Hacker News Reader

Comment by modernerd | Hacker News Reader

If you want to build a native app, use the native development tools. I've yet to see a third-party platform that offers 'support for building iOS apps' result in good user experiences and positive reviews. Take these, from Conqu for iPad (built with Flash Builder/Flex)[1], for example:

"App looks nice when it finally loads. Every function has a serious time lag that makes the app unusable."

"However, be warned, this app is painfully s-l-o-w -- at least for me. So slow it has been placed in the "tried apps" bin."

[1]: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/conqu/id440591468?mt=8

View on HN

It is also important to note that the library encompassing the AIR for iOS Runtime seems to be very large and cannot be shared across apps, making over the air downloads more painful (20mb cap typically applies for 3G OTA)

From Conqu (for example). A 25mb tasklist app?

Free Category: Productivity Released: Jun 02, 2011 Version: 1.0 1.0 Size: 25.0 MB

MuniTracker for iPhone

Category: Navigation Updated: Jun 04, 2011 Current Version: 1.1.0 1.1.0 Size: 21.8 MB

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/munitracker/id436932756

I agree a well crafted native app will produce a better end result however the time and effort to produce can be prohibitively expensive.

I'm not sure there are enough published Apps that have been produced with Flash Builder 4.5 to make a judgement on it one way or another yet.

I know I'll be downloading it and giving it a go - I don't mind Objective C but I'd rather be writing my code in other things!

Could you expand on your position regarding the relative cost of developing a native vs. flash application?

Is it simply constrained supply? The limited number of Objective-C developers, or that native development requires a higher skill level, thus constraining the number of suitable developers, or ...?

(I'm not actually a firm believer in the above, I'm just throwing some brainstorming ideas out there -- I'm even ready to believe it costs less to produce a polished native app than trying to polish a webapp).

I think what he means it would be handy if Flash app developers will be able to build iOS app too, without learning a separate tool.

Someone decided to release these apps in that state, and it wasn't Adobe. Furthermore, it was Apple's vaunted review process that passed these badly working apps.

Yet Adobe has decided to feature 'badly working' apps in their showcase to display what's possible with their tools.

My interpretation as a developer considering their software to build iOS apps is that the apps in their showcase are indicative of what I'd be able to produce for iOS with Flash Builder/Flex.

AIR and Flex have reputations for being slow even on desktops. It's just like Java on the desktop - yeah, it probably can be used to make nice-feeling stuff, but there's something going on with either the dev tools, the VM, the culture, or something that seems to make these apps tend to be, more often than not, really unpleasant.

Am I wrong, or did you just repeat the OP's point? He already knows that these apps are sloppy. He said exactly that:

>I've yet to see a third-party platform that offers 'support for building iOS apps' result in good user experiences and positive reviews.

Can you provide any apps that result in good user experiences as counterexamples? Or were you not disagreeing with him and I'm just reading you wrong?

Unity?

http://unity3d.com/

Unity works fine, indeed.

Also the Unreal Engine, which is used on Infinity Blade.

The Unreal Engine is written in C++, however, which counts as native code.

(Although I think games are a different beast altogether. They don't have to adhere to any unifying HIG, and are fully justified in doing their own thing. It doesn't really matter what's underneath in that case, as long as it gets the job done.)

Yes, but I think you missed the point... I was talking about how the Unreal Engine uses a third-party development environment, makes portable content but some of their games are huge success cases on iOS. Basically I was replying to this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2674382

But I agree 100% with your second assertion.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com