Apple attempting killing PWAs in EU: Action Needed
open-web-advocacy.org
Apple has decided to remove Progressive web apps from iOS in EU. If you have a business in the EU or serve EU users via Web App/PWA, we must hear from you in the next 48 hours!
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Just don't delete web data for PWAs then.
It's ludicrous that Apple is always "I know better so I will take away this feature or never implement it in the first place"
Okay, now you have a separate cache that defeats the os’ cache rotation policies and all that entails.
I genuinely don’t like apple or google or any company but the position they’ve taken of breaking the new hotness fast and dirty skirt the rules development process in the name of keeping things normal is about the most correct decision any company can possibly make.
You can be upset that it breaks stuff you use or that they’re making money but if I had control over a bigass platform like ios and wanted to maintain security while implementing a bunch of legally mandated changes it’s exactly what I’d do.
No, they could solve this "problem" if they wanted too.
They just want to be assholes like usual.
What’s a good solution that preserves cache rotation but doesn’t require the developer to make a “real” app and offer it through official channels?
I can’t think of one.
there’s another post in this thread comparing pwas to flash. I think I it’s an apt comparison. Both were able to exist because of a bunch of little insecure ideas that became nooks and crannies of the browser as a platform. Spackling up those problems broke flash and eventually it died. Users expecting secure browsers will eventually kill pwas and then someone will come up with a new way to get hooks into the browser and build programs that don’t rely on users installing them on the os itself and that’ll take off and we’ll be in the same boat again.
Of course if things keep going the way they’re going, rendering engines will be so deeply embedded in the operating system that insecure applications running in the browser will be an even more serious risk than it is now.
Why do you even need "cache" rotation?
Maybe they could do it in the same way it's done in safari?
One of the reasons it’s a good idea to clear the web cache is to prevent a few kinds of tracking and fingerprinting. That’s much more important on mobile than on a laptop or pc because phones go more places and can return and store information used to infer identities and locations very easily.
There’s a lot of good reasons but that’s just what popped into my head waiting in line.
Name resolution too. Can’t believe I forgot that.
There’s no limit to what browsers you can use on osx so pwa developers will just send over the payload that includes a custom version of chromium that they know to work with their package when someone with a safari/osx user agent tries to dl it.
If that sounds bad to you, it is.
There’s nothing but webkit on ios so pwas can’t do what they do on the desktop to avoid how the browser treats their data (and how the browser might work with the os to keep them from accessing other system files or doing weird crap).
Works fine on Android.
Forgive me for taking the easy layup:
Me: pwas are insecure and generally a bad idea. It’s easy to believe that apple is breaking the stuff that makes them possible in order to enhance security and I think it’s a good thing.
You: well they work fine on famously secure and privacy respecting platform android, did you ever think of that?
In all seriousness I do think pwas are gonna be put in users choice of browser jail on all platforms including the desktop eventually and as different aspects of their operation start making the news in bad ways they’ll get pruned away. Apple is ahead of the curve on this one.
I’m not sure if pwas will continue to exist once the stuff that allows them to function the way they do is taken away. Once you take away persistent cache, notifications, unique browser engines and probably some other stuff I’m forgetting they start to look a lot less enticing when compared to just having a website or making an application that’s distributed through normal channels.
Users should be allowed to use whatever they want and not be restricted by an asshole company that "respects privacy" when in reality it's just about control.
That sounds a lot like the old windows 95 and dos days where the expectation was that the os would never stand in the way of even the most obviously malicious software.
I don’t want to go back to those days and even the most freedom loving environments have dropped support for operations like direct memory mapped io and more pertinent to the topic of our discussion, web technologies like flash and inline pdf rendering.
I get that it feels like someone is trying to take something away from you, but you gotta recognize that the thing they’re taking away is basically a gun pointed at your own foot.
I run a lot of systems that allow you to screw up, but I don’t have any complaints about one that doesn’t, especially when it’s on mobile: a platform with a much higher risk, reward for compromise, higher user trust and higher level of obfuscation regarding what’s happening under the hood.
Sure but PWAs are not a big deal at all.
It’s weird then that Firefox on the desktop doesn’t support them.
Just think on why that might be. Why both Mozilla and Apple would be opposed to something that Google is in favor of.
I mean, if pwas are no big deal then surely a platform other than chromium and android combined would be gladly embracing this new technology.
I’m really not trying to argue from a position of aged authority, but pwas are bad. I know because every time some way to make a webpage just like a program and also escape the browser has come up it’s been bad.
And when you look at it as a power struggle between big corporations pwas are being pushed by Google, the bad one.
I know that’s not convincing so let me ask you this: what would be? What would convince you that despite Apple being your enemy, pwas are bad?
We don't know Mozilla's stance on it. (If you know, please link a source) Maybe they just won't bother unless a full spec is out, who knows. And Apple isn't opposed since they support it. They just don't want anyone else to support it so they shut it down in the EU.
What platform? Chromium is extremely dominating and Firefox (and* derivatives) are pretty much their only competitor and Firefox just happens to lack much support (they support some stuff though).
Considering how big chromium is there is really no space for anyone else to actively not support it because they are so insignificant that it doesn't matter.
Windows, Linux, macOS, iOS (Non EU) supports PWAs. What more do you want?
Microsoft (and Google) supports the publication of PWAs to their application store: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/progressive-web-apps-chromium/
I don't understand what you are trying to say here.
I dunno, facts? If they dropped PWAs in the rest of the world as well then it would still be an asshole thing to do (if their app store and ecosystem remains locked down) but it would come across as equally petty.
People should be allowed to use PWAs if they do damn well please. But no, Apple wants their "core platform fee" bullshit so they shut down PWAs in the EU.
Anyways, luckily the EU is investigating Apple for this: https://www.shacklefree.in/https://www.ft.com/content/d2f7328c-5851-4f16-8f8d-93f0098b6adc
Apple has always been incredibly anti-competitive (No I,m not saying Google is good either, but maybe better) which destroys any trust in cases like this: