My colleague in CETIS, Madam Cooper, recently published an informal “Horizon Scan” document. You can read about it here. There’s an interesting section on possible future trends in “Cross-platform Applications”. This got me ranting thinking again about desktop apps vs. web apps.
I agree somewhat with the comments about Java on the desktop as Rich Client. As for Java used in back-end, that will exist for some time, Oracle’s middle-ware depends upon Java, that’s why they bought Sun. Also, as the document says, there is trouble coming from Oracle, they are going after Google for using Java in Android. Stupid politics. But not only that:
- end-users are beginning to perceive “Java” on the desktop as a technology from the 1990s
- Eclipse RCP apps look non-native, especially on a Mac
- It’s getting harder for SWT/Swing widget toolkits to keep up with all the changes in all the evolving Operating Systems
- Java UI not really portable to mobile
My spidey senses tell me that Java Rich Client Apps’ days are numbered. So where too now? I’m afraid that technology appears to be moving backwards, like a crab. There’s web-apps for sure, but they suck. Ever heard of the iPhone App Store? What was there before that appeared? Web-apps on iPhone/iPod touch. That was a very sub-optimal experience. People want native, native, native, native with data in the cloud (or whatever fashionable name it has today).
Look at what the CEO of Evernote says here – http://techcrunch.com/2011/01/19/evernote-mac-app-store/ Whilst the main thrust of the article is about the value of the App store he has some interesting things to say about cross-platform, web-apps and native in section 4 of that article. He says (emphasis mine):
“If Evernote’s desktop clients were written in Adobe AIR, I’d be worried right now. The immediate popularity of the Mac App Store, and the iPhone App Store before it, reinforces my belief that in a world of infinite software choice, people gravitate towards the products with the best overall user experience. It’s very hard for something developed in a cross-platform, lowest-common-denominator technology to provide as nice an experience as a similar native app.
As the CEO of a software company, I wish this weren’t true. I’d love to build one version of our App that could work everywhere. Instead, we develop separate native versions for Windows, Mac, Desktop Web, iOS, Android, BlackBerry, HP WebOS and (coming soon) Windows Phone 7. We do it because the results are better and, frankly, that’s all-important. We could probably save 70% of our development budget by switching to a single, cross-platform client, but we would probably lose 80% of our users. And we’d be shut out of most app stores and go back to worrying about distribution.
Does this mean that web apps are doomed? Not at all, but the most successful web apps will be the ones that emphasize unique benefits—sharing, communications, integrations—that are better implemented on the web than in native code. This is the main design goal for the next version of the Evernote web client, by the way.”
So I don’t know where the future lies for cross-platform. I hope not in web-apps as they are implemented now. The aim of a web-app or widget is no different than what Sun were trying to achieve in the 1990s with Java Applets. Let’s be clear about the aim – to deliver an executable that runs largely the same on all platforms. But I despair of the current situation – to deliver a pseudo-executable cobbled together from an ancient and third-rate technology like Javascript and its associated technologies in a “Browser” is madness. Forget the Browser. It’s a third-rate renderer, a wretched and abhorrent application in itself standing between the user and the target application. Who wants to run apps in what is basically the equivalent of a command-prompt console, in a shell, a pox-ridden frame? I say deliver an executable compiled for the target that runs in the OS, not the browser. But look, now we go round in a circle….this is what Java and Applets was trying to do…or maybe Google with its forthcoming Google OS.
…but, hey, what do I know?
