you don't want to do a lot of setup work before you start doing X.

In what world native apps are slower than web apps? And where do you find "extremely fast" websites, with all this JS frameworks crap and gazillion of trackers being pushed to your poor browser?

In ever world since you have to install them and you don't have to install web apps.

Where do you find those extremely small native apps that are smaller than a website?

Well, it's not a lot of work. But it feels like way more work. It's visible even in the way we talk about it - "viewing a website" vs "getting an app". Looking at something is effortless, getting it implies effort. Often, too much of it, if I just want to check some stuff out quickly.

Also, I feel like after installing an app, it takes more time to get to the actual content, because every app has a few screens of "Welcome to Foo! Here's how you do stuff in here." Websites are pretty instant compared to that.

Whoa. If you want content quickly many apps will offer it in widgets. Many will show you notifications with ability to interact with them without even opening the app. There is nothing instant about websites.

I believe the contrast was between the following.

Open browser, create new tab or focus url, enter url

Open app store, search for app name, click on the one that seems correct, read reviews, click install, wait for installation to finish, open new app.

This of course is only valid for the trying a new application or website which hypothetically is 0.001% of your usage of an app.

My point was: There's no problem with casually checking out a website. But I'm probably not gonna install an app unless I'm pretty sure it offers me some value. Not rational? Possibly :)

Assuming I'm linked right to the exact app to install.

Click install. Review and approve permissions. Wait for some ungodly amount of megabytes to download. Wait for installation. Then open. Then approve some new permissions. Splash screen. Woo, content! But I'm not "deep linked" to the place I need to be.

Or, for a website: I'm just there.

> remember what screen and folder it's in

How is this fixed by a web app you have to remember the address for, or at best, remember where on your favorites you saved it?

Besides having to wait for the installation, one important recurring inconvenience for me (on iOS) is the lack of autofill. Especially autofilled user names and passwords.

I really wish Apple would add a password-manager extension point to iOS. Since they're trying to push iCloud Keychain I'm not optimistic about this happening, but it would be a really nice way to make password managers more attractive.

Maybe it's just specific apps integrating with 1Password, but Mint, among other apps, already can do this (and it brings up what appears to be an iOS share sheet). But this feature has largely become irrelevant to me thanks to almost every app I use that requires sign-in supporting Touch ID.

> I really wish Apple would add a password-manager extension point to iOS.

They kinda have in 2 ways - as of iOS 9 or 10 your app can utilize login credentials from your web domain name if certain requirements are met, and there's touchID for instant login after the first authentication.

I use Lastpass and a lot of apps offer a weird icon next to the password box that opens a share sheet with LastPass as an option.

On lots of old android devices: having to remove apps to make room for a new one

Even when you have tons of spaces on a huge sdcard even. This is incredibly frustrating as some devices were shipped with very very little space and too much of that taken up by the stuff that shipped with the phone that for whatever reason cannot be moved to your relatively large sdcard.

I think merged storage is either here in the latest version of android or coming which will hopefully let us stop worrying about storage again but many devices will sadly never see the update.

If you see an interesting link on the web, you generally feel safe clicking on it, and often click on it. Sometimes you get rick-rolled or whatever, but you just hit back.

If you see an ad or pop-up article about an app, what are the chances you install it, even if it looks interesting?

I feel very safe installing apps on my iOS devices. The sandboxing and app store review process gives me confidence that it's not going to be malware.

I click on links more than I install apps because loading web pages is a lot faster than installing apps. The flip side is that I hardly ever return to those "interesting links," while I use my installed apps frequently.

Most people only use 4-6 apps a day, or less. Users are spending more and more time in fewer apps. I reckon a good bit of that is the friction of installing new apps.

> The sandboxing and app store review process gives me confidence that it's not going to be malware.

I would re-evaluate that stance if I were you: http://www.wired.co.uk/article/xcode-apple-app-store-hack. Hundreds of apps injected with malware by a compromised version of Xcode made it through the App Store review process.

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