In the way software is developed these days, a huge effort is being put into the mobile platforms while the desktop side doesn’t have nearly as much innovation as it used to.
The reason? Money. A software developer has much more opportunity to make money developing crappy two-dollar apps compared to selling desktop apps.
A rather strange turn of events is there are morons are totally willing to pay $1, $2, $5, $10 or more for a crappy smartphone app, but absolutely will not pay for a desktop app. No way, no how. So the end result is that more developers simply aren’t bothering with desktop platform apps at all.
Believe me when I say there are very few smartphone apps that are actually any good. Software developers are mainly concentrating on churning out crappy quick apps to make a quick buck, so you’re definitely not getting better quality of software on a smartphone.
If you want the good stuff for the desktop, you have to “go corporate” or go open source.
An example of “going corporate”: Microsoft Office. Still the best there is, still the best for everything document, spreadsheet and presentation, and the newer versions connect up with cloud services easily for collaboration purposes. In addition there are sync-to-phone capabilities right out of the box.
An example of going open source: LibreOffice. Also an amazing office suite, and I use it personally. While it may not have the collab and sync abilities of Microsoft Office, for most people it works great, gets the job done in fine style, and the price tag of zero is very welcome.
New software titles for desktop environments will be sparse in the future
The only kind of software that you can guarantee will have new releases for a good long while are web browsers. As for everything else – and yes, I mean everything else – they are going to be much fewer in number.
That being said, this is what I recommend:
1. If you have some software that you really like right now, SAVE THOSE INSTALLERS.
Back them up. If it’s on CD or DVD, make ISO images of them (such as with ISODisk). If you have standalone installer files, back those up to DVD, USB external storage or even cloud storage.
2. Get familiarized with open source sites.
SourceForge is a great place to start. When you want the latest and greatest in open source – even for Windows – you start there.
3. Start using more portable apps.
Even if you don’t use apps portable-style, portable apps are still great to use because they’re self-contained, so to speak. See www.portableapps.com and www.pendriveapps.com.
Generally speaking, any desktop software that’s truly good will find its way into being a portable app at some point. And of course, all portable apps to the best of my knowledge are free.
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Good thought provoking post! Many desktop programs have now reached maturity with few new features being added. Upgrades are now often just to iron out bugs and security issues. I have over 200 programs installed on my system, mostly free utilities, and I can count on one hand the titles I’ve paid for (MS Office, Serif PhotoPlus and FABS Autobackup) although even in those cases there are great free and open source alternatives. I can see why software developers would want to switch to developing mobile apps.