

Ask HN: Are desktop apps dead? - pknerd

Following HN and other sources on Internet, it has started giving me feeling that I should not thinking of an app that is downloadable on Desktop PCs after paying a certain amount of money. Am I right? Why most of the companies keep going for SAAS model despite of we know that it always ask us to remain connected on Internet.
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SchizoDuckie
No. Desktop Apps are not dead. Desktops (with a full-fledged keyboard, plenty
of screen real-estate and proper multi-tasking are alive and kicking for
content _creation_

For content consumption, tablets and phones are much more convenient,
especially since they are used with well-optimized GUI. This will not change
until there are new and better ways of inputting (and working with) large
amounts of text, audio and video on portable/touch devices.

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SchizoDuckie
I typed this response from my android phone and the experience on android 4.2
is still shitty.

Typing into an overflowing textarea, Scrolling, changing a sentence, spelling
correction, it's just a tedious process. On a desktop I would have been 100x
faster and more accurate.

~~~
bestham
And yet, what device /did/ you end up using?

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mooreds
As always, the answer is "it depends". What is your market? Who are your
users?

It is better to start with the market and problem you want to address, then
find out what kind of platforms they possess (and plan to continue to possess)
and build for that platform, than to start from the technology side.

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imwhimsical
Depends on what you're making. With OS X, I don't think desktop apps are out
of the scene just as yet. I see a lot of great apps on the Mac AppStore which
are throttling sales. Coda, iA Writer, and Mindnode, just to name a few.

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jimmmylost
We prefer SaaS because of: 1\. Data Safety (and sometimes for high risk
information companies prefer a desktop app for privacy) 2\. Multi-Platform 3\.
Access from everywhere 4\. A better UX (in most cases) 5\.
Maintenance,Maintenance and Maintenance (a bug in your desktop app is
terrible, but SaaS? you can solve in for all customers in a second) 6\.
Prevent hack and cracks! (That's really a huge money-loss)

Really these are very serious problems. But there are some cases you should
use desktop apps.

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robodale
Having created and sold several Windows desktop apps over the last 10
years...the worst thing about them is getting updates out to users. I
regularly get bug reports sent from my apps, mostly from eastern European
countries, that are several YEARS worth of updates behind. I assume they are
cracked versions, so I usually pay no attention.

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mbreckon
See also: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5023123> (Do you think the
desktop is dead?)

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democracy
There are some advantages and disadvantages of desktop or web apps. Some
things can be done with only desktop apps. So they are not dead any time soon.
Also nothing stops you from creating a native desktop client for your web app
if you need one. But it only depends on your specific app. You could probably
share you app idea so we could give a better answer. cheers.

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ig1
You're conflating two issues, method of delivery and method of payment. There
are a number of very successful desktop app that are SaaS (Dropbox and
Evernote come to mind).

The reason that SaaS is so popular is that it provides a much more predictable
and reliable income over one-off sales.

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pknerd
To make things simple, when I mentioned it means a recurring model of payment.

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mikecane
It depends. Consumer or commercial market? Productivity or games? Low-priced
popular or high-priced niche?

EDIT to add: Win, OS X, Linux? Also, I would not do any desktop program
without also thinking about how it would be as a tablet app -- iOS, Android,
RT.

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pknerd
As per my knowledge Windows is still dominating in market so a windows based
desktop app.

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mikecane
Windows does dominate, but how many software programs are now unused because
people have found they can duplicate those functions on a tablet? Do you think
a map app would be popular on the desktop when a tablet can do that better?

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dotmanish
A lot of geeks on HN bought JetBrains' Desktop IDEs during their End-of-World
Promo (going by the responses to that thread).

Not Everything Yet.

~~~
pknerd
IDE is quite a different thing. IMO web based IDEs are not as mature yet as
Desktop IDEs.

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readme
Tried cloud9? It's actually very mature. The reason it's not widespread is
because it doesn't offer any significant advantage for most developers. What's
the advantage? Develop in the cloud, your environment everywhere? OK, so maybe
it's an advantage for developers who don't know how to use ssh/scp/sshfs. So,
for most talented web developers, the additional problems being solved aren't
there.

It does solve: hey, I'd like to be lazy and develop with my stock chrome book.
It does solve, hey, I'd like to develop without installing software (I think
schools will be big customers, especially to get all the setups at once!?) but
your typical good developer, is going to be very attached to vim, emacs,
sublime text, or whatever he normally uses that isn't part of cloud9.

For developers of more complicated software, embedded, OS, etc. Or even for
mobile devs, cloud9 is a non-starter since it doesn't integrate with their
physical environments (Like, their ARM board, or iOS device, nuclear reactor,
or whatever) so for a wide range of things it's just not an applicable
solution.

I think cloud9 will see success in education markets, as well as business from
developers who do lightweight web dev work who don't have a favorite editor
already.

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dear
We can all go for a vacation if the Internet is down.

