Comment by troupo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by troupo | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> This statement alone is evidence that you didn't understand the crux of the issue.

I do

> You are also confusing cause and effect.

I don't

> I clearly explained the root causes for that.

You didn't. You went on a rant about "public perception" and your own experience building mobile web sites.

> If you say that it's because they lack certain features, then you confirmed my point that it's due to active sabotage and denial of equal rights.

See. Again with the rant.

> Be specific, why are they not "good"?

E.g. Reddit's mobile web site loads every post in 3+ seconds. And reloads the full page when you click on a subtree in the comments.

When you scroll through Twitter, it will just randomly load a bunch of stuff and replace your content losing your scroll position. Same with going back from a tweet to the timeline.

Most websites take multiple seconds to display text-only information with broken layouts, layout shifts, and multiple loading states.

To quote myself from 3 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34517503

--- start quote ---

Features HN developers think are missing from the web to deliver an experience "as polished as a native app": notifications, prompt banners, link interception, Chrome-only non-standards like bluetooth etc.

Features actual users think are missing from the web to deliver an experience "as polished as a native app": actual native-like experience: responsiveness, smooth animations, polished usable and accesible controls, maintaining scroll position and location in the app, fast scrolling through large lists, no loading states for the simplest actions...

I mean, people people keep bringing up Twitter's objectively bad web app as an example of one of the best PWA apps... Have these people never seen an actual native app?

--- end quote ---

> There wouldn't be coincidentally a mysterious opposing force that actively prevents developers from improving those aspects, right?

There is no such entity. Besides, Google invested hundreds of millions of dollars into PWAs, and there are still so few that people can point to even on Android.

> X (formerly Twitter) - has PWA

Yup.

We have really complex web applications like Photopea.

They work fine performance-wise. The example of Reddit’s website being shit is just pointing out that Reddit’s website is shit.

Google maps web applications also works really well. Both Photopea and Google Maps are far more complex than reddit.

At this point I am sure reddit’s website is shit so people are forced to use their app so they can track users better. Not because of some underlying limitation of web technologies.

ht>> I clearly explained the root causes for that.

>You didn't. You went on a rant about "public perception" and your own experience building mobile web sites.

I have no time to engage in your shallow kind of tit for tat, where I do all of the work and you simply respond with infantile one word responses with zero elaboration or outright denial, misrepresentation or just repetition of already debunked narratives. I will still briefly debunk the parts where you put in at least some minor effort of trying to substantiate.

For a more elaborate analysis:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44694037

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44692287

>> Be specific, why are they not "good"? > E.g. Reddit's mobile web site loads every post in 3+ seconds. And reloads the full page when you click on a subtree in the comments. When you scroll through Twitter, it will just randomly load a bunch of stuff and replace your content losing your scroll position. Same with going back from a tweet to the timeline. Most websites take multiple seconds to display text-only information with broken layouts, layout shifts, and multiple loading states.

Those are some specific apps that have bad implementations, not an inherent limitation of the technology, so it's irrelevant to the bigger picture. I asked you for the specific technology. That's like me saying "Give me a specific reason why electric cars will never be a viable technology as you claimed" then you respond with "This specific brand has an electric car with this specific issue". It's such a transparent strategy of deliberately missing the point.

> --- start quote ---

Features HN developers think are missing from the web to deliver an experience ... --- end quote ---

All of those are issues that have already been fixed, so I don't get why you would bring up your severely outdated comment. It also contains aspects for which I clearly explained why and who is to blame for those.

>There is no such entity. Besides, Google invested hundreds of millions of dollars into PWAs, and there are still so few that people can point to even on Android.

I already responded to this in many different comments:

"Google is the primary champion of PWAs, they have a vested interest in its success. The reason I focused on Apple is because its actions are one of a profit-maximizing gatekeeper actively defending its most lucrative business against an existential threat that is PWA. Every bug, every delayed feature, and every artificial limitation imposed on PWAs on iOS is a calculated strategic move in this defense of its walled garden that makes maximum taxation possible."

Reply on news.ycombinator.com