Will web applications replace desktop applications?

Question

Will everything go to the cloud? If so, in which direction? Google-Gears? Flash,AIR,JavaFX?

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See also: Does desktop development matter?

Answer 1

I asked The Magic Eight Ball - it said, "No way!"

Answer 2

It will be quite a while before web technologies can truly replace desktop applications, but I have no doubt it will happen at some point. Technology advances too fast and consistently for it not to happen.

I doubt that any of the technologies you mentioned will be relevant then though. I think browsers will move towards a VM-like state that has increasingly more power to create better and better web experiences.

Answer 3

Heavy image processing and gaming might be a bit too heavy for a web application, but I think that many applications will eventually.

Answer 4

Nope, desktop applications are just stuck in limbo at the moment. It'll come back in full force once we finally solve the little issue of security.

Answer 5

There are things out there at the moment like eyeOS which are coming a long way, but when it boils down to sheer performance and gaming there's a limit to what browsers can do.

Answer 6

Yes, but I doubt the technology that will dominate exists yet.

Answer 7

I really don't see how this is going to happen any time soon, and by soon I mean in the next 10 to 15 years. Or even why one would want to. Intensive games, quantitative finance and science and defense, none of these would benefit from running in a web browser.

Answer 8

I've been asking this question for nearly a decade. In my business we build and sell both Windows and Web apps that do roughly the same thing. Four years ago I would have told you that we'd be 80-20 in favor of web apps by now. However, in terms of the numbers shipped, we are still about 60-40 in favor of the Windows apps.

While I once thought that the real barrier to the acceptance of software as a service was simply a desire for a better, richer user interface (which Silverlight, Air, etc. would solve), I'm now inclined to think that there are a lot of people who simply prefer a one-time purchase and local control over a web connected subscription model. Because this preference is rooted in personal perceptions of value for the money, I don't think that technology will change anything as quickly as we technologists think it will. Thus, I'd wager that Windows apps are with us for longer than we developers will ever expect; another 10 years at least.

Answer 9

So all we'll need are dumb terminals? Haven't we been here before? Well, ok, they'll certainly be prettier applications with multimedia and all of that. But, dumb terminals, none the less.

It doesn't seem like the pendulum should swing quite that far back.

Answer 10

I think for browsers (HTML/Java/CSS/Flash/Whatever) to eclipse native applications in the truest sense, the performance of computer architectures (CPU/Memory) will have to become so enormously powerful that you'd be capable of running a hard real-time process inside a browser framework and not see any reduced determinism or hard-real time performance.

That will require some truly significant advancements in computing, which as of now are not expected in the next decade.

Answer 11

No. Data-centric apps and communication-centric apps can be cloudized. However, processing-centric apps are less ameneble to being dumped onto the web.

Answer 12

The answer is very likely No, unless we discover secret physics in our universe or some other odd loopholes. Now for some sci-fi.

Consider this, one day we may have Quantum Cloud Servers that can process a Gazillion FLOPS per seconds, however as far as our knowledge goes we cannot send those results any faster than the speed of light.

So now imagine that the "Super Cloud", that can process anything no matter what, in 1 mili second, but if those results can't be received within a few mili seconds the "performance sucks". Imagine a space ship for example it can't possible rely on a cloud server, it would need a "Desktop".

Now this sounds crazy, but even today, as of 2008, a photon will take longer to cross from one side of a CPU chip to the other, than it takes to for the transistors gate-states to change. So we are already reaching the no faster than speed of light limit.

Answer 13

No, not until someone comes up with a very good argument for why I should let someone else control my data. And guarantees that my Internet connection is always on and available everywhere.

Answer 14

Personally my dream for this is that you will just carry around a USB stick that contains an OS and all the applications you use, along with all your personal settings. You can hook up this drive to any computer you come across, and get your own personalized experience every time, no matter which computer you are using. You always have access to all your applications, and all you data. When you get home at night, or check into specified computers, A backup is performed so that you don't have to worry about losing all your data. This is somewhat similar to what is being done with Gdium, and the G-Key, but I think/hope ideas like this will become much more popular in the future.

Answer 15

WebApps are great for a lot of things, but really the dealbreaker still is performance and local hardware integration.

If there's a good native app to do something, and an AIR app to do the same thing, I'll always use the native app. HTTP has it's limitations.

Answer 16

I think they will coopt each other. It will be possible to have components that are web-hosted, and parts that are local. Flex apps can use both local and browser sandboxes. If Silverlight doesn't yet, it will need to.

Answer 17

Individuals many not care where they put the family holiday pics but big business will be very careful what they let loose in the cloud.

Answer 18

People get way too caught up in looking for "the next big thing". It doesn't really matter! The web and the desktop as they exist today are nothing more than two separate platforms for apps. The line between those platforms is blurring more and more, but both platforms have advantages and disadvantages for people making apps, and in the end, the user only cares where the best apps are.

I say both will stay around, but soon enough you won't be able to tell them apart from an end-user point of view.

Answer 19

This is like arguing peanut butter is going to replace jelly. The truth is they both function fine alone or even better when used together in MANY cases. Personally I think the future will see a majority of instances of both being used in combination rather than separately one or the other. That said, there will always be separate instances where it makes sense - I don't see wikipedia or flickr becoming stand alone apps anytime soon. Similarly, I am sure there are desktop apps which have no benefit from being web enabled (although oddly enough I can't think of a good example at the moment).

I also agree with previous posters that the line between the two will become increasingly blurred.

Answer 20

Google has introduced Google Chrome OS as a bet that the desktop applications will no longer be essential.