On 23/03/2012 11:21, Bernard Devlin wrote:
OK. Thanks for that explanation. It sounds like tomorrow has arrived
(although the emphasis is on "might replace desktop apps"). From your
description both RealStudio and RunRev are facing in the wrong
direction. But there are many people who have pivoted their careers
about to learn Objective-C, a language which only 4 years ago seemed
to be about as niche as one could get. One project I was involved in
back then migrated to python because it was just too hard to get
people who knew anything about Objective-C. Runrev and RealStudio
will not be the only ones who might have chosen the wrong path
ultimately.
I will have to look into HTML5 further :)
Web apps (HTML/CSS/jQuery) are not a panacea.
I speak as one who has written a large web app (desktop publishing,
aimed at HR departments: docrobot.co.uk).
When they work, they can provide outstanding qualities (no installation
needed, quick to deploy, low maintenance, quick to update, etc).
However, they are brittle, dependant upon fluctuating browser
technology, firewall technology, always being online, rely on
device/O.S. features being expressed in a browser, etc.
There are cases where web apps make sense...and if you find a niche like
that more power to you, but I cannot believe that native apps are going
away any time soon.
The iOS situation makes that abundantly clear. Web apps are
significantly esier to write than native apps for many tasks. You can
deploy them without Apple having a word to say about them. Thanks to
Apple's WebKit efforts they look and work remarkably well...and yet...
Apple says there are over 500,000 native apps
(http://www.apple.com/iphone/built-in-apps/app-store.html), with over 10
billion downloads.
How many folks are clamoring for web apps?
-Ken
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