UWP struggling to excite developers

[+JR1966 Subscriber²]

I am increasingly concerned for the future of the UWP platform. We all know of many developers that have abandoned UWP for Web Apps. Now one of India's largest developers has killed the UWP FlipKart in favor of the Web Wrapper. I found this on the Windows Latest site reported by Mayank Parmar.

 

So, where do we find ourselves as MS supporters? Does UWP survive after the demise of WM? Are Web Apps the future and what does that mean for MS?

[spaceelf]

1 minute ago, JR1966 said:

Does UWP survive after the demise of WM? 

I probably can't list everything that's been going on for better or worse but there's no sign of UWP development slowing down.

 

The non mobile offerings have improved every year so you'll just have to wait and watch.

[+BudMan MVC]

Wouldn't this sort of question be better suited in the software section or windows 10 even?  Not sure how it pertains to internet or network or security unless you had a specific question about security settings or networking with the platform.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

//moved

 

I find myself only using the Netflix UWP ... everything else I use are just standard programs/websites. Just a personal preference...but The Store and the apps really don't interest me.

[Steve121178]

Its corporate policy for most Enterprises to block the Windows Store so it won't get much Enterprise traction.  

[+Sledge Subscriber²]

Until UWP supports building for iOS \ Droid (aka Xamarin but without the pain) it's useless as a platform to entice developers.

 

 

[spaceelf]

7 hours ago, Sledge said:

Until UWP supports building for iOS \ Droid (aka Xamarin but without the pain) it's useless as a platform to entice developers.

That's kind of like saying Apple or Google should port their entire OS platform to Windows.  Uhh...ok?  Not going to happen?

[Mando]

5 minutes ago, dwLostCat said:

That's kind of like saying Apple or Google should port their entire OS platform to Windows.  Uhh...ok?  Not going to happen?

Never say never wiith MS, who woulda thought we would see Ms apps on iOS and Droid? Pretty decent ones at that too.

7 hours ago, Jim K said:

//moved

 

I find myself only using the Netflix UWP ... everything else I use are just standard programs/websites. Just a personal preference...but The Store and the apps really don't interest me.

Does the uwp app do HD yet? havnt touched in eons.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

8 minutes ago, Mando said:

Never say never wiith MS, who woulda thought we would see Ms apps on iOS and Droid? Pretty decent ones at that too.

Does the uwp app do HD yet? havnt touched in eons.

Yes...and it (or Edge) are one of the requirements for UltraHD on Windows 10.

[Mando]

5 minutes ago, Jim K said:

Yes...and it (or Edge) are one of the requirements for UltraHD on Windows 10.

Cool may give it another lookie, cheers matey.

[spaceelf]

10 minutes ago, Mando said:

Never say never wiith MS, who woulda thought we would see Ms apps on iOS and Droid? Pretty decent ones at that too.

Some apps is quite a stretch to their entire app platform.  Something like .NET Core which offer none of the display and audio and so on IIRC would make the UWP stack nearly useless.

 

It's not that far from saying they should support building win32 apps for Droid or iOS.  Umm...kay.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

Just now, Mando said:

Cool may give it another lookie, cheers matey.

Should also be noted, I believe, that browsers (other than IE/Edge) are also limited to 720p.  So...you need to use IE/Edge/App for 1080p...iirc.

[Circaflex]

46 minutes ago, Jim K said:

Should also be noted, I believe, that browsers (other than IE/Edge) are also limited to 720p.  So...you need to use IE/Edge/App for 1080p...iirc.

I'm not going to lie. I didn't believe this at first, I figured you had made a mistake, but I went to the Netflix requirements webpage and sure enough, IE/Edge/App only for 1080 on Windows.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

This probably brings us full circle ... I believe as time goes on (especially after 7's EOL) UWP may gain some more traction.  However, they will need to be compelling to use ... offer features that you can not get otherwise (using Netflix as an example ... HD/UltraHD streaming).  With regards to web apps, as in the OP, I think such apps need to have the same functionality (and even improved functionality) before they take off and overtake their website brethren.  The UWP for my brokerage account, for lack of better words, just sucks.  It is missing tons of features that the website offers and I gave up on it (may give it another try in a year or so).  Even the Netflix apps is missing features (like everything else other than watching videos...which is fine because 99.9% is used to watch videos).

 

Anyway, as long as the developers do not "give up" ... I'm sure more comparable apps will come along to possibly overtake (or at least suitably complement) their web counterparts.

 

Just my take on it ... though I'm not sure if this helps the OP or not (probably not). 

[+JR1966 Subscriber²]

2 hours ago, Jim K said:

This probably brings us full circle ... I believe as time goes on (especially after 7's EOL) UWP may gain some more traction.  However, they will need to be compelling to use ... offer features that you can not get otherwise (using Netflix as an example ... HD/UltraHD streaming).  With regards to web apps, as in the OP, I think such apps need to have the same functionality (and even improved functionality) before they take off and overtake their website brethren.  The UWP for my brokerage account, for lack of better words, just sucks.  It is missing tons of features that the website offers and I gave up on it (may give it another try in a year or so).  Even the Netflix apps is missing features (like everything else other than watching videos...which is fine because 99.9% is used to watch videos).

 

Anyway, as long as the developers do not "give up" ... I'm sure more comparable apps will come along to possibly overtake (or at least suitably complement) their web counterparts.

 

Just my take on it ... though I'm not sure if this helps the OP or not (probably not). 

It helps Jim, all of the responses do as I wanted opinions from members much more knowledgeable than myself. I was using the Formula 1 app and the Cricinfo app but they have both either stopped working completely or are patchy at best. I emailed F1 only to receive a response suggesting I use the website instead. It is a worry when major players such as F1 and Cricinfo have seemingly lost interest.

[+JR1966 Subscriber²]

15 hours ago, dwLostCat said:

I probably can't list everything that's been going on for better or worse but there's no sign of UWP development slowing down.

 

The non mobile offerings have improved every year so you'll just have to wait and watch.

What are some of the major success stories this year in UWP? I repeatedly see comments elsewhere complaining that MS don't care even with their own products. Obviously that's ridiculous but with the mobile failure many are feeling this way.

[+JR1966 Subscriber²]

12 hours ago, Jim K said:

//moved

 

.but The Store and the apps really don't interest me.

There is the problem right there. I'm sure MS will be sweating bricks hoping W10S is successful. From the day W8 was released MS misjudged the mindset of desktop users and their preference for traditional programs. 

[spaceelf]

5 hours ago, JR1966 said:

What are some of the major success stories this year in UWP? I repeatedly see comments elsewhere complaining that MS don't care even with their own products. Obviously that's ridiculous but with the mobile failure many are feeling this way.

Play Anywhere games are one thing.  Microsoft and Capcom are major contributors, Warner Bros, Activision, and soon Square Enix have games up there now...

 

There's also paint.net and even Office now...  I don't really get much out of the non-gaming stuff so other people might know more.

 

All those things people kept telling me would never happen because UWP had already failed.

 

 

[Gerowen]

The mobile UWP apps are pretty lackluster to be honest.  As an owner of a Windows Phone, most of the things I need are there like an app for my bank (USAA), Facebook (unstable as hell), News/Weather, FB Messenger, OneNote, Cortana/Bing, Outlook, Netflix, Hulu, etc., but certain apps that I would "like" to use aren't there, like the PayPal app.  I sometimes make purchases with PayPal in local stores, and in order to get the "code" to punch in at the register, we have to use my wife's Android phone because the mobile PayPal site I can access using Edge on my phone doesn't have that functionality.  It's not the end of the world, but it would be nice to see more up to date mobile offerings in the Windows store.  I've actually bought a couple of games from the Windows store; Halo Wars 2 and Super Lucky's Tale.  They were both good games and it's really cool that unlike Steam, my wife and kids can all play those games on their Windows 10 PCs using my license without booting me off.  I just added my account to their Windows store app, switched back to their account, and all of the items I've purchased in the store like Minecraft, Halo Wars 2, Super Lucky's Tale, etc. can all be played by my family members even though I haven't paid for the games on their accounts.  On Steam, if I set up "Family Sharing" and my wife tries to play a game that's shared from my library at the same time as me, it'll boot one of us out of the game after 5 minutes.

 

The Windows store and therefore UWP apps seems like a good first attempt at centralizing software distribution and updates like what has existed in Linux distributions for literally decades where users have had one service (varies depending on distribution) for acquiring, installing, and updating 99% of their software including checking digital signatures on the packages provided and everything.  Users can still manually download software binaries or source code themselves and compile/execute it, but using the package manager means that all the software you get through it also gets updated by it without having to have 30,000 update daemons running in the background.  It has been a disadvantage in Windows that you had to manually keep all of your third party software up to date either by manually going to websites and checking, or leaving update daemons running in the background 24 hours a day to automatically check for you, and then the exact process for updating those apps could mean manually downloading and running the installer for the new version, letting the app "update" itself, etc.  The Windows Store and UWP development has made a good first step toward fixing that issue, I think, and Microsoft would do well to continue improving the offerings in the Windows Store and making it easy for developers to get their software onto the platform.

[DevTech]

21 hours ago, JR1966 said:

I am increasingly concerned for the future of the UWP platform. We all know of many developers that have abandoned UWP for Web Apps. Now one of India's largest developers has killed the UWP FlipKart in favor of the Web Wrapper. I found this on the Windows Latest site reported by Mayank Parmar.

 

So, where do we find ourselves as MS supporters? Does UWP survive after the demise of WM? Are Web Apps the future and what does that mean for MS?

This thread reads like the "Blind Men and the Elephant" folk tale.

 

Everyone is generalizing from their own subjective experience.

 

The starting point is to realize that 1.3 billion human beings use Windows every day. In order for Microsoft to support such a large ecosystem combined which a very large range of hardware capability and feature sets, requires providing as much developer support and options as they can within reason. 

 

The number of ways in which a developer can use the Windows platform is very large and every developer needs to select the right dev matrix to suit their needs and the needs of their users.

 

1. UWP

 

UWP is a re-design of WPF targeted originally to solve the severe performance problems that large WPF applications experienced. Instead of being a runtime layer on top of the Windows API, the basic plumbing of WPF was integrated into the core code of Windows and is officially part of the Windows API. That simply is not going to go anywhere despite weirdo theories you find on the internet.

 

Since UWP is part of WIndows, it is simply not practical to backport it to previous Windows versions and so developers that need to support WIndows 7 and earlier would not use it. Over time perhaps a long time, the legacy Windows versions will become an insignificant percentage and that will open of UWP for that segment of developers.

 

No need to detail the plus side of UWP since it is designed form the ground up as a modern programming model and is the "native" dev mode for Windows. Which means performance, device range, touch support etc.

 

2. JavaScript (Web tech)

 

Using JavaScript and web stuff will never be performant and requires much thought to avoid weird stutters and general awkwardness but has the advantage in theory of covering more targets.

 

In Windows even this option has many variations. You can make a WIn 10 App in JavaScript, or you can make a Desktop app using Electron (with embedded Node.js) and similar tools.

 

3. Traditional Win 32 API

 

Same performance as UWP, works on legacy Windows. Many UI runtimes such as QT target this API.

 

4. Traditional WPF on WIndows desktop.

 

This option shares XAML to some extent with UWP and could in theory have unique Windows acceleration over time since the WPF group at Microsoft has been re-born to some extent.

 

5. Xamarin

 

Xamarin targets Android and IOS and can also target WIndows.

 

 

6. Unity 3D

 

Nothing prevents a developer from making anything with Unity 3D, not just games. It is just as cross-platform as JavaScript and has performance as well. Of the many many targets included, is UWP along with anything else you would want.

 

The downside is extra work to erect a UI, a downlevel version of C# and a license cost if you are outrageously successful.

 

----------------

 

The conclusion I'm trying to provide is that letting developers pick their desired options is NOT a problem for UWP. UWP is part of the O/S and is here to stay. It is just such a huge ecosystem that everyone sees just one aspect of it. 

 

Note: this is a quick dump off the top of my head so please feel free to provide corrections and dev options I missed.

 

 

 

[Tuskd]

Well, the good news is that Microsoft Store is a much healthier store than the Mac App Store.

 

However I find the following problems that prevent UWP from being a success.

1) Microsoft isn't spending time marketing it. Microsoft's own apps aren't fully UWP yet. Despite the fact that the Store is pinned to the taskbar, nobody notices it, let alone open it.

2) The lack of form factors owned by a person nullifies the versatility of UWP. Windows 10 is installed on primarily on non-touch desktops and laptops. The number of people owning touch screen Windows devices/Windows Phones/XBox/MR headsets/Surface Hub is negligible. Heck, many people have only 1 device with Windows on it, but have multiple iPhones/Androids.
3) Major problem for Microsoft to fix is the Store. Microsoft's suggestion for apps is pathetic. Circling around the same set of apps. Search is also bad. Junk apps are an issue too. No need to remove junk apps. Let them keep it to boast numbers. But the problem is that these junk apps get priority over newer/more useful/well made ones.
4) Mentality of people to be changed. Most people browsing the Store want the quality of iOS apps at the price of Android apps (i.e, free). Also, I would be very glad to pay the developer, but sometimes the effort they put on the app and the paywalls makes me think, instead of paying I could make one myself. I understand developers need money, but the price they ask is sometimes too much for what they've done. Plus the uncertainty with dev/microsoft for supporting the app/platform makes me cautious in investing in this ecosystem.
5) Web apps could be seen as a threat to UWP. I understand UWP can be better than Web Apps, but many apps on the Windows Store currently can be converted to Web apps.

[adrynalyne]

2 hours ago, Tuskd said:

Well, the good news is that Microsoft Store is a much healthier store than the Mac App Store.

 

 

In what way, exactly? 

[MikeChipshop Member]

3 hours ago, Tuskd said:

However I find the following problems that prevent UWP from being a success.

And that is Microsoft sticking with it and running with it. There's literately nothing else preventing UWP from being the killer here other than Ms bowing to crappy media responses to it and pulling it BUT even that's highly unlikely.

[MikeChipshop Member]

22 hours ago, Steve121178 said:

Its corporate policy for most Enterprises to block the Windows Store so it won't get much Enterprise traction.  

UWP apps don't have to be installed from the store. Take Adobe XD for example.

[Tuskd]

1 hour ago, adrynalyne said:

In what way, exactly? 

Number of apps