Moving away from App Store-focused development manton.org

@manton I am disappointed by this news but I understand. My disappointment lies with Apple, not you, and not Micro.blog, which is wonderful.

I expect the biggest consequence for me will be a bigger .app file, since I’ll wager that React Native will be bloatier than 7.9MB.

@manton I like this change. Hopefully it will help you avoid the seemingly destructive distraction of navigating App review with Apple.

@manton I appreciate your openness as a developer. Many would not and sing the apple song

@manton What does this mean for iOS apps for the end user?

@manton "Moving away from native apple frameworks development"? Seems you are stuck with the app store either way. Unless you fully pull out of it.

Have you thought about just going web only and no apps? Or is that not even an option given the landscape today?

@manton As much as I love a lot of the things which the Apple ecosystem allows me to do as a user, I can understand developers many disappointments with Apple’s ways, especially of late; your remedy and go forward plan sound quite sensible–and point in the right direction, I think.

@fgtech Yes, app size is a bummer. The good news is there's no hurry to replace the current iOS app — which was just updated this week — until we're confident a new version won't be a downgrade in any way.

@pratik Nothing right away. At some point in the future (it could be a while!) we'll update the iOS app with the new under-the-hood plumbing. Not going to do that until I'm sure people will love the app.

@jsonbecker I'm thinking about how the technology can have an influence; even just the fractured state of Apple's frameworks has the potential to create an unnecessarily heavy and confusing workload, which would then increase the chance of making mistakes that triggers the review team hurdle. Also, when Apple arbitrarily decides "now these frameworks are useless" it is on the developers to drop any other in-motion plans and adhere to whatever decision has been made.

I understand similar issues can be found with any choice you make here, however I have noticed Apple developers in particular make it clear that there has been a decline in their experience.

@Burk I don't think it's an option. I still like my iPhone and there are things we can do with native iOS apps that we can't do in web apps. Having said that, I do think our mobile web version should be better than it is.

@Burk @manton I'd agree with the idea of concentrating more on the web and the underlying APIs. Since the API is open anyway, let third party developers handle it (no App Store, no Play Store to worry about).

Personally, I access Micro.blog more on the browser than the applications (though please put the toggle for cross-posting on the app to the web please - easier to do on the app before posting).

But then again, @manton has the numbers. Are there more posts from the apps than on the web?

@simonwoods I think that any non-native framework is only more likely to trip review issues (if they use a private API for example), though React Native is widespread enough to avoid it. I would not think tech choice, in this case, basically has any impact on the review process at all. This is more a signal that cross platform development and parity is more important for the mainline app and Apple's existing UI frameworks are not sufficiently easier/better to justify having a separate native app.

@manton FWIW, I would put "has an iOS app" as one of the primary reasons I use micro.blog for my blog hosting. Having someone else run the micropub part and making it easy for me to post on the go is the major advantage over just using Hugo with Github actions or something similar for users like me.

@manton Ok. Coz ease of posting and everything working simple and great is why I use Micro.blog for my photo blog.

@jsonbecker Thanks. I agree, it's really important.

@rom @Burk We don't actually track what apps people use when posting! 🙂 We probably should, but I'm not sure it would change much... We'll always want the native apps and web version to keep getting better.

@pratik Thanks! Easy posting and everything working great won't change. 🙂

@manton @Burk I think you should so you'd have an idea as to how people are using the APIs as well. Like Twitter, the third-party apps have improved on the experience of reading and writing. :)

As for the app, please please make ShareSheet-from-screenshots-without-saving-to-Photos work. :)

@manton Will this effect integration with third party apps - eg Ulysses, Drafts and iA Writer? This integration and the general ease of posting both to my written blog and podcast (when I post an episode) is one reason that I choose Micro.blog.

@crossingthethreshold Nope, won’t affect any of that at all.

@manton Thank you!

@manton I think you and Vincent will do a good job with the React Native-based iOS app. I think that the Android app beta looks great so far. I hope that the iOS app will retain its iOS design language and doesn't end up looking non-native (like my banking apps do) or too much like an Android app.

@mjdescy Thanks. If the app looks anything like my banking app, we've got big problems!

@manton woah, that was unexpected… and yet, your reasoning makes a lot of sense… I guess. I’m mostly using Ulysses for publishing or the website. As I wrote today, Apple is making it hard for everyone but themselves these days… wishing the iOS version will still feel iOS native.

@numericcitizen I liked your post and meant to reply. I wonder if Apple underestimates how many people who didn’t want sideloading would start warming to it as Apple refuses to give even an inch in changing the App Store.

@manton Thanks for the info and update.

As an iOS developer since 2009, though, my biggest disappointment isn’t that you’re moving away from 1st-party Apple tech, but that you chose RN over Flutter. 😝 I’d offer to help if you went with the latter! 😉

@manton That said, I am looking forward to any dev details you share during the transition. 👍

@muncman Flutter looked good, but I would have to convince @vincent to use it too. 🙂 Ultimately, all these frameworks have trade-offs and it was most important to me just to consolidate to something, even if it’s not perfect.

@jsonbecker @manton I’d give this a +1

@manton I don’t fully understand the technicalities and yet I appreciate the openness.

@manton Your frustration is justified. And as a Mac and Android user, this makes me happy.

Also good to know that we won't lose on any of the simplicity of the platform. Mobile apps for quick posts and integrations with apps like Ulysses and iA Writer remain the core benefits of this platform for me 👍

@fgtech for what it’s worth, Gluon (another React Native Micro.blog app) weighs in at 8.6MB… and I use quite a lot of stuff in there. So I personally also take it to heart if something is bloated 😃 if RN always produced bloated apps, I would not use it… the problem is starter kits that assume many things, but we don’t use any of those (I made our own starter kit). cc/ @manton

@Burk FWIW I rarely used any web apps on my phone, it's too complicated. I very much prefer an app.

@muncman Flutter does look good. When I first started with React Native I was going to look into it (even though it came later). My turn off at the time was that I had client obligations that wanted a RN app. This then took me into the realm of building Gluon, which then evolved, and also made its way back to client work... so I didn't really look at alternatives as I actually made a small living from this. The only downside with looking at Flutter today is the speed and energy needed to learn a new language again. In an ideal world I would actually love a Ruby or Swift based Framework like RN or Flutter. The RN Javascript bridging isn't ideal, but I am hopeful for the future that more, and probably better, alternatives appear. Saying that, frameworks come and go... so it's OK to shop around again. I'm keeping an open mind. cc/ @manton

@manton Thanks! Apple underestimate many things for sure... and cannot read the room temperature... thanks to its financial successes.... it is blind...

@vincent Ah, yep, that makes total sense. Fwiw —if you ever give it another look— Dart isn’t perfect, but it is easy to learn and has been improving.

@Burk It's funny... personally I have been thinking web only for personal projects going onwards.

@vincent @manton That is good to hear!

I want to reiterate that I think you are making the decision that is right for Micro.blog. React Native gives you greater leverage for a small team developing what should be available on any platform.

@vincent @manton Here’s the thing: the best teams are small teams. My disappointment with Apple is that they only build things to support the walls in their garden and nothing that supports the needs of actual developers and their customers. Too many sticks; not enough carrots.

@vincent I love web-only for personal projects. And I like apps for M.b.

@vincent @fgtech I'll be honest, I assumed the worst about React Native file size. Glad I was wrong!

@manton if it was similar to Electron… I’d not touch it 😂

@manton I’ve been building with React for four years and React Native for two. Have a lot of experience if you have any questions and Stack Overflow isn’t helping 😉

@pat Thanks! So far I've been pretty impressed with how much documentation is out there.

@jsonbecker this is the big reason I moved here after running a gatsbyjs blog. So much nicer posting set up.