3 ms·

This issue is so furiously divisive, and I feel like it brings out the worst in HN. I'm from a web dev background. Some of the comments here make me feel like

This issue is so furiously divisive, and I feel like it brings out the worst in HN. I'm from a web dev background. Some of the comments here make me feel like I should be ashamed of that fact. I can see both sides of this argument (every time it comes up) As a consumer of apps, I want the leanest, most minimalist, fastest thing going. I want native apps on my devices (If you think slack is a hog on the desktop you should try it on Windows Phone). But as a developer, I know that electron is a shortcut that means my app will take less time to build. I can take my existing skills, take work I've already done on a WinJS app and publish it on Mac OS, Linux and Win 7. I can spend more time with my family, instead of spending all my evenings learning py+qt, or xamarin, or react native, or whatever the new fangled thing is. And I know people will use it. Hell, I've even got better odds of pushing an electron app than a native one, as I can submit a pull request and maybe have it appear on https://electron.atom.io/ https://electron.atom.io/ Obviously, seeing the Electron hate always gives me pause for thought, but at the end of the day it feels like the hatred is from fellow coders (if a dribbling front-end-js writing low-life such as myself can call you writing-assembly-on-a-napkin-while-you-quote-stallman-types fellow coders) and my apps user-base is overwhelmingly non-technical.

pseudalopex 10y ago
Your non-technical users are capable of noticing that a certain application makes their computer slow or drains their battery or doesn't support a certain feature of their platform. It may take them longer to notice, and they won't know why, but that won't stop them from switching if a better alternative comes along. Delivering high-quality web apps generally requires knowing JavaScript and CSS. Delivering high-quality desktop apps generally requires knowing the tools of that ecosystem. Sometimes we compromise to get things out the door, but we should be honest with ourselves when we do.
- roryisok 10y ago
  I'm honest with myself. I'm not disputing that Electron is not the most optimal way to create a desktop app, I'm saying that it makes desktop development (particularly cross-platform development) faster and easier. I know I could make a more efficient app by going native. And hopefully in time, I will. But for the sake of getting it out the door I'll most likely go the Electron route.
  - pseudalopex 10y ago
    I meant that as a general statement, not a challenge to you specifically. I wish I'd phrased it more kindly, because dismissing criticisms as "hatred" and implying that non-technical users don't care about battery life are the sort of thing I'm advocating against.
astrobe_ 10y ago
> This issue is so furiously divisive, and I feel like it brings out the worst in HN. I'm from a web dev background. Some of the comments here make me feel like I should be ashamed of that fact. I'm an embedded devices programmer and I'm proud of it. Proud to know a little bit about my hardware, and proud to get the most out of it. And I'm ashamed when I find a more efficient way to do something: it's not an optimisation but a bug fix.
tigershark 10y ago
Honestly seems quite sad that developers today know only one (quite awful) language and have no whatsoever interest to learn new things because they can just write an application (probably with a quality not much better than the aforementioned language) that can be used everywhere but taking a huge amount of unneeded resources. The thing that I like the most in software development is the ability to continuously learn new techniques and new, better, ways of solving problems. I'm really afraid to think what would have happened if VbScript would have won the race as the de facto standard for the web.. ..but actually thinking about it probably it would not have been that different from today. We would have had VisualElectron instead of Electron, but with all the same problems maybe in a slightly worse or slightly better language, depending from the point of view.

pseudalopex 10y ago

Your non-technical users are capable of noticing that a certain application makes their computer slow or drains their battery or doesn't support a certain feature of their platform. It may take them longer to notice, and they won't know why, but that won't stop them from switching if a better alternative comes along. Delivering high-quality web apps generally requires knowing JavaScript and CSS. Delivering high-quality desktop apps generally requires knowing the tools of that ecosystem. Sometimes we compromise to get things out the door, but we should be honest with ourselves when we do.

roryisok 10y ago
I'm honest with myself. I'm not disputing that Electron is not the most optimal way to create a desktop app, I'm saying that it makes desktop development (particularly cross-platform development) faster and easier. I know I could make a more efficient app by going native. And hopefully in time, I will. But for the sake of getting it out the door I'll most likely go the Electron route.
- pseudalopex 10y ago
  I meant that as a general statement, not a challenge to you specifically. I wish I'd phrased it more kindly, because dismissing criticisms as "hatred" and implying that non-technical users don't care about battery life are the sort of thing I'm advocating against.

astrobe_ 10y ago

> This issue is so furiously divisive, and I feel like it brings out the worst in HN. I'm from a web dev background. Some of the comments here make me feel like I should be ashamed of that fact. I'm an embedded devices programmer and I'm proud of it. Proud to know a little bit about my hardware, and proud to get the most out of it. And I'm ashamed when I find a more efficient way to do something: it's not an optimisation but a bug fix.

tigershark 10y ago

Honestly seems quite sad that developers today know only one (quite awful) language and have no whatsoever interest to learn new things because they can just write an application (probably with a quality not much better than the aforementioned language) that can be used everywhere but taking a huge amount of unneeded resources. The thing that I like the most in software development is the ability to continuously learn new techniques and new, better, ways of solving problems. I'm really afraid to think what would have happened if VbScript would have won the race as the de facto standard for the web.. ..but actually thinking about it probably it would not have been that different from today. We would have had VisualElectron instead of Electron, but with all the same problems maybe in a slightly worse or slightly better language, depending from the point of view.