I am a computer engineer. I will always love to see computing evolving in right direction.
Google Chrome OS is bad for evolution of computing.
Computing evolved with Desktop computing and then web apps. Browser Based apps are always slow and faulty, they can never be as robust as a desktop application can be.
After The invention of web services and REST API, I would love to see web enabled desktop Apps.
I love the concept of Portable Apps , When we mix concept of portable Apps and Cloud Based storage, we can achieve much better results. BUT Google will never let it happen, they are re-inventing all those age old things again in browser. I have posted a small video response on you tube.
Here it is.
"Browser-based apps can never be as robust as a desktop application can be."
ReplyDeleteI actually use browser-based spreadsheets, not necessarily Google's, because they are more robust than OpenOffice Calc or Microsoft Excel, both of which have given me fits by means of data corruption and general instability.
Perhaps you would care to give some specific reasons why you believe executing code in a browser is inherently less "robust" than executing it on a runtime?
Why Browser-based apps can never be as robust as a desktop application can be?
ReplyDelete1.Desktop based apps are here of ages, there are many matured programming languages available for coding desktop apps.
2.Desktop Apps run natively (mostly) They perform better.
3.Desktop Apps can bring out of the Box functionality, Like notifications, Shell Integration etc.
4.Desktop Apps can use OS supported Data recovery (after crashed).
5. Desktop Apps are inherently Offline Accessible.
Only thing They lacked till date was Cloud Based Storage and portability. I would love to see something like,a mix of portable apps which are web enabled.
>Desktop based apps are here of ages, there are >many matured programming languages available >for coding desktop apps.
ReplyDeleteNot all of the code behind a normal web application is written in javascript and css. Most of the actual logic is written in the same languages you refere to as mature.
>Desktop Apps run natively (mostly) They >perform better.
Google chromes V8 engine actually lets developers write c++ hooks that can be used from javascript .. that sounds pretty native to me.
>Browser Based apps are always slow and faulty, >they can never be as robust as a desktop >application can be.
How you figure? Have you ever used google apps? I can't recall one single incident where a web app actually hangs for me.
Google Chrome OS, with Google Gears and Google Native Client, will feature offline applications with compiled native machine code. I would be surprised if Google Chrome OS does not allow data to be saved/loaded from a flash drive, via these offline apps.
ReplyDeleteSo, even if there are no such apps, now, Google Chrome OS will be able to deliver a better experience than many other operating systems.
@Anonymous (should i assume Anonymous1==Anonymous2??)
ReplyDeleteI use chrome, I use GMail (with offline feature), Gear crashed several times.
It might have been the case that it never crashed with u, but hangs and crashes are something unavoidable. No one can write a perfect code. I know Google Products are good, they have good engineers. BUT Here i am talking about evolution, next DAY when others will come with web apps, take my word there will be huge security problems and crash and Hangs.
Google Wave, Awesome concept!! but look at GUI, slow and sluggish. Why?? Because this time big time AJAX hackers (frm GMail) are not here.
When we talk about JITs the speed is not that good but is not that bad. Let's think that we can considerate a "C++ application speed" split by two. This means that most of applications will run at least as a Pentium 3 at 500 MHz on an Atom like CPU as N270, and this is kinda power. For a person that have a very powerful machine, I may agree with you, that it will perceive as slow this machines, but think that a Pentium 3 500 can run flawlessly Windows XP. Compressing the code with tools that Google will offer (using let's say gzip) will save a lot of bandwidth and will make most applications to just run start fast.
ReplyDeleteI tend to agree with you.
ReplyDeleteLet's be optimistic and state that web apps are just as stable as desktop apps. There is still 1 issue and 2 reasons of concern:
issue: handling large documents remotely (edit large images?) across the web is not the same as working locally, and features likes autosave for crash recovery are very hard to implement efficiently
concern 1 - for every serious application you'll need to write native plugins to access local storage/resources. What languages are supported? How does the OS expose its internals/API? Do we have to learn new languages and new APIs to do what we can do today using Silverlight or AIR or Java (reaching today potentially everybody)?
concern 2 - do you expect any company that requires medium security (including a freelancer) to adopt a model where data/docs have to be saved in the cloud?
@Giorgio
ReplyDeleteAwesome new points!!
As you said every serious application will need native plug-in, I think this is 110% true. Now when any way I need a plug-in for new apps, there is no fun of having web app, i will miss this app on new computer where this plug-in is not available.
I hate people's love of seeing Apps with-in browser's co-ordinates, without understanding the mode of execution.
I will take gmail over Outlook any day.
ReplyDeleteI so wanna argue dude.... but I will just leave with two blog posts
ReplyDeletehttp://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001296.html
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000883.html
Its the same fight all over again.