NATIVE DEVICE APPS VS BROWSER BASED APPS

Which way?

 

With the mobile phone revolution streaking along like greased lightning, questions on what sort of applications one should build for the mobile market are now more convoluted than Robinson Crusoe's beard. And with the ceremonious arrival of the now ubiquitous iPad and the clamouring hordes of "me-too" devices, the market and the need for mobile based applications has seen growth last seen during the computer hardware wars.

So, should I as a product developer, or content provider create an application for the mobile phone that is native or should I develop a cross-platform application that works off the native browser?

 

The Pro Native Application Development Argument

I can take advantage of the hardware and OS. This is a no-brainer. I want my app to fluidly and gracefully swish from portrait mode to landscape mode when the user tilts his device. Which looks AWESOME. I can also use the phones GPS capabilities to identify location, its bluetooth capabilities to hail other similarly set up devices and I can get the device to vibrate pleasurably at different speeds and intensities for whatever reason that might be necessary.

I can customize for the hardware and OS. The program can effectively take advantage of all the features available on the phone. It can fully utilize the Ighz Snapdragon processor's speed, it can reside on the RAM and react faster than the user can think and it can store its data on the systems memory - requiring the internet only for data exchange and backup.

I can sell it! I can make money off the app by selling it on the app market of whatever OS i've based it on. So, if it were an Android app, I can put it on the Android app market and sit back as I wait for the bank to call me to explain where the 96 million being deposited to my account is coming from.

But...

Here's the thing, for every action, there's an equal and opposite reaction.

There's the need to create a whole slew of apps for the whole slew of OSs out there. They're not that many but each extra OS means an extra amount of development time which translates to an extra amount of cash.

There's also the need to future (and past?) proof your apps. Seeing as it works on IOS4, will it work on IOS4.1? Or will it work on IOS2. The same applies to your app in all the other OSs - it works on Android 2.1 will it work on 2.2? Will there be a need to tweak?

 

The Pro Browser based Application Development Argument

No need for a different app for every godforsaken OS out there. Because the browser based application runs off the browser, it doesn't require a different app made for every single OS and its mother. So long as the OS has a browser that supports it, the app will run.

Always online. This may look like a disadvantage, but it actually isn't. Because the app is browser based, it will generally only operate while online. This is in line with the world's vision of an always online, always switched on human population right before the robot apocalypse. Information is always at your fingertips.

I can sell access to content! Take for example a newspaper. In the last few years, there has been a rapid decline in hard copy newspaper sales across the world. This is because an increasing number of people are realizing that information on the internet is for the most part free. Some newspapers have attempted having online users pay for content but this hasn't really worked out at all. In fact, it has miserably failed. Perhaps here's where they can make some money. On mobile devices, they can sell subscription to interested users for content.

Cloud computing? This is the new buzzword, right up there with Jasmine Revolution and personality disorder. All your data is stored on the "cloud" - on a magical server which is protected by axe-murderers riding on rainbow coloured unicorns. Only you have access to this data and you can access it by any device connected to the internet. As hardware became faster and more poweful, and the internet became faster and more affordable, your personal computer has been converted into what used to be referred to as a terminal. All the brainwork is done on the server, and all you do is manipulate your data on your dumb terminal. The means by which one connects to this remote all-knowing server is either via customized software or the browser. You can see where I'm going with this and I shall stop here.

But..

Ah yes, the "but"...

Where's my hardware? Because the system runs off the browser, the developer ends up with the same working environment as the browser on a desktop computer. They can take advantage of some of the hardware components but cannot do quite as much as the native apps can.

Always online? The Scrooges out there shall not be pleased. Cost implications of an always online applications - however minimal - are there.

I'm sure there are many more pro and anti arguments for the two cases outlined above. I personally think browser based apps are the better bet, but, like with the iPad, I could be woefully and emphatically wrong. Something else that has always bothered the shit out of me. Why didn't Friday have a beard?