Whatsapp's Web release without iOS support seems on purpose somehow.

[Serelus]

While I might be paranoid, I am a little suspicious towards google's involvement in this all.

- Whatsapp stated that google's Push Notification system is ideal, and that's why it was chosen.

- Google Chrome exclusively supported, which seems odd. This is the kind of service that could be easily made compatible with any browser. At the very least more than just chrome.

- Being that chrome is also available on iOS it's actually the only version also NOT supported, so even if I had a keyboard attached to my iPad for convenience, I still wouldn't be able to use it.

Maybe I am paranoid, maybe I am mad the feature is not available on iPhone.
I still feel like it seems very much like Google had a huge influence on the outcome of this all.

 

[hank moody]

why are people still using this?

TELEGRAM is soo much better and have all that features and more for a while now...

https://telegram.org

 

[KALLT]

While I might be paranoid, I am a little suspicious towards google's involvement in this all.

- Whatsapp stated that google's Push Notification system is ideal, and that's why it was chosen.

- Google Chrome exclusively supported, which seems odd. This is the kind of service that could be easily made compatible with any browser. At the very least more than just chrome.

- Being that chrome is also available on iOS it's actually the only version also NOT supported, so even if I had a keyboard attached to my iPad for convenience, I still wouldn't be able to use it.

Maybe I am paranoid, maybe I am mad the feature is not available on iPhone.
I still feel like it seems very much like Google had a huge influence on the outcome of this all.

I’ve read that WhatsApp is using an experimental non-standardised feature in Google Chrome that isn’t supported by any other browser, hence the limitation. They probably still have to figure out a solution for Internet Explorer and Firefox.

The reason why it doesn’t work on iOS, or so they claim, is because of iOS sandboxing and API restrictions. Essentially, they use WhatsApp as a funnel to create a secure connection to Chrome, which requires a constant Internet connection between both programs. If I understood it correctly, iOS doesn’t allow developers to control the activity of their apps when the app is in the background or when the device has gone to sleep, so the feature wouldn’t work as intended.

It is no secret that they prefer Android over iOS. I distinctly remember that their developers criticised the restricted model of iOS several times. That would neatly fit with the generally slow rollout and update frequency of WhatsApp updates on iOS.

why are people still using this?

TELEGRAM is soo much better and have all that features and more for a while now...

https://telegram.org

The reason why Telegram does have multiple clients is because they chose to store all messages in the cloud. WhatsApp seems to be using their servers as relays only and don’t store the messages for longer periods of time. It would probably require significant structural changes to do this and I’m sure there’s a cost factor involved as well. No other messenger has so many users and messages per day, the costs would be enormous (and they’re already not making any money).

I believe that this web version is purely experimental at this point to test the waters. WhatsApp has been firmly against any web-based or desktop extensions, so it would not surprise me that they prefer this cheaper method for now. I’m sure if the web app is becoming popular, they will finally budge.

 

[wolfaaron]

I’ve read that WhatsApp is using an experimental non-standardised feature in Google Chrome that isn’t supported by any other browser, hence the limitation. They probably still have to figure out a solution for Internet Explorer and Firefox.

The reason why it doesn’t work on iOS, or so they claim, is because of iOS sandboxing and API restrictions. Essentially, they use WhatsApp as a funnel to create a secure connection to Chrome, which requires a constant Internet connection between both programs. If I understood it correctly, iOS doesn’t allow developers to control the activity of their apps when the app is in the background or when the device has gone to sleep, so the feature wouldn’t work as intended.

It is no secret that they prefer Android over iOS. I distinctly remember that their developers criticised the restricted model of iOS several times. That would neatly fit with the generally slow rollout and update frequency of WhatsApp updates on iOS.



The reason why Telegram does have multiple clients is because they chose to store all messages in the cloud. WhatsApp seems to be using their servers as relays only and don’t store the messages for longer periods of time. It would probably require significant structural changes to do this and I’m sure there’s a cost factor involved as well. No other messenger has so many users and messages per day, the costs would be enormous (and they’re already not making any money).

I believe that this web version is purely experimental at this point to test the waters. WhatsApp has been firmly against any web-based or desktop extensions, so it would not surprise me that they prefer this cheaper method for now. I’m sure if the web app is becoming popular, they will finally budge.

The iPhone version of Whatsapp stores messages on iCloud. It might be possible to add browser compatibility to Yosemite macs because they have access to iCloud, but windows users with iPhones would not be able to because Apple doesn't give access to windows users to iCloud.

It goes to show how much apple's closed ecosystem will hurt them in the cloud years.

 

[KALLT]

The iPhone version of Whatsapp stores messages on iCloud. It might be possible to add browser compatibility to Yosemite macs because they have access to iCloud, but windows users with iPhones would not be able to because Apple doesn't give access to windows users to iCloud.

It goes to show how much apple's closed ecosystem will hurt them in the cloud years.

I don’t think that WhatsApp stores messages in iCloud either. WhatsApp is much older than iCloud and probably uses its own backend servers for this. Users can, however, use iCloud to backup their own WhatsApp messages, but that really is just for restoration purposes if you reinstall WhatsApp. I think this ist just an extra service they offer since the iCloud API made it possible to let users store their app data in the cloud, without requiring additional server capacity. If anything, it supports the assumption that WhatsApp just doesn’t store your messages anywhere for prolonged periods of time, because they wouldn’t need iCloud if they did.

 

[GreyOS]

The reason why it doesn’t work on iOS, or so they claim, is because of iOS sandboxing and API restrictions. Essentially, they use WhatsApp as a funnel to create a secure connection to Chrome, which requires a constant Internet connection between both programs. If I understood it correctly, iOS doesn’t allow developers to control the activity of their apps when the app is in the background or when the device has gone to sleep, so the feature wouldn’t work as intended.

Hi! I created a thread about WhatsApp Web and iOS a few days ago.

I was trying to get to the bottom of how they are able to bring WhatsApp Web to Windows Phone but not iOS. I totally get that Android is more open when it comes to background services etc., but I thought Windows Phone and iOS were very similar in this respect. I wouldn't be so perplexed if it was only available on Android!

If you have any further ideas on this subject, please share!

 

[KALLT]

Hi! I created a thread about WhatsApp Web and iOS a few days ago.

I was trying to get to the bottom of how they are able to bring WhatsApp Web to Windows Phone but not iOS. I totally get that Android is more open when it comes to background services etc., but I thought Windows Phone and iOS were very similar in this respect. I wouldn't be so perplexed if it was only available on Android!

If you have any further ideas on this subject, please share!

I have no experience with Windows Phone, sorry. I’m inclined to accept that iOS just makes it either needlessly complicated, fickle or impossible. If they even support the less popular platforms Windows Phone and BlackBerry 10 then there must be some good reasons why iOS isn’t on the list (if not political).