4 ms·

Why would you use this instead of Electron?

Sir_Cmpwn 11y ago
Because Electron provides an awful UX. It ships with an entire web stack for applications that could be 1/100th the size and 100x the performance if they used a native toolkit instead of a web view. Electron apps also get none of the native L+F that you get if you use an actual toolkit properly. Electron is to the desktop as hybrid apps are to mobile.
- ex3ndr 11y ago
  OSX UX libraries are always was slower than chrome-based. If your chrome-based app is slow then this is problem in your code, not in chrome itself.
- eudox 11y ago
  >Electron apps also get none of the native L+F that you get if you use an actual toolkit properly. This is a selling point. CSS can make an app look beautiful, native look-and-feel is always atrocious, everywhere.
  - IMcD23 11y ago
    Key word can. It's also important to give users a familiar feel across the apps on their platform. The UX must make sense to them.
  - lucian1900 11y ago
    Is it atrocious? At least on OS X, iOS and Android, the native UI is quite good.
  - boomlinde 11y ago
    The obvious advantage to native look and feel is that it will be familiar to users, and that consistency in itself might make for an overall more beautiful look. If I use 5 applications and they all look entirely different, it will not look beautiful, and each time I swap to a different application I have to re-familiarize with whatever the UI designer thought was a good idea for that application.
- jstejada 11y ago
  I don't think that's true. You can achieve a lot with just react, css, node and the electron APIs. With enough effort and attention to detail you can make an app look and feel native with css (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIRXVGVPzn8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIRXVGVPzn8), V8 is not /that/ slow, and you have the advantage of using multiple node processes inside electron to offload work. And it's cross platform. Yes, the built apps might end up being big, but that's a trade off I'm willing to take in favor of developing cross platforms apps with a modern and familiar web stack.
potomushto 11y ago
Author here. In most cases, Electron is much better in many ways. I'm working on the code editor right now, so I'd like to build something small (few megabytes), performant, but allows me to use the whole js ecosystem.

Because Electron provides an awful UX. It ships with an entire web stack for applications that could be 1/100th the size and 100x the performance if they used a native toolkit instead of a web view. Electron apps also get none of the native L+F that you get if you use an actual toolkit properly. Electron is to the desktop as hybrid apps are to mobile.

ex3ndr 11y ago
OSX UX libraries are always was slower than chrome-based. If your chrome-based app is slow then this is problem in your code, not in chrome itself.
eudox 11y ago
>Electron apps also get none of the native L+F that you get if you use an actual toolkit properly. This is a selling point. CSS can make an app look beautiful, native look-and-feel is always atrocious, everywhere.
- IMcD23 11y ago
  Key word can. It's also important to give users a familiar feel across the apps on their platform. The UX must make sense to them.
- lucian1900 11y ago
  Is it atrocious? At least on OS X, iOS and Android, the native UI is quite good.
- boomlinde 11y ago
  The obvious advantage to native look and feel is that it will be familiar to users, and that consistency in itself might make for an overall more beautiful look. If I use 5 applications and they all look entirely different, it will not look beautiful, and each time I swap to a different application I have to re-familiarize with whatever the UI designer thought was a good idea for that application.
jstejada 11y ago
I don't think that's true. You can achieve a lot with just react, css, node and the electron APIs. With enough effort and attention to detail you can make an app look and feel native with css (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIRXVGVPzn8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIRXVGVPzn8), V8 is not /that/ slow, and you have the advantage of using multiple node processes inside electron to offload work. And it's cross platform. Yes, the built apps might end up being big, but that's a trade off I'm willing to take in favor of developing cross platforms apps with a modern and familiar web stack.

potomushto 11y ago

Author here. In most cases, Electron is much better in many ways. I'm working on the code editor right now, so I'd like to build something small (few megabytes), performant, but allows me to use the whole js ecosystem.