Survey: Most Developers Now Prefer HTML5 For Cross-Platform Development

Surprising, a company that makes development frameworks for working with various HTML5 era technologies did a survey that found the majority of those surveyed preferred creating mobile apps using HTML5 over using development frameworks native to each platform.

The study appears to draw erroneous conclusions about mobile cross platform development by presenting mobile cross platform development questions primarily to desktop website developers. A concluding statement for the study could have been, "Desktop website developers prefer HTML5 technologies for cross platform development, indicating that HTML5 is more popular than native development on mobile devices".

The issue with a survey like this, and the reason a company takes no issue with providing a bad survey, is that many people will believe it. They don't have the time or the inclination to question it or the article that glosses over it.

The article correctly points out the bias in the survey resulting from asking developers who are highly likely to already be experienced in and doing HTML5 development whether they plan to use HTML5 for development in 2013.

The study conclusions list the perceived difficulty of developing for various platforms. I think this is an irrelevant ranking -- you develop for where your desired users are and there are still platforms where there are fewer users (Microsoft mobile). The notion that Microsoft products are easier to develop for isn't really important at this stage. The study indicates the developers were asked only to respond for platforms they had worked with. The truth is that few developers have worked with multiple platforms to a great degree and I suspect that the difficulty level tracks experience level more than anything else. It wouldn't be ideal, but the study should have asked for experience level on each platform so that developers that, for example, spent a weekend trying to learn a platform were weeded out.

The study notes that 60% of the planned development from those surveyed is for desktop "apps". The term "app" has officially been appropriated to mean all software with a user facing UI because people making desktop applications or websites were upset they weren't a part of the mobile app revolution. If most of the developers are targeting desktops for business use (I'm assuming the business use part based on "productivity" apps being the most prevalent app type and that 71% of those surveyed worked in medium or enterprise businesses), is it really surprising that they would show a bias toward using HTML5 on Windows or that they would consider the platform they are already working with to be the easiest to develop for?

Lastly, if most of the "apps" being created by those surveyed are for business productivity, it wouldn't be surprising that HTML5 is valued -- business productivity is about spending as little money as possible to provide a functional product. These are the bullet points HTML5 products are expected to hit. Ease of use and user experience are rarely on the list of goals (at least not seriously).