作者：Ryan Matzner

在5年多以前（2007年1月9日），乔布斯发布了首款iPhone。当时iPhone只有那些预装的应用（例如计算器和YouTube），iPhone应用少得可怜，甚至无法布满整个主界面！苹果当时并未提供创造或安装额外应用的条件，开发者被迫选择创建那些只能通过Safari浏览器访问的网页应用。

而由于黑客破解iPhone代码并创建自己应用的行为大量涌现，苹果不得不开始采纳原生应用。

苹果App Store目前已有70多万款iPhone和iPad应用，App Store、Google Play及微软Windows Phone Marketplace（游戏邦注：最近刚更名为Windows Phone Store）中的产品均为原生应用，开发者需使用这些平台专属技术和代码创建这些内容。针对iPhone的应用若要移植到Android操作系统，几乎需要重新编码（好比是把一本书从一种语言翻译成另一种语言版本）。

后来，又出现了网页应用。

网页应用

这类应用是使用基于HTML5、CSS3及其他现代网页技术的内容，无需特定的翻译、转换或重新编程，它就可以在含有现代、标准兼容性的网页浏览器上运行。用户可以在iPhone、iPad、Android手机、Kindle Fire和Windows Phone设备上访问同个应用，并在任何平台上运行该应用。

原生应用只能运行于一个平台，另外其开发时间比原生应用更长，成本也更高。那么，为什么大家还要去创建原生应用？因为当前开发技术让原生应用更占优势——但这只是我们暂时的技术局限性。只要技术再继续发展，原生应用很快就会重蹈桌面应用的覆辙（虽然桌面应用仍有一定市场，但多数用户在浏览器中投入的时间更多）。以下是原生应用为何不能主导未来的几个理由：

1.用户体验

apps-all-OS-mbiebusch(from mashable)

原生应用一般在视觉和感觉上都更流畅，更精致。它们能够利用本地操作系统的一些功能，所以看起来像是与手机设备深度整合。从美学和整体用户体验上看，网页应用确实难与击败原生应用。另外，原生应用含有许多预装元素，只需通过网络而非整个应用来获取用户数据，因此运行速度也会更快。

现在的网络技术已经有了很大飞跃，网页应用创造出堪比原生应用的技术也迟早会迎头赶上。还记得HTML5刚出道时的情况吗？HTML6或HTML7必将更胜一筹。

至于网页应用需下载比原生应用更多的数据这个问题，也将因电池续航能力与移动网络的迅速发展而得到解决。4G下载速度远超过一般的美国宽带网络，用户抱怨网页在桌面电脑加载速度的时代早已远去，移动网络发展速度同样不容小觑。

2.发布渠道

用户易于发现和安装原生应用，他们可以通过苹果App store、Google Play等应用商店浏览和下载应用。打造成功应用商店的难处在于创建一个健康的开发者社区，并且这些开发者愿意投入时间、心血和成本去创建用户想要的出色应用。这是一个艰巨的任务，可能也是微软Windows Phone为何难以获得大量开发者支持的最大原因。

苹果、谷歌甚至微软可能都很满足于行使手中的权利，通过应用商店控制平台应用发行渠道。而网页应用自由发布的特点，却可能给手机应用带来威胁，因此当前许多原生应用商店运营者都对此保持警惕。所幸，对于用户来说，网页应用崛起的趋势无法阻挡。

有了网页应用，开发者无需针对特定平台创造软件。而针对多数平台制作的应用却也可方便多数平台的用户，只要其所在平台拥有合适的网页浏览器。将来，打造应用商店也不再是操作系统创造者的特权，独立零售商也可以推出自己的应用商店。BestVendor和Listio等目录网站也可能将成长为App Store的竞争对手。

3.开发时间和成本

典型的原生应用开发时间要比一款对应的网页应用更长，但随着开发者工具和能力的提升，这个局面可能发生转变。并且随着开发者精通掌握创建原生就用的开发语言和技术，整体应用开发成本也会降低。

但有一点不太可能改变的就是，针对多个平台和设备开发原生应用的成本很高。制作一款iPhone应用再添加iPad兼容性，可能增加50%的项目开发成本。而若苹果真推出了传闻中的iPad Mini，我们可以想象如此针对如此多种设备规格开发原生应用，到底需要增加多少开发预算了。

网页应用却可因自动适配性和响应性而运行于一系列设备。

4.更新

在这一方面，网页应用已经超越原生应用。常令开发者沮丧的是，多数手机用户很少更新应用。这意味着特定原生应用的用户运行的是多个不同版本的应用。有个朋友最近声称Instagram居然不能在iPhone上正常运行，结果却发现是他自己很久没有更新这款应用，他使用的是已经不再受到支持的旧版本。

而网页应用却几乎不可能遇到这种情况。想象一下加载网站的情况。每次访客开启一个网站时，他们都是在从服务器加载最新版本。当谷歌更新主页上的logo时，用户并不需要下载一个更新版的谷歌浏览器，他们只需访问该网站就能看到最近更新版本。

网页应用意味着用户无需担心版本更新的问题。

5.硬件接口

原生应用的一大好处在于可无缝使用手机硬件功能。出色的手机应用可整合手机加速计（例如Nike+）、GPS（Foursquare）或摄像机（Instagram）功能。当然，在这三个功能中，网页应用目前能使用的只有GPS，并且范围十分有限。在这一点上，毫无疑问，网页应用甚至无法使用手机摄像机功能或访问你手机上已经保存的照片。

网页应用尚无访问移动设备硬件功能的标准渠道，但这一点在未来技术升级中将得到改观。它需要克服的一个问题可能就是安全隐患，但其中最大的障碍也许就是既得利益者（游戏邦注：这里指那些欲意维持原生应用霸权地位的公司）在这一点上不予合作。尽管如此，应用及手机操作系统领域的竞争压力终将迫使设备更具开放性。

black-and-white-apps(from mashable)

6.信用卡

苹果的一个秘密武器就在于它掌握了4亿拥有信用卡存档的活跃iTunes帐户，这意味着这些用户购物十分便捷——只需点击“购买”并输入密码就能完成交易。谷歌和微软平台的活跃帐户显然更少，但其数量仍在不断增长。最重要的是购买原生应用和IAP内容将极为简便。

目前购买网页应用或其中的额外内容尚无统一的支持渠道，但随着时间的发展，PayPal、Square、Venmo等支付服务供应商入驻，这种情况终将得到改观。

iOS的巨大成就部分要归功于App Store，正如iTunes音乐商店正是iPod热销的一个巨大推动力。但是App Store的一个祸根很可能就是苹果在原生应用之前所推崇的网页应用。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Why Web Apps Will Crush Native Apps

by Ryan Matzner

Over five years ago (on January 9th, 2007, for those of us who are counting), Steve Jobs released the original iPhone. At the time, the only apps on the iPhone were the ones that came pre-installed (think stocks, calculator and YouTube). There were so few apps, they didn’t even fill up the home screen! Apple didn’t provide the ability to create or install any add-on apps. Instead, developers were urged to create web apps that users would access through the built-in Safari web browser.

Facing backlash from developers, particularly in light of a community of hackers that figured out how to crack the iPhone’s code and build their own apps, Apple came around and embraced native apps.

Apple’s App Store contains more than 700,000 iPhone and iPad apps today. The apps available in Apple’s App Store, the Google Play marketplace, and Microsoft’s Windows Phone Marketplace are all “native” apps, in that developers built them using technology and code largely proprietary to those platforms. An app built for the iPhone has to be almost entirely re-coded if it’s to work on a device running Google’s Android operating system (a bit like translating a book from one language to another).

Then, there are web apps.

Intro to Web Apps

Web apps are built in standards-based technologies such as HTML5, CSS3 and other modern web tech. Without any special translations, conversions or re-programming, a web app can run on pretty much any platform with a modern, standards-compliant web browser. Once a web app is launched, users on iPhones, iPads, Android phones, the Kindle Fire and Windows Phones can all access the same app and run it just as well as on any other platform.

Native apps only work on the one platform they were built for, plus they take longer and cost more to build than a web app. Why then, would anyone bother building native? Current technology makes native apps a superior experience — but this is the case only for as long as we’re stuck with current technology. A few advances here and there, and pretty soon native apps will go the way of desktop apps (i.e. there are still a few around but most users spend most of their time in the browser). A few elements explain why native won’t rule the app roost in the future.

User Experience

Native apps tend to have a smoother look and feel, more polish. Native apps are able to leverage elements of their native operating system (i.e. rubberbanding, overscroll and slick screen transitions on iOS), so they feel more deeply integrated into the phone. When it comes to aesthetics and overall user experience, it is incredibly difficult for web apps to trump native. Furthermore, native apps come with lots of elements pre-loaded and only need to fetch user data from the web rather than the entire application, making them speedier.

The web has come a long way from the days of scrolling marquee. It’s only a matter of time before the technologies behind web apps are able to compete directly with the aesthetic capabilities of native apps. Remember how marvelously advanced HTML5 seemed when it came out? Just wait ’til HTML6 or 7!

And as for having to download more data than native apps: In the future, battery life and mobile connections will be fast enough that it won’t matter. 4G download speeds are actually faster than the average U.S. broadband connection, and when was the last time you worried about the size of a website loading on your desktop?

Distribution

Native apps are easy to find and install. The Apple App Store, Google Play, etc. are great places to browse for and download apps. The hard part of building a successful app store is creating a robust developer community willing to devote the time, effort and money to build lots of great apps that users want to use. That’s a tall order, and is probably the biggest part of why Microsoft is struggling to gain traction with Windows Phone.

One caveat to this whole web app thing is competition. Apple, Google and even Microsoft must be particularly content with the great control and influence they wield by controlling distribution for their platforms via app stores and marketplaces. As web apps pick up steam and begin to threaten mobile apps, it’s likely that current stakeholders will push back against anything that devalues their native app stores. Fortunately for consumers, there’s probably not a whole lot anyone can do to stop the impending march of web apps. Robust web browsers being baked into the OS aren’t going anywhere.

With web apps, there’s no need to convince developers to create software for a specific platform. Instead, apps created for users on the most popular platforms will also work for users on the least popular platforms, assuming that platform has a decent web browser. In the future, app stores can be created by independent retailers rather than operating system creators. Directory sites such as BestVendor and Listio might grow to rival Apple’s App Store.

Build Time and Cost

A typical native app takes a bit longer to build than an equivalent web app would, but as developer tools and education improve, that will likely change. And as more developers become versed in the development languages and technologies used to create native apps, overall app development costs will fall.

But one thing that likely won’t change in the world of native apps is that building for multiple platforms and devices is expensive. Adding iPad compatibility when building an iPhone app can add up to 50% to the development costs of a project. When rumors began swirling that Apple might release an iPad Mini, we wondered, who has the budget to build for all these screen sizes?

Web apps will work on devices across a range of sizes by being adaptive and responsive.

Updates

This is an area where web apps already trump native. Much to the chagrin of developers, typical mobile users update their apps very infrequently. That means the user base for a particular native app is spread across multiple versions. A friend recently exclaimed his surprise that Instagram wasn’t working properly on his iPhone. It turns out he hadn’t updated the app in a while and was using an unsupported old version.

Having an out-of-date web app is virtually impossible. Think about loading a website. Each time a visitor loads a site, he or she is loading the latest version off the server. When Google updates the logo on their homepage, seeing it doesn’t require users to go and download an update to Google — the mere action of visiting the site means the user is viewing the latest version.

Web apps mean that users will never have to worry about updates.

Hardware Interfacing

One of the things that make native apps so delightful to use is their ability to leverage the phone’s hardware so seamlessly. Think about all the great apps that use your phone’s accelerometer (Nike+), GPS (Foursquare) or camera (Instagram). Of those three, web apps can only access GPS and even then, only in a limited capacity. Yes, that’s right — web apps can’t even use your phone’s camera or access photos you’ve already taken.

There’s no standard way for web apps to access hardware on mobile devices, but that’s relatively easy to change in future updates. One issue to overcome is potential security concerns, but probably the biggest hurdle is a lack of cooperation from entrenched interests that would prefer to keep a native app monopoly in place. Nonetheless, competitive pressures in the app and phone OS space will eventually force devices to become more open.

Credit Cards

Apple users are notoriously voracious consumers. Apple’s secret weapon is that it has 400 million active iTunes accounts with credit cards on file. And having a credit card on file makes app purchases a breeze — tap “buy” and enter a password — that’s it! Google and Microsoft surely have far fewer active accounts on their platforms, but those numbers are growing. The bottom line is that purchasing native apps and making in-app purchases is exceedingly easy.

There is no consolidated payment system for purchasing web apps or buying web app add-ons, but that will change over time as players like PayPal, Square, Venmo and others jump into the space.

A huge part of the success of iOS is attributed to Apple’s App Store, much as the iTunes music store is a big part of why the iPod was such a hit. And yet, the App Store’s undoing will likely be the web apps that Apple originally promoted in lieu of native apps.（source:mashable）