But Google over the past year or so has gotten serious about getting more apps in front of more users, particularly in search results – which remains Google’s bread and butter. App indexing – wherein Google actually sorts through the content of an app so it can present it back to users in any number of ways – is the key to all this. You can open a traditional web search result directly into an app. And later Google would show a button that take you to the Play Store to install the app.
And now Google has cut out the middleman – for some of us, at least – by skipping the step of opening the Google Play Store app before installing. Technically speaking, that’s probably not a huge leap. And, frankly, it’s not as big a deal as headlines are making it seem.
Installing applications is just one of the many things where Android outshines iOS. For instance, it’s 2016, and you still can’t install applications from the App Store web listing to your iPhone or iPad. I spend most of my computing time on my desktop computer, and I’ve lost count of how many times I came across an interesting iOS application, only to realise that the only way to actually install on my iPhone was to actually get my iPhone, which could be anywhere in the house, open the App Store, search for the application, hopefully actually find it (search in the App Store is dreadfully bad), and then install it, all the while hoping the App Store app won’t soil its undies halfway through.
For Android applications, I just click install on the Play Store web listing, and I’m done. It’s one of those niceties that companies that understand web services can do properly without much effort. And it seems like Google is taking all this a step further now, allowing you to install stuff straight from Google Search
Meanwhile, the iOS App Store application is so unreliable and terrible, it needs a hidden “tap ten times to reload” shortcut.
OK.
Incorrect. If you get the app in itunes and have auto-install apps enabled on your iPhone it will install it on your phone.
So you need iTunes to enable auto-install? Why not through a plain old desktop browser?
At least Google made it obvious to you that you can just click the button to install it on your device(s) later on when those phones connect to the internet.
And why would I ever run iTunes in the first place? The best thing Apple’s done is divorce device management from the iTunes app and, if I want some local content, I use NPlayer or other apps capable of standard file transfer methods.
On top of that, why would I install iTunes on my Windows machine in the first place? It’s a massive resource hog, a terrible application, and one that infects your machines with all kinds of other Apple software, unwanted, unasked (through that ridiculous updater).
I have iTunes on my rMBP, and I’ve only ever used it once to transfer over my music to my iPhone (because iOS still can’t just be used as an USB drive because Apple is incompetent).
Agree Thom. On top o dealing with sudden hogs by JavaScript now dealing with this…
The logic, from a user point, is fuzzy at best.
Consider this: http://softorino.com/waltr
In addition to installing music for you it also converts any files not compatible with iOS. It works with video also.
( Yeah, it should be an Apple supplied solution but on the bright side buying it you’d support the Apple developer community. )
Not saying it’s the best system, just pointing out that you’re wrong in saying your only option is to install apps on the phone itself.
As for the phone acting like a USB device, that is not an option because of a deliberate design decision, not incompetence. The fact you don’t agree with that design decision is another matter.
Edited 2016-01-21 02:20 UTC
Yeah, an incompetent design decision!
It’s arguable that a deliberate design decision is incompetent. In Apple’s case, it’s more likely just sleazy though. Either way, it’s a good reason not to trust them or buy their crappy products.
Massive resource hog … maybe in 2005.
Who gives a shit anymore, my craptop at work has an i5 and 16gb of ram … my brother’s rubbish HP he bought from PC world runs this stuff fine and doesn’t ever really cause performance problems anymore. I am pretty anti-iTunes and I will tell people just to install it.
My desktop at home runs Steam, Origin, Uplay and a load of other crap and thanks to the magic of SSDs I don’t care.
I used to muck about with winamp and my iPod 120gb years ago, but these days it just isn’t worth caring.
Unless you have a real low end system who really give a f–k?
Edited 2016-01-21 20:19 UTC
YMMV, but iTunes (though less than optimal) is quite useful in my Mac environment. Encrypted IOS device backups to my local computer is just one example. Controlling the subset of my videos/audio, etc. that syncs into my devices is so easily managed via iTunes.
Personally, I just email myself the app store link. Click it on the phone and it takes you to the relevant app.
Which requires you to… go get your phone! Precisely the thing he was complaining about in the first place.
You still need you phone to use the app though. You just have to tap 3 times and wait a few seconds rather than the app being installed waiting for you. Not the end of the world.
Another thing I would add, as a Londoner, is the idea of my phone being “anywhere in the house” is only ever a few meters away anyway
I’m kind of shocked google hasn’t taken that over by now. I don’t think I’d trust apps from them though…
So you don’t use Android? You can’t trust apps made by google which means you don’t trust Android. Or you are using Android AOSP(minus google apps)?
goole not Google. I trust Google search, not Goole Search, which is actually a real thing separate from google.
https://i.imgur.com/utzTCyo.png
Thom typoed Google in the headline, which he’s now corrected. making it seem like I’m crazy. Thanks Thom!
Edited 2016-01-20 14:55 UTC
Bill Shooter of Bul: You may want to contact Thom, in the future, about typos by clicking on Contact in the menu bar under the logo. That would keep the grammar correction reporting private.
Edited 2016-01-20 16:15 UTC
It wasn’t grammar, it was a typo. Just a light hearted joke.
I might have missed this (it’s not obvious if it’s implemented anywhere), but how do you require authentication (i.e. a password) for app purchases via the Web Google Play store?
I can add this per device (not sure why it isn’t an “everywhere” setting to be honest), but it’s quite disconcerting that once I’m logged into the Web version of Google Play, purchases don’t require a password.
google uses your gmail account to identify you and your devices
“straight from Goole Search”… Ghoul Search?
I would worry that some users would get used to it. Then, next time an App comes up in search, maybe it comes from some malicious site that looks like Google, and it asks them to install. Of course they would get a warning before installing it – untrusted source – but I know most users will just follow its direction about enabling 3rd-party sources.
I’m confused about how this works.
Maybe you use Android for your desktop/laptop OS. Please verify this.
You say that you use Google Search to find an app and you can tell it right then to install it. How does this work if you are not currently on your mobile device? Are you telling it to install on any device where you login with a google email account? If yes, I admit that is cool. If not, then I have zero idea how this works.
As for installing apps on my iPhone/iPad, I don’t have a problem doing this. And while you may hate iTunes (its an easy target like fish in a barrel), I just ignore this part of the deal (the hate part) and have zero problems finding and installing apps when I see articles for apps that I’m interested in and want to download and install.
Take for instance the new Music Notes app. There was a link to it and I clicked on it and it brought up a web page. I then emailed it to my devices and I was able to click on that link and it took me to the screen, yes in iTunes, and I install it. And it is installed on both my iPad and on my iPhone.
Could iTunes be better. Yes. I could easily list a couple hundred things about Android and Windows and every other OS.
That’s the way Google Play Market works, too: you click on install and select the device you want to install it to. As far as I have understood this just leverages the same process, but straight from Google Search.
And of course you have to reveal your identity not only to the Google Play Store but also to Google Search which in turn enables Google to track you on even more spots and combine data.
I already hate all those existing points where Google services try to lure me in to give away my identity (and not just the IP of the device which can be used by different person and hence is more difficult for Google to profile).
.. installing Malware direct from Google Search!