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> The biggest issue isn't UI - GTK easily solves that. I laid out above why this doesn't solve anything for products that haven't been developed with that in m

by Udo 10y ago

> The biggest issue isn't UI - GTK easily solves that. I laid out above why this doesn't solve anything for products that haven't been developed with that in mind from the start. These are the majority of commercial software. > Support costs money. That isn't feasible for a ~3% market share OS. That's part of the reason why many vendors didn't (and still don't) support OS X either, whereas those who did turned a tidy profit. It's certainly worth it if you just charge for it. And there's always the prospect of growing your market share with an underdeveloped platform. Personally I think it's largely psychological. Vendors assume Linux users will likely not pay for professional software. But with more developers switching over that could change.

tornadoboy55 10y ago
The difference is that OS X is largely used by wealthier people (that can afford the entry fee into Apple's walled garden). OS X is also a stable target. Supporting all major Linux distros would already mean distributing your app in 4+ (!) package formats. Oh, and every distro has different libraries and bugs. Then there's the problem of Linux users, who are compromised largely of tinkerers and FOSS zealots. Believe me man, I would be stoked if I could use 1Password, Alfred, Amphetamine, Karabiner, etc. on Linux but it simply isn't happening for a few more years. Ingredients needed: 1 package format (so Flatpak needs to win because most other distros will never accept Snappy packages) 1 UI kit (GTK has this bagged) 1 core set of libraries and most of all consistency. Even from LTS to LTS there shouldn't change too much. I'm pretty sure someone that's used to OS9 could pick up Sierra and be reasonably productive. Try teaching an average person Gnome 1.0 on Debian 2.1 and then drop him in Gnome 3.2 on Debian 8.6..... yeah
- cbcoutinho 10y ago
  As far as package format goes, I think it depends on the complexity of your app. Electron is making development of rather simple apps pretty straight-forward - I'm using at least 2 apps daily that are developed using Electron, and I can access them on both Linux and Windows. I'm not a really heavy application user, but I am curious about the limitations of centralizing packaging using something like Flatpak or Electron. If you try to build a program like Photoshop or Solidworks, do you run into some of the bottlenecks of those services?
  - tornadoboy55 10y ago
    Electron is a webbrowser-as-a-backend on which JS+HTML5 apps run. Photoshop is written in C++, or at least large parts of it. Plus its millions of lines of code. Adobe (or any company really) will never go to the effort (think ten-thousands of man hours) of completely rewriting Photoshop (let alone their entire Creative Suite) just so its on Electron and Linux geeks can run it. Plus, its JS- it will run like hog-shit compared to C++. And even if you hypothetically did get it somewhat performant - we need to get rid of feeling the need to run everything on Electron. Atom runs on Electron. GitKraken runs on Electron. So does WhatsApp. I don't want to spawn 5 Electron instances just to run some apps. Its just horribly inefficient. WhatsApp on OS X, a chat client, uses 500Mb memory(!). Safari with 5 tabs open uses 550Mb. Telegram, which basically does the same as WhatsApp uses 125Mb, because its written natively. What would be best is a unified repo that solely contains Flatpaks. Flatpaks contain all the libraries the application needs to work, so no more issues supporting 20 different distros. However, that will never happen: 2/3+ of Linux users are on Ubuntu and Canonical will always want control (and they want to force their own standard- Snappy packages), and the other 1/3 does not want to bend to Canonical and their weird contributor license. I've already voiced it elsewhere but (mainline) Linux could be as solid as OS X, if only there was more consistency. If almost all distros were purely Wayland+Gnome+Flatpak (and mostly on the same versions) then most companies would feel comfortable targeting that instead of the constant moving multi-target that Linux is now.

by Udo 10y ago

tornadoboy55 10y ago

The difference is that OS X is largely used by wealthier people (that can afford the entry fee into Apple's walled garden). OS X is also a stable target. Supporting all major Linux distros would already mean distributing your app in 4+ (!) package formats. Oh, and every distro has different libraries and bugs. Then there's the problem of Linux users, who are compromised largely of tinkerers and FOSS zealots. Believe me man, I would be stoked if I could use 1Password, Alfred, Amphetamine, Karabiner, etc. on Linux but it simply isn't happening for a few more years. Ingredients needed: 1 package format (so Flatpak needs to win because most other distros will never accept Snappy packages) 1 UI kit (GTK has this bagged) 1 core set of libraries and most of all consistency. Even from LTS to LTS there shouldn't change too much. I'm pretty sure someone that's used to OS9 could pick up Sierra and be reasonably productive. Try teaching an average person Gnome 1.0 on Debian 2.1 and then drop him in Gnome 3.2 on Debian 8.6..... yeah

cbcoutinho 10y ago
As far as package format goes, I think it depends on the complexity of your app. Electron is making development of rather simple apps pretty straight-forward - I'm using at least 2 apps daily that are developed using Electron, and I can access them on both Linux and Windows. I'm not a really heavy application user, but I am curious about the limitations of centralizing packaging using something like Flatpak or Electron. If you try to build a program like Photoshop or Solidworks, do you run into some of the bottlenecks of those services?
- tornadoboy55 10y ago
  Electron is a webbrowser-as-a-backend on which JS+HTML5 apps run. Photoshop is written in C++, or at least large parts of it. Plus its millions of lines of code. Adobe (or any company really) will never go to the effort (think ten-thousands of man hours) of completely rewriting Photoshop (let alone their entire Creative Suite) just so its on Electron and Linux geeks can run it. Plus, its JS- it will run like hog-shit compared to C++. And even if you hypothetically did get it somewhat performant - we need to get rid of feeling the need to run everything on Electron. Atom runs on Electron. GitKraken runs on Electron. So does WhatsApp. I don't want to spawn 5 Electron instances just to run some apps. Its just horribly inefficient. WhatsApp on OS X, a chat client, uses 500Mb memory(!). Safari with 5 tabs open uses 550Mb. Telegram, which basically does the same as WhatsApp uses 125Mb, because its written natively. What would be best is a unified repo that solely contains Flatpaks. Flatpaks contain all the libraries the application needs to work, so no more issues supporting 20 different distros. However, that will never happen: 2/3+ of Linux users are on Ubuntu and Canonical will always want control (and they want to force their own standard- Snappy packages), and the other 1/3 does not want to bend to Canonical and their weird contributor license. I've already voiced it elsewhere but (mainline) Linux could be as solid as OS X, if only there was more consistency. If almost all distros were purely Wayland+Gnome+Flatpak (and mostly on the same versions) then most companies would feel comfortable targeting that instead of the constant moving multi-target that Linux is now.