Introduction To Web Applications: Part 1

It is hardly surprising that web applications have seen such an impressive development over the course of the last approximately ten years. If one were to make a synthesis of the overall experience of desktop applications, there are a couple of valid arguments that we can be almost certain would appear. First and foremost, a piece of desktop software has to be manually retrieved (downloaded from the Internet or physically) and installed, which can present issues to the "non-technical" user. Needless to say that this process can bring, and mostly has, subsequent issues in regards to updating and/or patching the software, system requirements, etc. Also, cross-platform development efforts are needed in order to provide versions for the three major operating systems (macOS, Windows, Linux) if the target is to reach as large of an audience as possible. Desktop applications used to be bound to the machine in terms of the licensing as well, which further reduced the flexibility in approaching one's work. A further valid point has to do with the limited, often delayed, user feedback and how that can lead to the diminishing of testing scenarios. Of course no solution is constructed out of disadvantages alone and we are not dealing with such a case here, either: desktop applications tend to be faster and are generally considered more secure than their web counterparts. However, history has shown that while the web is not the perfect solution, its advantages were simply too powerful to ignore. Not only does a web application require no installation from the user, updates can be easily rolled out and made available to all users instantly after a new release.