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Comment by karlgkk

8 hours ago

Honestly, you’re so wrong about the app situation that it’s almost staggering. iOS apps tend to be more stable, better polished, have better integration with system features (like the Dynamic Island), and even often have more features. This isn’t even an unfounded opinion, it’s a material problem for Google and led them to vastly investing in automated testing and quality efforts

App addressable user base is another problem for Google, one that they have mentioned in developer conferences. It’s a big part of why they’ve been trying to ship a tablet and unify android and Chromebook. If Google isn’t careful they could find themselves in a downward spiral situation, stuck between apple on one side, and android forks on the other.

And the last answer is, as always, money

- browser is deemphasized on iOS, and so it’s weaker feature set matters less

- iOS is generally easier to develop for because of less device differentiation

- on average iOS has significantly wealthier users who tend to be higher return or paying customers (seriously, look it up). This in turn leads companies to invest more heavily in iOS.

- easier integration due to a narrow system services ecosystem (no Google vs Samsung slapfights)

- unified platform advantage (apps written for iOS easily port to the watch and tablet, unlocking larger markets, and justifying greater spend in developing apps)

- apples review process is significantly stricter (for better or for worse)

Yes, Apple doesn’t have something like fdroid, and that’s really disappointing and honestly a legitimate dealbreaker for a lot of people

24 comments

karlgkk

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ben_w  7 hours ago

> iOS apps tend to be more stable, better polished

It's been a while since I was last using Android, but first-party Apple apps no longer meet my standards for "polished".

e.g. type this sequence into the calculator:

  [2] [-] [4] [=] [x²] [=]

The answer should not be negative, but the app says "-4".

The desktop Contacts app has been putting invisible LTR and RTL codes around phone numbers for years now, breaking web forms when auto-entered. The mobile version refreshes specific contacts several times in a row to add no new content, preventing copy from working while it does so.

The MacOS Safari translation button appears on the left of the omni-bar, until you click it, at which point it instantly moves to the right and your click turns out to have been on the button that the left-side translation button had hidden. Deleting a selection of items from browsing history is limited to about 5 items per second, as it deletes one then rebuilds the entire list before deleting the next.

If I'm listening to a podcast on headpones and an alarm goes off, it doesn't play the alarm through my headphones, it plays on device speakers only.

Podcast app's "Up Next" is a magical mystery list that can't be disabled or guided.

The "Do Not Disturb" mode can be activated unexpectedly, leading to missed calls, and cannot be deleted.

Localisation is inconsistent at every level, including system share sheet and behaviour of decimal separators.

I could go on, but you get the point. Apple's quality control just isn't visible in the software at this point.

  • toxik  4 hours ago

    -4 makes sense if you understand that the input -2 is a unary minus operation. So typing -2 then hitting square only squares 2, not (-2). This is the same in eg Python so I'm not sure it's very controversial. I agree it's unexpected, though.

    • AshamedCaptain  2 hours ago

      At no point in the current expression you wrote "-", though. It may make sense that if you type [-] [2] [x^2] [=] then you get -(2²) = -4, but if your current answer is already -2, then tapping x² should result in (ans)^2 = (-2)^2 = 4. Splitting your current answer into a separate unary [-] as in - (2²) makes absolutely no sense.

      Most calculators, even CAS ones, simply get this always right. But sadly this is not the first "desktop" calculator that I see getting this completely wrong. And it makes some results outright wrong!

    • ben_w  2 hours ago

      I didn't enter -2, I calculated -2. The x² should have been taking x = (-2).

    • well_ackshually  3 hours ago

      "-4 makes sense if you consider that the calculator is so damn stupid it ignores every convention every single calculator has made in the past hundred years and instead copies behavior of a dumbass language" isn't exactly the praise you think it is.

  • criddell  5 hours ago

    > The answer should not be negative, but the app says "-4".

    When I do those exact keypresses I get the correct answer.

wiseowise  8 hours ago

> browser is deemphasized on iOS, and so it’s weaker feature set matters less

That's precisely the OP's point. They gimped their browser so there's bigger incentive to use their proprietary system frameworks.

> iOS is generally easier to develop for because of less device differentiation

That's nonsense. What year are you from? I've heard this like 10 years ago when there only 1 or 2 current iPhone models in circulation.

> on average iOS has significantly wealthier users who tend to be higher return or paying customers (seriously, look it up). This in turn leads companies to invest more heavily in iOS.

If you offer subscription service, like Netflix/HBO/Nest or whatever, your main goal is volume, not how wealthy your demographic is.

> easier integration due to a narrow system services ecosystem (no Google vs Samsung slapfights)

Easier integration with what?

> unified platform advantage (apps written for iOS easily port to the watch and tablet, unlocking larger markets, and justifying greater spend in developing apps)

That's like Android's moat from the start, not bolted on during some 10+ major versions like on iOS. And it works much better, Android apps are truly the same apps. Not gimped, cut off things like Instagram on iOS (is it even fixed now?).

> apples review process is significantly stricter (for better or for worse)

Both are shit these days due to volume of shovelware produced.

  • jakub_g  5 hours ago

    Re: iOS apps being easier to develop: device sizes are the minuscule of the problem.

    The real problem is that Android vendors mess up with the OS in weird ways by adding custom ultra battery savers, removing APIs etc. which is much less predictable than dealing with a few Apple devices, that are more homogenous.

    Then many vendors ship their own apps which are buggy and you need to know that vendor's Z Calendar app has a weird bug to account for.

wolvoleo  6 hours ago

The pricing gap also rules Apple out in a lot of markets. Almost nobody has Apple here in Spain, the only people i see are tourists and expats.

  • manuelabeledo  5 hours ago

    While not as popular as Android, last time I checked iOS was at 28% market share. That’s hardly “almost nobody”.

  • dismalaf  1 hour ago

    It's not the pricing gap, there's Android phones more expensive than the most expensive iPhone. There's just also tiered alternatives.

    It's the fact Euro carriers are less likely to subsidize or finance the phone. And realistically, a $500 phone is pretty good these days.

    In Canada (where phones are subsidized and/or financed) there's very few budget Android phones too. Almost all Samsung flagships, Pixels, etc...

Jedd  7 hours ago

FWIW, starting a sentence with "Honestly ..." always makes me think the rest of what this person has to say is dishonest.

Your BIO on HN is:

> I HAVEN'T SHOWERED AT ALL! THAT'S WHY I REEK! WORKING IN FINTECH! AIN'T SHAVED IN WEEKS! POUR CRUMBS FROM MY KEYBOARD! THAT'S WHAT I EAT! WROTE A CURRENCY LIBRARY! 3RD TIME THIS WEEK! LURKING HN! I PREFER /b/! IN MOM'S BASEMENT! I'M THIRTY THREE! IT'S 3'O'CLOCK AM! THAT'S WHEN I SLEEP! AH!!!! COME ON FUCK A GUY!!!!

What level of credibility are you seeking?