D could catch this wave: web assembly

Nick Sabalausky via Digitalmars-d digitalmars-d at puremagic.com
Sun Jun 21 00:38:01 PDT 2015


On 06/21/2015 01:42 AM, Joakim wrote:
>
> I'd say this is a temporary respite before the final collapse. The only
> reason it hasn't happened yet is because mobile devices have not worked
> well with plugging into a large monitor with a mouse and keyboard, but
> that is now changing.
>
[...]
>
> Sure, but current mobile hardware is about as powerful as desktop/laptop
> chips from a year or two ago, which is what most people are actually
> running at work:
>
> http://www.anandtech.com/show/9289/the-nvidia-shield-android-tv-review/3
>
> At this point, it's just a software issue.  Mobile devices just need UI
> features like multiwindow to make more capable use of large desktop
> monitors.
>

No, there's more to a desktop/laptop than just processing power and 
keyboard/monitor/mouse. The mobile devices are also (currently) shit at 
storage space (not to mention virtual memory) and peripherals. And then 
for devs, ie the people who actually make all this stuff in the first 
place, there's even more improvements needed.

I'm not saying it can't or won't reach parity with traditional 
laptop/desktop. The groundwork is there and it IS now feasible at least. 
But there's still a lot left. And, to even get there at all, the mobile 
OS/device devs will have to accept that it will require adopting more 
and more desktop/laptop features.

And I think that's the biggest question mark, as they seem quite loathe 
to accept that mobile-style (or really, iOS-style, which everyone else 
in mobile copied wholesale) isn't universally superior for everyone in 
every way. This attitude will prevent them from reaching parity and 
replacing desktops/laptops until for as long as they choose to cling to 
it. How long they'll cling to it is the question.

But suppose, sooner or later, they've finally managed to improve enough 
to render the traditional line of desktops/laptops obsolete. It *WON'T* 
be a case of "mobile killed desktop". Because they will have, by 
necessity, BECOME just as much desktop as smartphone - the only 
difference being the lineage. It would be, in effect, exactly the same 
as laptops gaining mobile capabilities and mobile-friendly UI. Except, 
oh wait, that's happening too, see MS Surface Pro.

So it's NOT mobile replacing desktop/laptop. It's not "the new defeating 
the old" as the smartphone/tablet fans would have everyone believe. It's 
just plain old convergence. Neither side will "win" over the other 
because winning this game requires erasing the lines between both sides.


> Yes and no.  As hardware form factors, the old desktop and laptop models
> are being ditched.  The desktop box will almost completely disappear,
> while the folding laptop is only really needed by a small niche, those
> for whom "lap-ability" in a plane or conference seat is needed.  I
> picked up a bluetooth keyboard for my tablet last year: that suffices
> for me, and I bet most people, since I'm always going to put them down
> on a hard surface before typing.  I bet 97% of the people who currently
> use laptops are in this category.

And then you need some place to set the phone/tablet. The natural choice 
is to dock it into the keyboard, ideally with some sort of hinge. At 
which point you've just re-invented the laptop form factor.

The usefulness of laptop form factor won't go away, People will just 
start failing to recognize that it's just a laptop in new clothes with a 
few more tricks.


> As for the desktop OS, Windows has essentially no penetration on mobile,
> while OS X and linux live on only in the core kernels of their mobile
> counterparts.
>
> All that is converging is the software UIs, where mobile devices will be
> able to display apps appropriately both for constrained touchscreens and
> larger monitors controlled by a keyboard/trackpad.  Only in that last
> sense are mobile devices converging, by adding software UIs to work on
> large screens.
>

No, as you already pointed out yourself, the hardware capabilities are 
converging as well.

And then you have on one hand the whole "hooking up a keyboard/mouse" to 
a phone/tablet (and monitor too, HDMI-out has become pretty common on 
Android)...

And on the other hand, you have laptops getting their mainboards moved 
to the upper-half and becoming detachable from the bottom half, and 
getting smaller, lighter, better battery life...

That...is form-factor convergence.

>> Of course, that's dependent on the phone/tablet folks actually
>> managing to pull it off. Which is certainly a possibility, I agree,
>> but I'm not convinced they'll necessarily manage to, at least not in
>> the short term.
>
> It's around the bend and frankly should have been done sooner.
>

Never underestimate the power of corporate ineptitude ;)

>> MS, [...]

> They certainly seemed to start on it first, but screwed it up in some
> key ways.  Not allowing the desktop on Windows RT was a big mistake,
> which they appear to be sort of remedying with their recent
> Continuum/Universal-app moves.  Ironically, this was one of the few
> cases when Microsoft was too early, because mobile devices were probably
> not powerful enough when Windows 8 came out three years ago.
>

Yea, totally agree on this MS stuff. Pretty much the point I was making 
about Win8/Win10.

>> Interestingly, Canonical could've beat everyone to the punch here.
>> They had what was basically "continuum for linux" more or less already
>> working, but then...they just...what, threw it in the trash bin or
>> something? I dunno, I don't quite get Canonical sometimes.
>
> I get the sense that they're a small organization that bit off something
> way too big for them.

Hmm, yea, that may very well be.



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