I have worked on both Webapps and application software for last few years now. Whenever I look up to strategize the menu for the application, there is a subtle difference and a confusion that I see about how the webapps see the menu bar and the latter.
Why is Nav Menu in webapp tend to help us literally navigate and the software applications has operations and features combined?
Need your perspectives
Application software is much older than web apps. The UI/UX principles have fundamentally changed in the meantime. "In the old days" there were actually only a Microsoft standard and later an Apple standard on how to design UIs and which elements should be used in which purpose.
The application approach stems from the "Object operation" wording. Like:
File -> Print or File -> Save. First inconsistencies came up with the introduction of "Edit" as primary "object". Like Edit -> Cut to Clipboard (could be shortened to "Cut" because it is an ubiquitous operation, intimately known to any user) or even worse Edit -> Preferences.
Apple introduced the "program name" in the menu as primary object, while Microsoft went with "File". Program -> Preferences makes much more sense in the "Object operation" scheme. Same with Program -> Exit and File -> Exit.
Web apps on the other hand are mainly very narrow in scope. More than desktop applications. So their menu and navigation could be simplified, while menus on the desktop grew larger and larger.
