Why Build Native Mac Apps?

Darn I missed a not. MacOS native development won’t die. It will dwindle.

Instead of saying I’m wrong, given a good business reason why I would build a small software company (without VC money) to build a native Mac App today?

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:blush: I hate when that happens!

I’m not the one making the argument. It is up to you to prove your case.

But a reason would be that you have identified a need and a market.

Would this be better phrased that an Apple computer is a niche market, and software on it is built to be native by those who appreciate why.


JJW

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85% of Windows computers are running W10 or W11. I would not have guessed it was that high.

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That only shows, that the Windows PC that are used to surf on the Internet do use W10/11 with a 85% rate.
It does not show how many PC are running on those system at all, because it is not capable to show how many PC are not connected and/or used for surfing on the internet.
There are for Example a lot of large companies with thousands of PC’s, who are running them on a Server-Client Base, where the PC´s are only used to access the Company-Server.
Those PC’s often still run on older OS and are not available for small Developers as potential customers.

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If you do not have a special idea for an App, there is no reason at all to build a company like that, completely independent on the Target-OS, or programming language in use.

That is all already available, so why develop the wheel again…?

I do not think so!
Software designed for Apple, has a unique approach on the UI/UX and is clearly distinguishable to software developed for other OS, or in general.
And every time you could observe a software, that is in lack of this special UI/UX, it is pretty fast one of the main concerns you could read about this software.
Apple User want to have this special appearance, and therefore the market will not die (or dwindle) on that.
It is OK, if someone developed an other software for a wider range of OS, but then the Dev. should consider to not have the Apple-Community as his/her Main Market.

I agree. But I would guess the % of small developers that create software for non-Internet connected computers would be very small.

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1Password 8 & UpNote both have proven that electron-based apps can be top-class.
Of course I prefer Mac native but it’s not a deal breaker for me.

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Of course, but that is not the point.
I questioned the stats from the OP, because it might be, that 80% of all Computers where running on Windows, but this does not mean, that those PC’s are potential customers of a small Developer.
A hugh amount of this systems would be either Clients-only, or otherwise in a secured company operation, that prevent the installation of a random app of a small developer, if it is not an app with a special value for the company.
So, for a decision whether to develop a Windows, a macOS or an other kind of App, I would not trust statistics like the mentioned one, as they not really answer the question about where/how to find the most potential customer.

1Password has an AppStore Rating of “2.9 out of 5”!
I wouldn’t call this a “Top-class”…

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and VS Code, Obsidian, Discord, Figma, Notion, Slack, Trello, and hundreds more

Creating an app is only one small part. Marketing takes considerable time and cost.

Some small software shops may consider the Mac App Store to be a compelling reason to write a Mac app; how can you gain similar exposure in the PC world?

Another reason is that many users prefer apps which sync between iPhone/iPad/Mac. It is much easier to write such an app and sell such an App using Apple infrastructure than it is to do something similar in the non-Mac world.

w

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I don’t put a lot of faith in reviews but I do check the most recent ones in an effort to spot any new problems. Most of 1PW’s bad reviews for the last year or two seem to be related to electron and subscriptions so maybe that rating is deserved. At least some of the 2829 people who left a review think so.

Personally, I like it.

Yes, and I do. Furthermore, I loathe Windows.

Correct on both counts.

What has changed is the advent and maturation of platforms like Electron.

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I remember when native apps on phones were going to dwindle away and die because of progressive web apps.

Desktop apps were going to die, except for the biggest and most intensive, because we would only want mobile apps for the rest.

Oh – and remember how Flash was going to replace all the things? I was told in all seriousness that it would replace HMTL altogether, by someone who actually understood both quite well.

Electron etc. are putting pressure on native apps. Good. I expect we’ll see some more innovation eventually, whether from Apple or elsewhere.

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And Java, don’t forget Java! Write once run everywhere.

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Oh man. I try to forget about Java every chance I get…

(Ok, not fair, I’m sure. I took one Java course, because I wanted to learn some “real” programming skillz, and it was the only class I could take at the time. It worked, and I’ve never used Java since.)

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th-3925700854

:slight_smile: I kid… and actually, I think your reasoning is fine. I think it’s perfectly acceptable for developers who don’t care about building the best to build electron instead. The native Mac market is for developers who care about their craft. Yes, it’s hard. Yes, most don’t make it. But some do.

Honestly, the best thing to make money on the mass market is probably to develop an electron casino app. Setup recurring, weekly charges and sell loot in the game.

I don’t care about electron because I don’t care about cross-platform apps. I have two Macs and an iPhone, I care not a whit how well Slack runs on Windows or Linux. Only that it doesn’t behave properly when I’m using it.

If any group understood this, I’d figure it to be the Mac Power Users forum. The Mac has always been a second or third-class citizen in terms of market share. That’s never been the reason to use or develop for the Mac. The reason we’d develop here is to make something we can be proud of, and if we can make a living in the life… that’s just the icing on the cake.

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I look at it from another POV. I get the question why can’t LambTracker and AnimalTrakker run on iOS? The reason is that it’s prohibitively expensive to develop for a 3 person team all self funded. We focus on what we can get done that works to the end user and that’s not iOS devices. Now for th desktop apps, they run on all flavors of desktops. And no they are not as nicely native as a native app, I use tkinter for the UI for example, but they work and it’s a single code base I can support and that trumps any need of really nice looking stuff.

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That is what ALL my mobile code is written in. It’s got its quirks but no worse than any other langage.

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