

The Irony of iPad: A Great Day For Open Technologies - wycats
http://yehudakatz.com/2010/01/27/the-irony-of-the-ipad-a-great-day-for-open-technologies/

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tdavis
I actually tweeted about this exact thing after catching up to the
announcement:

    
    
      Despite iPad propriety, higher res + HTML5 make web apps   
      much more relevant and far cheaper/faster to develop & iterate.
    

I think this is absolutely awesome for web apps. The only thing that's missing
is the ability to sell "icons" on the app store that merely subscribe one to a
web app and stick the link on their home screen. This would meld the ease of
development and deployment of web apps with the ease of payment processing the
app store provides. I don't see this ever happening because Apple couldn't
control the ability to review subsequent changes before they were live, but
it's a nice dream.

~~~
WilliamLP
The elephant in the room is that no matter how much Douglas Crockford
apologizes for it and tries to brush the fact aside, JavaScript the language,
the browser DOMs, HTML, and CSS make an absolutely terrible platform on which
to develop large, complex, and well performing desktop-style apps.

I can't be the only one who thinks this, and it seems like Google is the only
one to have any success at all in doing this on a large scale.

~~~
old-gregg
You are absolutely correct but you picked the wrong venue to express this
view, hence downvoting.

From a purely technical perspective web platform is approaching DOS circa 1990
accelerated by sheer amounts of open source libraries available today. But it
still provides pretty much DOS experience albeit on a high-res screen.

I am not sure it's a bad thing though: when you give developers absolute
freedom over your hardware they will quickly turn your PC into a typical
popup-ridden WinXP box with tray area half-screen wide :)

~~~
bad_user
I'm pretty sure you haven't developed for DOS in the 90ties, otherwise you
wouldn't be saying that.

People that bitch and moan about HTML, CSS, Javascript and about choosing a
(high-level) language/framework for server-side development ... should really
try developing for DOS, having to deal with Turbo Pascal or C (since C++ in
the early 90ties was a mess), having to drop to 286 or 386 assembler to do
their job, having to deal with the conventional memory limitations, going
through hoops choosing between extended and expanded memory, or having to deal
with the protected 386 mode, and always having to reinvent the wheel because
open-source practically didn't exist for DOS ... like writing their own
windowing tookit, or simulate multi-threading / background workers with
hardware interrupts.

The truth of the matter is, we've never had it better. People bitching and
moaning about web-dev are just conservatists ... but really, they should get
over it since this is 2010, not 1992.

~~~
fnid2
I don't know if they are conservatists or simply too young to understand what
it was really like back in the "old" days.

The web is awesome. It's the most amazing technology platform the world has
ever known. HTML, CSS, and JavaScript are all standard and interoperable.

People who complain about CSS should try changing the look/feel of an entire
desktop app. People who complain of HTML should try building PDFs or Word Docs
on the fly. People who complain about JavaScript should try writing some
Assembly: DOS, Sparc, what have you...

People who complain about web programming should try to deploy an enterprise
app to 10,000 desktops. It's a nightmare. The Web is a blessing to the world.
Thank you Tim!

~~~
stcredzero
_People who complain about CSS should try changing the look/feel of an entire
desktop app. People who complain of HTML should try building PDFs or Word Docs
on the fly._

Actually, those two capabilities were two things that VisualWorks Smalltalk
has had for something like a decade? Want your App to look OS X Aqua? One line
of code, boom! Building apps on the fly? Business as usual for Smalltalk.

(To be fair, the Aqua/Motif/Windows emulated UI was half-baked appearance
wise, but the underlying framework was good.)

------
whughes
It doesn't matter how open HTML5 itself is. Going "to the cloud" is still a
step backward for openness. I'd much rather be stuck with .doc files than have
everything stored on Google Docs and transmitted using open Web standards.
Openness is more than just file formats. Moving to the cloud is just as big a
step back, if not more, than the App Store.

~~~
patio11
You know how there is the free-as-in-beer versus free-as-in-speech
distinction? I think we need an open-as-in-I-can-build-stuff-without-your-
permission versus open-as-in-consumers-theoretically-control-their-own-data
distinction. I kind of like having the first type of open around. The second
type, meh, whatever.

I make toasters for people who like toast. They pay me to make toasters so
that they don't have to deal with the freaking breadcrumbs. The word
breadcrumb sort of scares them, anyhow. They don't need open breadcrumbs.
(Influential people, including many present here, think open breadcrumbs are a
moral imperative. None of them buy toasters. I optimize accordingly.)

On the other hand, as a toaster maker, it is very handy for me that I don't
have to apply to a Central Toaster Authority for a Certified Toaster Maker
Certificate which will let me check out The Black Arts of Toaster
Manufacturing from the library and use my Genuine Toaster Tools (cost $100,000
per set)) to start cranking out toasters.

~~~
aminuit
I get where you're going, but the toaster analogy doesn't work. If you want to
sell toasters (or basically anything that takes mains voltage) en masse in
Western markets, you'll have to fork over several large to Underwriters
Laboratories and go through their approval process.

~~~
stcredzero
Yes, but they aren't _nearly_ as notoriously capricious as the App Store.
(Perhaps it's just not as well publicized?)

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ezy
Wow, do people think if they say this enough times, it'll be true?

Apple doesn't give you access to the same experience from the web as from a
native app, and simulations of such have up to this point been second class
and will remain so. End of story.

A netbook-ish device with no way to put software on it except thru a
proprietary corporate censored app store is a big loose. Beyond the hype, I
think this device will be everyone's wakeup call. Noone cared too much about
the iPhone app store problems because of its limited form factor. Truly,
there's a limited number of things you can do with it in a reasonable manner
and they were all covered generically about 6 mos after launch.

This device can do much more, but there's a lot you _won't_ be able to do
because everything must be vetted by Apple.

~~~
wycats
Wow, do people think if they say this enough times, it'll be true?

Apple has been spending gads of time, energy and effort to make the web
experience as close to native as possible. This includes giving access to
hardware accelerated CSS animations, access to GPS, and access to offline
storage (I outlined a bunch more in the article).

For instance, there is _no_ reason the New York Times app they demonstrated
today would not have worked fine as ipad.nytimes.com.

~~~
code_duck
I don't see what possible motivation Apple would have to make the web
experience as close to native as possible. They don't get a cut of sales on
native apps, and they can't control the content, style or functions to the
same extent - are these issues not important to Apple? Seems they are from how
they act about app approval.

~~~
stcredzero
_I don't see what possible motivation Apple would have to make the web
experience as close to native as possible._

It makes it easier to sell the hardware.

------
jawngee
Except the iPad simulator in the SDK Beta doesn't ship with Safari. You can
sort of fake it with S4, but only sort of. Just like you can sort of fake a
native app with HTML5, but only sort of.

I've commented before how this is a disaster, and will be even more so as we
become even more mobile. The precedent has been set and it's only going to get
bigger and more ubiquitous.

That said, I'll still be getting an iPad. But mostly because I write apps for
myself and the iPad is something I've been waiting for to fulfill a specific
purpose that the iPhone only sort of takes care of.

~~~
abdelazer
Why in the world is Safari not on the iPad simulator?! I'd like to believe
they'll fix that during an update, but I hesitate to think that Apple would do
anything I find sane...

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baguasquirrel
I also wonder why more people haven't mentioned the A4. Intel seriously needs
their asses kicked. The A4 isn't going to be open tech by any measure, but the
fact that it was possible may mean we will get more attention/innovation in
that area-- not open by a direct technical standpoint, but openness in terms
of market options/competition.

~~~
joneath
I was wondering what Samsung(current manufacture of the 3GS's A8 processor)
was thinking during the announcement. With the iPad using in-house silicon I
will bet the next iphone will as well. This is going to hurt any future ARM
manufacturer that Apple might have used.

~~~
tesseract
I'm hearing quite a bit of speculation that Samsung is the fab for the A4. If
so, they are still getting a slice of the action.

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n8agrin
I whole heartedly agree with what Yehuda is saying here. If you're not writing
a game and don't need direct access to the hardware (i.e. camera support on
the iPhone/iTouch) I find it very hard to understand why you would _want_ to
write anything other than a highly optimized HTML5 app. Wanting aside, I
totally understand why people _do_ write native apps, both for reasons of
integration-feel and for speed, but I'd like to think most app developers
would rather have a highly optimized Safari and a robust / optimized
Javascript API to write their apps with instead.

~~~
sandGorgon
_One area in particular where iPhone web apps fall short of native iPhone apps
is scrolling. This friction might make sense for regular web pages rendered on
the iPhone’s small screen, where by “regular” I mean “not optimized
specifically for display on the iPhone”. But it just feels slow — stuck — on
iPhone-optimized apps._

That was the Daring Fireball page on PastryKit

~~~
wycats
Did you read to the end? It's possible, with pure HTML, JavaScript, and CSS,
to solve these problems. Apple has, and we don't need them to release
"PastryKit" for us to get the same powers.

~~~
sandGorgon
I was replying to your question about why it is sometimes better to have a
native app, even though you may not need direct access to hardware - user
experience is another factor.

Do understand that such a kind of experience may be deliverable today, with
PastryKit or whatever someone else develops, but Apple can break this
compatibility (which it cant do with its native SDK).

A new business model may exist where developers make advertising money off
free iphone webapps. It is extremely naiive to believe that Apple will allow
you to deliver the same user experience by bypassing the App Store.

------
mrshoe
I fail to see the irony here. Apple is not trying to stifle innovation and
control absolutely everything we do with their devices. As he points out in
the article, Apple is the biggest driving force behind open web standards and
their implementation in WebKit.

The motivation for the App Store is simple: consumers want an easy way to buy
apps, and developers want an easy way to sell apps. If you want to take
advantage of the payment processing, bandwidth, store interface, and marketing
provided by the App Store, you have to adhere to their ToS. I'm sure Yahoo!
Store has ToS as well.

However, if you want to roll all that on your own, go right ahead. As pointed
out in this article, no one has done more to support you in that endeavor than
Apple -- including a lot of support in WebKit and iPhone OS specifically for
web apps on these devices.

It's not just a question of web vs. native, either. Even if _all iPhone apps_
were HTML5/CSS/JS, you'd still have to adhere to Apple's ToS in order to sell
through the App Store, and you wouldn't have to adhere to them if you sold
through your own store.

~~~
bad_user
> _However, if you want to roll all that on your own, go right ahead_

You can't do that with native apps. You really don't have that choice, and
while the browser is really capable, it means some precious functionality is
out of reach ... like being able to handle the web-cam.

> _Apple is the biggest driving force behind open web standards and their
> implementation in WebKit._

Oh, please. They took KHTML and invested some resources into it. Then it
became a defacto standard for mobiles, because it remained LGPL, because KHTML
was LGPL.

Surely Apple is doing his part, but to call it "the biggest driving force
behind open web standards" ... Jesus!

Speaking of that, I guess you're not using Linux and have never encountered a
page filled with Quicktime screencasts. And on Windows you have to buy a
license to get full-screen? WTF is that? Sorry for the expression ... but
driving force, my ass ;)

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noonespecial
If the only thing we get out of the ipad and its ilk is a large installed base
of flash free devices, it will all have been worth it. I don't like Apple's
closed everything attitude, but I like adobe's even less. The enemy of my
enemy...

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callmeed
Weren't similar things said about the iPhone pre-App Store? (that mobile
safari supported HTML/CSS/JS/etc)

Still, I don't think there were any groundbreaking iPhone web apps that didn't
eventually become iPhone Apps.

~~~
swannodette
I dunno, mobile GMail on iPhone Safari is pretty impressive.

~~~
dantheman
That's only because apple won't let google release a mail client.

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mark_l_watson
I agree with Yehuda that any good browser platform helps promote web apps, and
HTML 5 makes this even better. One point of disagreement: I think that it is
awful to not have a sandboxed Flash implementation so the device could access
hulu.com, conference videos, etc. This rules out my wife and I buying one of
these because I would not by a web browsing device that could not access quite
a bit of web content.

~~~
loire280
I agree that in the short term, not having Flash will wall off large sections
of web content.

However, if the iPad takes off we will have to either provide alternate
content or abandon flash on our heaviest flash sites. The web design company I
work for will probably switch to standards-based Javascript animation and
HTML5 video with the usual fallbacks for IE6. We already use JS for many
things that used to be flash, like menus, slideshows, galleries, and
animations.

When it was just the iPhone/iPod touch, with their relatively small browsing
traffic, it was easy to shrug it off when a site didn't work properly.
Expectations will be different with this device. My clients will be asking why
their site is broken on their iPads.

The big video sites will implement an HTML5-powered player for the iPad
because it allows them to go around the iTunes / App store model. Smaller
video players will probably make the switch sooner.

Apple may be doing the developer community a favor by giving us a reason to
leave flash behind. The runtime is fine on Windows but sluggish on OSX and
slow and buggy on Linux; it's frequently using more CPU time than anything
else on my system and often has terrible video playback performance.

------
daleharvey
the amount of effort going into pushing browser technology has always confused
me with apple, unless they never aimed for the appstore to be a permanent
thing.

but its a pleasant surprise, im excited by the type of applications we can
build these days using very common web standards

~~~
mbrubeck
The success of the internet and web keep Apple's computers relevant in a
still-Microsoft-dominated world.

I was a Mac user starting in 1989 (and since then switched to BeOS and then
Linux). Once everything started moving onto the internet and then the web,
alternate operating systems became far less like neglected ghettos. Now as
long as it has a good web browser, even the most marginal platform is pretty
useful.

~~~
bad_user
Yes, and what bothers me with this scenario is that things can always go
around ... what do people think it will happen when Apple is the one
dominating?

I can tell you one thing ... the Microsoft era will seem something like a
golden-age.

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AndrewO
It's ironic that Steve's much criticized initial suggestion of "why don't you
make web apps?" in lieu of an SDK when the iPhone first came out is now more
and more acceptable. Certainly Safari advances and all the negativity about
the approval process have played a part in that.

I just find it funny that Steve had to be "wrong"* about something just to
show how right he was about something else...

[*] open to interpretation of course, depending on how you feel about the SDK
and the AppStore.

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thomasfl
Sell accounts on sites like Dropbox, Basecamp and 37signals on iTunes Store?
Not a good idea for Apple, but maybe a good idea for someone else?

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passingthrough
What happens when this device becomes ubiquitous and Apple decides to support
the features in HTML5 "they" want and not others, or to stop supporting it
altogether. Will you switch to another browser on your IPod/Pad/Phone?

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Devilboy
Related news: Apple now allows VOIP apps with the new iPhone / iPad SDK

[http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/apple-lifts-voip-over-
cel...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/apple-lifts-voip-over-cellular-
restrictions-in-new-iphone-sdk/)

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c00p3r
Yeah, finally a 4chan-compatible device! =))

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dfischer
I like this viewpoint.

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vais
Apple has finally made a netbook - and they did it on their terms. Bravo!

