The mobile app is dead - long live the mobile web interface

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JethroUK

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Scrap the android mobile app
Its crap - cant even read mine the text is too small

Seems to be a race to produce as many mobile apps as possible when the answer is right under their nose

I have a nose for trend and it never ever fails

Mobile websites

Stop developing mobile apps, there too much work and too many platforms

Develop the Mobile website instead
It takes a lot less time because its a simple conversion of existing information
It is suitable for all mobile/tablet platforms
It can retain more of the features of the desktop site

The mobile app is dead - long live the mobile web interface

You heard it here first folks and ill point you back here in 5 years time
 
Mobile websites are OK for WiFi, but Apps dramatically reduce the amount of data traffic between the client and the server and are far better suited for 3g/4g applications.

BTW, my MBclub App works well on both my S4 and S5, not sure what is the issue with yours?
 
apps are going nowhere. For frequent use sites like ebay, forums, facbeook etc they make much more sense.

For sites with high traffic from causal users, building a responsive site that scales to the size of the browser window is critical. Supporting phones, tablets, laptops and desktops with myriad size screens, responsive builds massively improve user experience.

What we'll see the death of, more than likely, is mobile versions of sites. These are usually poorly conceived and rarely maintained properly.
 
apps are going nowhere. For frequent use sites like ebay, forums, facbeook etc they make much more sense.

For sites with high traffic from causal users, building a responsive site that scales to the size of the browser window is critical. Supporting phones, tablets, laptops and desktops with myriad size screens, responsive builds massively improve user experience.

What we'll see the death of, more than likely, is mobile versions of sites. These are usually poorly conceived and rarely maintained properly.

Both are needed.... Apps re for sites you frequent regularly, but we still need mobile websites for those sites that we happen to use on a one-off basis.

It is not practical to expect users to download an App for each website they want to access from their mobile devices.
 
Which is pretty much exactly what I said.............

Except, mobile versions of sites aren't needed if the main site is built properly, i.e. as a responsive site.
 
Apps and websites are entirely different things .

I have apps such as Photoshop , iMovie , Calculator , unit conversion , audio recorder and many others on my iPhone , none of which can be replaced by websites .

Some apps such as TomTom navigation do use an internet connection for mapping , but again the navigation software resides on the device ( on some devices the maps reside on local storage too ). Other apps which use the internet include Mail and the Weather app which uses GPS to determine your location so as to produce a local forecast from information gathered from the web ; similarly Petrol Prices Pro which finds the cheapest fuel within a chosen range of your current location .

Websites , such as this one are fine for looking up information and interacting with others , but they are visited using a web browser such as Safari - that is the app , not the websites .
 
Which is pretty much exactly what I said.............

Except, mobile versions of sites aren't needed if the main site is built properly, i.e. as a responsive site.

I often hate that my phone , by default , goes to mobile versions of websites which are heavily de-featured .

This site isn't so bad , but some such as eBay , Gumtree , DPReview among others restrict what you can do or see to such a degree that I often find myself navigating straight to the desktop versions .
 
Scrap the android mobile app
Its crap - cant even read mine the text is too small

Seems to be a race to produce as many mobile apps as possible when the answer is right under their nose

I have a nose for trend and it never ever fails

Mobile websites

Stop developing mobile apps, there too much work and too many platforms

Develop the Mobile website instead
It takes a lot less time because its a simple conversion of existing information
It is suitable for all mobile/tablet platforms
It can retain more of the features of the desktop site

The mobile app is dead - long live the mobile web interface

You heard it here first folks and ill point you back here in 5 years time

This from the member that could not operate the cruise control or work out if he had folding seats!:D
 
Which is pretty much exactly what I said.............

Except, mobile versions of sites aren't needed if the main site is built properly, i.e. as a responsive site.

Consider 3g/4g users, especially when roaming. A standard website - even one formatted correctly - will use far to much bandwidth. A mobile website will use less (and lower-resolution) images, no scripts, and no flash or Java.

However while I do agree that mobile websites should come-up as default for mobile device users, I also think that a mobile websites should have a link to 'view full site' for those mobile device users who prefer it and have no bandwidth constraints.
 
I often hate that my phone , by default , goes to mobile versions of websites which are heavily de-featured .

Same thing happened when WAP (remember that?) was being pushed and the WAP sites would generally be pretty awful.

Bit ironic that 'enhancing' the mobile experience seems to mean reducing and breaking it.
 
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Consider 3g/4g users, especially when roaming. A standard website - even one formatted correctly - will use far to much bandwidth.

Maybe developers should be asked WTF does it take 250K and 500K of HTML and guff to render what is in effect 1K of actual usable information?

3G often feels no faster than 14.4K dialup did 25 years ago - in fact in some cases it feels slower.

Part of the problem is economics - the charging mechanisms don't reallyb penalise developers and website providers for all this traffic - samwe way that spam purveyors exist because there is minimal cost penalty to blitzing the web with unwanted and unneeded bytes.
 
Maybe developers should be asked WTF does it take 250K and 500K of HTML and guff to render what is in effect 1K of actual usable information?

3G often feels no faster than 14.4K dialup did 25 years ago - in fact in some cases it feels slower.

Part of the problem is economics - the charging mechanisms don't reallyb penalise developers and website providers for all this traffic - samwe way that spam purveyors exist because there is minimal cost penalty to blitzing the web with unwanted and unneeded bytes.

Lack of research, mostly. There are millions and millions of websites out their, many of them designed by people who (somewhat arrogantly) think they know what the public or their customers want or need.

This is a classic case of ideology vs empiric research.... focus groups, when done properly, help get rid of a lot of unnecessary crap.
 
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......It is not practical to expect users to download an App for each website they want to access from their mobile devices.

Which is where I see apps topping out

Facebook mobile web sitw us near exactly the same as the mobile app interface

The benefit being no need for an app/download and the same single interace for all platforms

I see apps receding and mobile sites increasing
 
Same thing happened when WAP (remember that?) was being pushed and the WAP sites would generally be pretty awful.

Bit ironic that 'enhancing' the mobile experience seems to mean reducing and breaking it.

Yes , I'm afraid I do remember WAP , and thought better of mentioning it since it is redundant these days with smartphones being dominant .
 
...Facebook mobile web site us near exactly the same as the mobile app interface...

Apart from the fact that the mobile website takes up far more bandwidth than the App. Not a problem when on WiFi, but not great news when roaming on 3g.
 

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