People always ask what apps to use for mastodon but frankly the progressive web app is already glorious on it's own
@fenwick67 It's ok for a webinterface but webinterfaces generally provide the worst UX for applications.
Their question is *absolutely* right and the sad answer is, there are a few ok-ish ones for iOS and Android phones but none for computers.
Mastodon absolutely needs good native GUI applications to succeed.
For comparison, the people really active on the birdsite *all* use native applications and not a webinterface.
@MacLemon I disagree, the web interface is perfect for me and probably for most users since it's feature complete, fast, and well supported. If you use the 'add to homescreen' feature it's not distinguishable from a typical native app, other than the lack of notifications (which I personally would turn off if they existed).
@fenwick67 “Works for me” != the perfect interface, even less so for everyone.
I can very much distinguish any web app from a native application any time. There are *so* many differences. People do notice them a lot, not everyone can articulate what exactly or why it feels different though.
The desktop experience of a web interface, even Mastodon's is terrible compared to an actual application. On the phone there are Apps, they're not mature, but acceptable.
If it works for you, that fine. :-)
@miterion It's a web interface. No coherent keyboard control, laggy latency is laggy, it's non-euclidean space, no resizing of columns, I cannot use multiple accounts simultaneously, no selective muting of hashtags/clients/string filtering, drag & drop is horrible, smiley autocomplete automatically is 100% wrong, always. I can't reply to a toot and get to where I was, scroll position is lost all the time. Did I mention keyboard control? Can't quit browser without losing access to communication…
@MacLemon I can understand your issues but most of them can be fixed in browser. I just imagine that most desktop clients will be kind of the same (especially if they are based on electron like signal's). At least a web app can be optimized and tweaked by other users
@miterion Please, don't get me started on Signal's electron thing, it's a UI/UX abomination of sorts. No concept of focus…
The *only* problem an electron client solves over a web interface is that you can now quit a separate browser instance over your regular web browser. All other problems remain, plus now you have the usual Electron problems on top. (Broken Updating, still no keyboard control, need another 16GB RAM just to run the 7th outdated Chrome instance, etc.)
I can understand that…
@miterion intriguing to use Electron as it gives the illusion of coding like a website and getting an application for most platforms. The reality is that this is nothing more than an illusion and you're creating a terrible user experience which is hard to realize since your wrote the application.
Then when you do user testing everything falls apart to ruins because it's still just a web browser of sorts.
Ask UI/UX people…
@MacLemon Native clients are really hard to make, especially if they are cross plattform. I believe that many of your issues can be better solved in this web client than with making another electron client (there are a lot of mattermost desktop clients, just google it)
@miterion Yes, proper UI, streamlined workflows, a logical and intuitive interface are a lot if work. I know, I've been there, done that.
It's a terrible misconception that GUI Clients should be cross platform, they should not if they pass the complexity of hello world.
A cross platform UI will always be alien to all the platforms it is used on.
It's a fallacy to think these issues could be solved with Electron or a websites, because io the underlying technology.
@miterion If you have access to or are using a Mac or iOS device try comparing the birdsite web interface with the native Tweetbot application.
The UI is mostly specifically made for each platform's interaction concept. It's several AUs ahead of the webinterface on iOS and still way ahead on the Mac.
There's nothing of that quality on any *tux/*BSD window manager or Windows.
Still, even the Mac version has shortcomings regarding the UI. Any webinterface is terrible in comparison.
@MacLemon Sure, a polished native app can be quite nice. And I agree on the birdsite webinterface although there is an alternative at https://tweetdeck.twitter.com (not perfect but gets the job done quite nicely) It is not easy to make good looking applications on linux if you consider all the different desktops. Since there probably won't be a good mastodon app in the near future we should make the website as good as possible
@MacLemon @fenwick67 ehhh, i don't understand the obsession with "native" apps. even a "native" app is just a glorified wrapper for web information. the mastodon website is objectively better / smoother / more featured / etc than any client app i can think of. the only reason i'd look for another client app is if i wanted a different UI.
@MacLemon What are your main complaints about the web interface of mastodon?