from Hacker News

Are JS Mobile Apps Worth It?

by bspates on 8/17/14, 10:34 PM with 3 comments

So a few years back I wrote a few simplistic mobile applications for android using the sdk. I was new to the programming world and was excited enough by novelty to power through the verbose nature of the library. In the two years since I last touched android I have been working as a full stack developer; mostly in JS. Today I attempted to dive back into android only to be jarred by the over-complexity of its sdk. Needing to instantiate four managers to get one piece of data was something I haven't experienced in awhile, and it got me thinking. Has the performance of JS mobile apps(created with apache cordova or whatever) reached a tipping point where non graphic intensive apps are close to indistinguishable from native?

  • by untog on 8/17/14, 11:32 PM

    Performance is less of an issue than it was, but it still exists (though the great IOS8 news is that in-app webviews finally get Nitro[1]). The larger problem, IMO, is UI. You simply cannot recreate native UI in a web view.

    But there are some interesting frameworks out there that blend native UI components with web views - it can work well, and is used more than people often think (in Instagram, for example). As with anything, it's a tradeoff. If you want to make cross-platform a priority, having your main views be web-powered can save you a lot of time, even if they won't be quite as good as native ones. But I maintain the non-HN crowd will be unlikely to notice a slight lack of polish - the standards in our echo chamber are artificially high, IMO.

    [1] http://9to5mac.com/2014/06/03/ios-8-webkit-changes-finally-a...

  • by compedit on 8/17/14, 11:09 PM

    Definitely not. Most of the time when I encounter an obvious webpage disguised as a native application, I feel deceived and underwhelmed.

    Maybe a little over the top, but honestly it's true. Build a fast, responsive mobile site and be honest about what you're producing. If you want the web and its technologies to win, build and present with the web.

  • by abhinavgujjar on 8/18/14, 5:55 AM

    Like everything, It depends. If your app provides a clear utility and that is the main reason for people to use it, then yes - A Js with some hybrid framework should do.

    However - If you're competing in a crowded set of apps, then going native is the minimum you'd need to do for your app to stand out in the crowd.