Feature Request: app for the iPad

[studentIvan]

Can be build somehow with the ionic for example. And if it will have some chrome-like web inspector, or like the separated app - then we can start a new era of web development, using iPad only.

[jankeromnes]

Thanks for the suggestion @studentIvan. While I agree that Gitpod's dev experience on iPad could be much improved, I don't think a native iOS app is the way to go for now.

Personally, I would prefer getting the web version to work great enough on all mobile/touch devices (e.g. iPad, Chromebook, Android, etc) instead of developing and committing to support several different native apps.

However, I agree that there are some benefits to having a more native experience. For example, we're planning to work on a Desktop version of Gitpod soon (e.g. packaged with Electron), which could help close the gap with some VS Code features that cannot work inside a browser tab (e.g. some keyboard shortcuts like Cmd+W).

Maybe in the future we'll revisit this, and ideally find a way to have an iPad app without needing to rewrite all of Theia. But for now, I'll mark this as "won't fix". Please feel to disagree if you think this is a top priority now.

[jankeromnes]

@studentIvan FYI, you should now be able to "Install" Gitpod on iOS, and get a fullscreen app experience, thanks to eclipse-theia/theia#7607.

[Kreyren]

Electron

I know that i am saying this all the time and it's annoying, but PLEASE no.

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Maybe in the future we'll revisit this, and ideally find a way to have an iPad app without needing to rewrite all of Theia. But for now, I'll mark this as "won't fix". Please feel to disagree if you think this is a top priority now.

Afaik deploying an application for Tablets that are just a browser with disabled UI and shortcuts to wrap gitpod shoudn't be an issue alike proposed servo in #970, but i don't like this implementation since it's very janky and weird to use so i woudn't recommend changing priority on this.
If that is really desired then and assuming theia being a typescript you may want to look at https://www.nativescript.org/ which (fork i think?) i was helping to implement in past without major issues.

but theia should be adapted to be responsible anyway it's generally a good practice since making a static pages usually results in a lots of rewriting effort that increases exponentially the more it is evolved for which i would recommend bumping the priority assuming current theia code base to my layman understanding of it since i am not too familiar with typescript.

[stale]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[jankeromnes]

Keeping this feature request alive because of:

[studentIvan]

2 problems on iPad:

1. impossible to change the width of the panels
2. no any developer tools / console in the ipad browsers so developers can't develop and see what they develop, at least is complex

[studentIvan]

@studentIvan FYI, you should now be able to "Install" Gitpod on iOS, and get a fullscreen app experience, thanks to eclipse-theia/theia#7607.

just tried and it simple doesn't work, the only thing I see is a white screen

[studentIvan]

@studentIvan FYI, you should now be able to "Install" Gitpod on iOS, and get a fullscreen app experience, thanks to eclipse-theia/theia#7607.

just tried and it simple doesn't work, the only thing I see is a white screen

https://youtube.com/shorts/IgO4fUk5V3w?feature=share

[wilmarques]

Most of the issues we have on the iPad is because Safari for mobile devices has a weird implementation for mouse support.

Maybe a native app could ship with a different WebView engine embedded in it. Although I’m not sure if Apple would allow that.

[akaFTS]

Apple won't allow a differente WebView engine but you do have much more leeway to fine-tune the experience, shortcuts, UI and so on.

I honestly do not see a Gitpod webapp working decently on iPad anytime soon given how bad Mobile Safari is.