Not everything needs an app
I have an app for programming my chicken coop. My 401k company just created an app for onboarding new participants.
These should have been mobile friendly webpages.
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I have an app for programming my chicken coop. My 401k company just created an app for onboarding new participants.
These should have been mobile friendly webpages.
Often, the apps are there just to collect ad information for you in a way browsers don’t allow.
And send notifications
And collect email addresses, to send
important messagesspamDing ding ding. It’s all about the tracking data. Also, notifications. They want to be able to buzz you with spam, to remind you that the app exists.
Is there a way to insulate apps in my phone from looking at stuff they shouldn't? Kinda like Firefox Multi-Account Containers.
You could look into Shelter if you are on android.
On iOS, in the App Store entry for each app there is a section called “App Privacy.” You can use that section to see what data the app will collect. I do not know how to prevent it from collecting that data once it is installed.
This is a very popular opinion
You won't see unpopular openion on your feed because people downvote unpopular openion and op knows it's popular openion
I posted an actually unpopular one and can verify.
And not every program needs an installer.
Just because I downloaded a program to write ISOs to a USB drive, does not mean it needs to be installed on the system. Unless it's something like MS Office, why does it need to be installed? Just give me a zip file, I will extract it and delete it when I don't need it anymore.
Your problem here is you're running windows
I can tell you're a Linux user lol.
You can tell he's not a FreeBSD user because he doesn't have to dive in and alter the source to make it compatible.
Yeah, who needs an installer when you can just
./configure, then./makeand./make install, just stopping to fetch and build missing dependencies occasionally, upgrade some others, then retry.Or just download a standalone binary. Or don't download anything because most things are in your package manager.
Windows doesn't require you to install most things though. Developers just choose to do so unnecessarily sometimes.
Why hate windows for this of all things? Isn't it normal to "install" packages in Linux as well?
Via your package manager. Not by downloading some random nonsense a random developer decides should write who knows what their system files
If you’re on Windows and looking for a portable ISO burner, Rufus works great and is a 1.4mb portable .exe for that. It works great for when I overwrite Windows with Linux.
my directory of 'portable' programs has about sixty different things in it. some of which are used daily and are either in the path or are windows' default for something.
I hate propietary apps that are just services or stores and especially when they refuse to have a website and make you download their app.
I do not need 200 apps on my phone. Just one web browser app will do.
With 200 open tabs
Ahh, I see I have finally found my people
"If you'd like me to run company software, you'll have to provide a company device for me to run it on."
Never install work software on a personal device. Security, Privacy, Expectations (regarding personal resources).
Along with this, never use personal software/accounts/services with company devices. You can't be sure who's watching and can't be sure you'll have a chance to remove/collect your personal data before being locked out of said device.
That’s not their employer. It’s the company they have their 401k retirement plan with.
Empower, John Hancock, fidelity, vanguard, whoever.
100% this. I put my foot down at my last job after finding out their app demanded device location when it wasn't being used.
I got the fuck out the next week. Place is already sliding downhill fast
I rather have an app and a way to control the chicken coop offline that depend on the internet connection to whether my chicken coop works or not. That is in my opinion a right place for an app instead of a website.
Most online services don't need an app though.
Like some kind of self hosted solution on Nextcloud or something. Maybe linked in with Home Assistant or able to access it remotely via Tailscale.
Feels like overkill but if I had the time and the money, I would love to tinker with a system like that lol
Totally agree. I’m hoping web apps make a comeback as well — a lot of apps in App Stores are just websites in an “app wrapper”. Start rejecting that shit and tell people to publish it as a web app.
I make WebApps for exactly this reason! PWAs for the win!
What can your chicken coop do that needs programming ? Genuinely interested
Probably heat, maybe timed doors, timed food, or something like that.
Automatic doors.
Is it cheaper than just adding a little programmable clock onto the coop doors? I would assume you're not going to change the timing much anyway since chickens thrive on routine.
The electronics on the thing are not that expensive. It's just a little photosensor that by default goes at dusk till dawn. The programmable portion is to change the delay and light sensitivity. Since summer vs winter is 3-4 hours different a timer would have to be adjusted a lot.
Wait, explain this chicken coop
I hate how all smart devices need their own apps. Lights, vacuum cleaners, doorbells, fans, etc. super annoying to go through my phone and see so many random apps.
they should work through home/homekit
And then they become unsupported and unavailable.
That's so you feel locked into one brand so you can use all one app
Just use home assistant. Open source and can connect to lots of different devices
They want your precious data
Programming your chicken coop?
yeah right what does that even mean
Mood lighting and music.
Get the chickens completely relaxed with smooth jazz, then steal their eggs.
I’m imagining it probably has temperature, humidity, maybe automatic feeding, water capacity and maybe the ability to turn on a heat lamp.
I program my chicken coop from the touchscreen panel on the outside. I don't need an app for it.
So… that’s actually my plan. But that’s just because I program industrial HMIs for a living. Totally unnecessary.
Probably setting times for the gate to lock
You are correct.
Nothing needs an app.
I rather have an app when I need that stuff to work regardless of the internet connection.
As if apps weren't basically just thin skins over browsers and needing internet connections anyway...
Yes, but apps cqn work offline. Websites are necessarily online.
But then they couldn't scrape maximum personal data, collect your contacts, have access to your mic and camera, and track your every physical movement. Your so selfish!
Because not everybody likes the stock interface of Lemmy. Same thing with Reddit, and why people chose to use third-party apps there, as well. Web apps aren't always designed in the most intuitive ways for every user, and sometimes a native app can fill those UI/UX gaps, or add features that aren't possible through a PWA.
That list is getting smaller every day.
https://whatpwacando.today/
Yeah... more than half of the demos ended up saying "This feature is not (yet) supported on your device."
Huh, interesting. I only get that for 3 or 4.
Even then, there's a lot of feature you end up missing out on. Even just basic navigation has to be done via the browser's default navigation options. Even simple things like long-pressing something on the page will typically only give you access to your browser's long-press menu (though that's not always the case, in my experience very few web apps handle this effectively).
Personally, I prefer the experience of a native app. But I get why it's not appealing to all people.
The most useful PWA I have found is Voyager, and its app counterpart is way better IMHO.
Native android/iOS apps are way smoother for daily navigation, you also get some perks like notifications and that.
I have not tried out voyager, but just from looking at it's GitHub, it's essentially just a web browser packed in a native app anyways.
Performance shouldn't really be different from browser app to local app this way unless something is done wrong, or there's some specific functionality, like async I/o that's still unsupported.
Notifications are also a thing in web browsers nowadays. Most device features that you can access in a separate app are actually supported by now.
Nah, Voyager is primarily a pwa that works entirely in your phone's browser.
They recently packaged it with a browser into an APK because lots of users asked for a "native app" for some reason. But the pwa is still there, and is still the main way it is developed
But no front end for Lemmy should ever need to be an app.
Perfect application for PWA. Save it to your homepage and works just fine.
True. Not everything does.
I agree. Same with every business doesn't need a freaking app. It's why I've avoided the app development sector of programming in my career. I don't want to crank out shitty apps for every local business for the rest of my life. talk about boring.
Yeah my work just switched payroll companies and they want us to download an app to do timesheets and stuff. No way in hell that's going on my phone. A least it works in desktop browsers too.
Its like when restaurants want to get people to order via a QR code on the physical menu and place your order on their website or app.
Like no. You are making this so much more awkward than it needs to be for the sake of novelty.
Restaurant near me tried to implement this during Covid. At the time I get it because people were trying to minimize risk and might have been worried about being around a waiter and getting infected etc.
But they still haven't stopped it though. The worse thing is that the signal there is terrible so it takes 5 minutes for the damn thing to load in the first place.
Is this actually unpopular? Give me web interface that works OK on mobile and I'm usually a happy camper.
I mean most of lemmys front page is usually promoting unnecessary apps
I don't know if you can communicate over Bluetooth via a webpage to program your chicken coop.
Oddly enough, it doesn’t use Bluetooth. It’s a light sensor on the door. The phone actually flashes the screen at the light sensor to program it. I’m sure by being a native app it gives them more control over the screen but still….
That's an interesting way of doing it. I wonder why they chose it over Bluetooth.
Devs coded it using flashlights? ( Best I got, man, it's been a long day )
light sensor is a lot cheaper than a BT would be my guess.
Does the app work when offline? In that case it kinda makes sense since farms tend to be in areas with no cell service and a web page won't work with no service. The lack of Bluetooth maybe they just don't want to troubleshoot with people who might not be able to call to troubleshoot while being near the device.
I once had to download an app to get my hair cut. Never walked out of a barber before so that was a first.
"Download our app to see our menu"
walks out
It’s actually flashing the screen to a photo sensor
Bluetooth for example does work in web browsers though, and so does USB. There's web sockets and webrtc for communication. I can't think of a reasonable connection method that's inaccessible, but maybe I'm forgetting one.
I'd rather choose the password manager I trust that can safely store my credentials and auto-fill, than being forced to use a specific banking app with unknown security features.
What kind of programming does a chicken coop need?
How much of a delay on the light sensor for the automatic door.
my company's payroll management software just rolled out an app called "swag"
that's not a joke
Best apps are those that do basically everything in webview anyway (looking at you playstation)
I agree. It's way more sus to download an app. The reason social media sites push apps over websites is because they can harvest a lot more data that way.
I agree mostly but 401k does last after you leave a company. It’s more like a bank account setup for your employer to put money in.
It’s just used for onboarding and not managing or following your investments.
Corollary: I hate websites that refuse to provide native apps for commonly used functionality.