A very interesting, albeit old, thread on Stack Overflow piqued my curiosity the other day. The original author of the thread was asking: What is the difference between a website and a web-enabled application? This got me thinking because, to a layman like me, they both seemed the same. But this particular user was looking for definitions that would differentiate them. In his opinion, a website points to a specific page and a web-based application is a portal of content and information. However, web applications are also viewed through browsers. It would seem that the line between websites and web applications is blurred.

Another user joked that the difference between a website and a web-based application was a couple of thousand dollars. That one made me laugh! But finally, we got a more refined answer from Kerrek, an experienced Stack Overflow user, who made the following distinction:

1.A website is defined by its content
two.A web application is defined by its interaction with the user

He introduces the difference in terms of the degree to which the user experience is personal and subjective and goes on to explain that a website may consist of static content that visitors can use, while a web-enabled application relies on interaction with the visitor. , an interaction that requires programmatic user input and data processing. Kerrick goes on to say that complex websites that constantly change content rely on a sophisticated programmatic backend, but are still defined by their output. However, a web-based application is essentially a program that is executed remotely and is critically dependent on processing and a data storage backend.

Morrison, another user, relies more on Kerrek’s understanding:

1.Websites are primarily informational.: They provide content for visitors in a traditional sense, like the BBC and National Geographic websites do.

twoWeb applications are primarily for interaction.: They allow the user to interact and perform specific tasks such as sending emails, writing and saving documents, and consulting website analytics. For example, Google web-based applications such as Gmail, Google Docs, and Google Analytics.

3.They are not entirely exclusive.: Probably the most important fact about websites and web applications is that they are not mutually exclusive. Websites may contain applications that users can interact with, for example, a university website with a web-enabled application for managing student grades and course materials.

And finally, Genia, yet another user, felt that the term “website” was an anachronistic term from the early days of the Internet when the notion of a dynamic application that can respond to user input was very limited and uncommon. He goes on to say that commercial websites were largely interactive brochures, with the exception of hotel or airline booking sites. Genia says that over time, the functionality of these websites and their supporting technologies have become more responsive, and the line between an app you install on your computer and one that exists in the cloud has blurred.

Now, if you’re still as confused as ever, it’s safe to assume that web-based applications require user input and data processing and are generally inclined to perform a set of functions. A web application can be seen as a group of static HTML pages that provide content and information to a user and can also have embedded applications.