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I was with you until you mentioned how long to takes to start an electron app... It's nearly instantaneous for me. Actually, nearly all apps open instantaneousl

I was with you until you mentioned how long to takes to start an electron app... It's nearly instantaneous for me. Actually, nearly all apps open instantaneously for me but maybe it's because I'm running a Linux Desktop with an SSD? Also, the battery thing is nonsense. An idle web app will use up just as much battery as an idle native app. It's the implementation and code architecture decisions that matter more for battery then the underlying APIs. Lastly, making apps cross-cross-platform is worthwhile unless the point of the app is platform-specific (e.g. an app that tunes something in the OS). You're always going to end up with a larger code base and more complexity when making things cross-platform. Using something like electron is an excellent way to avoid all that complexity.

userbinator 10y ago
An idle web app will use up just as much battery as an idle native app. How about when they're not idle? There's probably an order of magnitude if not more instructions being executed in Electron, which eventually reaches the same OS APIs a native app would call directly. JITs still have overhead. You're always going to end up with a larger code base and more complexity when making things cross-platform. Using something like electron is an excellent way to avoid all that complexity. All you've done is moved the complexity to where you as a developer may not see it, but your users sure do.
AbacusAvenger 10y ago
An idle web app will use up just as much battery as an idle native app. Idle apps can still vary in how much battery life they consume. I've seen some background apps that don't appear to be using any CPU (i.e. "0%" utilization) but actually have high-frequency timers which will wake the CPU every time they fire. Waking the CPU is bad news because it kicks it out of the low-power C-states and thus eats more battery. If you're on Windows try running 'powercfg /sleepstudy' and you might find some interesting power-hungry behavior from even "idle" apps: https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2014/06/26/sleep-study-diagnose-whats-draining-your-battery-while-the-system-sleeps/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2014/06/26/sleep... On Linux, you can use 'powertop' for the same purpose, though I've found powertop is more useful since it shows more raw data and makes fewer assumptions.

userbinator 10y ago

An idle web app will use up just as much battery as an idle native app. How about when they're not idle? There's probably an order of magnitude if not more instructions being executed in Electron, which eventually reaches the same OS APIs a native app would call directly. JITs still have overhead. You're always going to end up with a larger code base and more complexity when making things cross-platform. Using something like electron is an excellent way to avoid all that complexity. All you've done is moved the complexity to where you as a developer may not see it, but your users sure do.

AbacusAvenger 10y ago

An idle web app will use up just as much battery as an idle native app. Idle apps can still vary in how much battery life they consume. I've seen some background apps that don't appear to be using any CPU (i.e. "0%" utilization) but actually have high-frequency timers which will wake the CPU every time they fire. Waking the CPU is bad news because it kicks it out of the low-power C-states and thus eats more battery. If you're on Windows try running 'powercfg /sleepstudy' and you might find some interesting power-hungry behavior from even "idle" apps: https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2014/06/26/sleep-study-diagnose-whats-draining-your-battery-while-the-system-sleeps/ https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2014/06/26/sleep... On Linux, you can use 'powertop' for the same purpose, though I've found powertop is more useful since it shows more raw data and makes fewer assumptions.