Why UK's Government Digital Service Decided To Ditch Apps (govinsider.asia)

In a world where there's an app for nearly every product and service, the UK Government Digital Service (GDS) still rely on its website to serve its customers. "But why?" You ask. Ben Terrett, former head of design at GDS outlined some of the reasons in a recent interview. He said the problem with mobiles apps is that they require a lot of commitment and resources. Apps are "very expensive to produce, and they're very very expensive to maintain because you have to keep updating them when there are software changes." He concludes that government services are much better off with responsive websites (websites whose layout and design adapt in accordance with the device it's being accessed on). "If you believe in the open internet that will always win," Terrett said, adding that responsive websites are also much cheaper to build and maintain. Another benefit of responsive websites is, he adds, that when you want to push an update, only one platform needs to get updated. From the report: Key to the GDS' approach is designing for user needs, not organizational requirements, Terrett says. "That is how good digital services designed and built these days. That is how everyone does it, whether that's Google or Facebook or British Airways or whoever." The problem is that public sector agencies tend not to design with citizens in mind. "Things are just designed to suit the very silos that the project sits in, and the user gets lost in there," Terrett adds.According to estimates, the move to go the responsive website way has saved them $8.2B in four years.

Comments

Wow, someone gets it

[danomac]

I am literally so tired of visiting a website and having it pop up a download notification for another new app.

Re:Wow, someone gets it

[i.r.id10t]

Indeed. If I can do it from a desktop or laptop via browser, why do I need to install an app on the phone/tablet to do it?

That's what I've been saying all along

[Anonymous Coward]

Many of our customers insist on having "an app" for their brand. All the app does is embed their website in an embedded browser and provide some navigation buttons to get to different web pages!!! What a waste. I've always thought a responsive website is the way to go unless you have a good reason to create a native app that might work offline. For example, an alarm clock app, a compass app, etc.

Re:That's what I've been saying all along

[Anonymous Coward]

Apps are about marketing; not technology. Having an icon on your device that shows [insert brand here] keeps it in your head.

Also, EVERY ONE of them wants to send you notifications. Why? So that they can splash their crap on your screen. "On SALE!" or "Check out our new content!" - while sending more ad revenue our way. And you take notice of it before swiping it away thnking it might be email. Now, of course many of us don't allow such nonsense but someone who's hooked on say shoes, LOVES the Zappos notifications! I bet their app has sold more shoes than any of their web page ads.

Mobile devices have become the best targeted advertising platform ever!

The purpose of a browser. HTML isn't PDF

[raymorris]

> Browsers naturally layout the page to fit into the browser window. If you design the website properly, you don't need a bunch of JS to mess with the layout. There already is a layout engine, everyone please stop making your own slower ones.

Exactly. This is the difference between PDF and HTML - the entire job of a browser is to render the page appropriately for the size of the window, the user's preferred font size, etc. 80% of what a web designer needs to do is simply don't set the width of anything. The browser knows how wide a word is. Then learn the CSS for what yiu actually want, frequently margin and padding. You add margin above something by setting the MARGIN, NOT by moving it down by 60 pixels. Try 1em margin as a starting point.