Allow me to take this opportunity to address something related to a minor point from the article:
>To me an app is a small bit of code for an iPhone to do something cute. Are we going to call the massive SAP suite an "app?"
Lately I've been hearing many people complain about "serious" desktop applications being called "apps". Do you think this is a valid complaint? (Myself, I'm not sure; I won't disclose my reasoning right now so as not to skew the conversation from the start.)
In my mind, app is simply short for application. I think it has good connotations that come along with it as a result of mobile apps, such as being a single contained package that doesn't interfere with other apps, but we've seen that on OS X for years anyways, so that's hardly something new to desktop computing. There are complex, CPU intensive apps that are developed for tablets to do things like 3D modeling, are those any less of an app than a desktop version of the same thing? Does anyone have a problem with those being called "apps" vs "desktop applications"?
Amongst developers, using the word 'app' to describe any kind of software seems like the navy referring to everything as a 'boat'. Using more specific words improves the conversation and our thought processes.
But when talking with end users, it seems to make sense to classify their system into 'Apps' and 'files'. The average user still gets confused by the difference between Windows, Word and a Word Document. If saying "Apps are things you find in an App Store" helps end users be more effective with their computers, then it makes sense.
At least in Mac OS, they have always been called Apps, and with Mac OS X (2001) they even adopted the ".app" extension (Mail.app, Safari.app.) Steve Jobs used to call them apps in public all they way back to the 80s, even during the NeXT days when they only focused on 'serious' enterprise software.
Windows users call them programs and I guess after the 'there's an app for that' campaign, everyone associates apps with smartphones but in reality the term is almost as old as the PC.
There was a time that I would have agreed that an "app" is, in essence, a minimal application designed to perform a simple, narrowly circumscribed task. The distinction was natural because this was about the level of sophistication of most software that the average user would encounter on a mobile device, all of which were sold through "app stores." (And app stores sold only apps, thus defined.)
Since then, however, I have found that the definition has more to do with the purchase/installation process than the functionality of the product itself. The emerging definition that I perceive is that an "app" is something purchased and installed through an "app store." App stores are environments that greatly reduce the normal friction involved with purchasing and installing an application such that this can all be accomplished without leaving the app store interface and without the user's being required to enter any configuration information. (This step, if it is necessary, is typically reserved for when the app is first run.) Uninstallation of an app is similarly streamlined (or, at least, a user expects it to be...). Apps are also not typically conceived of as running in windows. They are presented full-screen with no OS-chrome. This is an obvious hold-over from the demands of the mobile-device environment.
An obvious counterpoint is Steam, which would seem to meet all of these criteria. This anomaly is perhaps explainable on the basis that it pre-dates the modern app store and, thus, users' expectations of it are not framed by the mobile environment as they are in other ecosystems. The fact that it typically is used only for PC games helps with this differentiation. It is worth pointing out, though, that Steam does sell non-game software, though to my knowledge it is not terribly successful in doing so. This lack of success might be attributable to its failure, in this capacity, to comply with the symbology of the app/application distinction that users have come to internalize.
Interestingly this is something I was thinking about the other day. I was trying to explain to my parents that they wanted to download and run a program on their Windows company - I called it an "app". They were confused as that is the term for things that you install on a smart phone.
Like yourself, I'm not sure. It does seem a bit of a disservice to call something as complex as AutoCAD or Photoshop etc by the same term as a stupid fart app. But then, it is an accurate term - they are both applications, so I tend to use it as such.
>To me an app is a small bit of code for an iPhone to do something cute. Are we going to call the massive SAP suite an "app?"
Lately I've been hearing many people complain about "serious" desktop applications being called "apps". Do you think this is a valid complaint? (Myself, I'm not sure; I won't disclose my reasoning right now so as not to skew the conversation from the start.)