6 ms·

This looks like such a nice app! Proper Mac UI too. I'm going to try it out as soon as I get home.

Waterluvian 8y ago
This is interesting to me because it's an example of the other side of the "Electron" argument. `lsof` exists in Linux. At least, my Ubuntu 16.04 has it. So if this were an Electron UI, would we instantly have a Linux version as well? Or is it not that simple? I do really enjoy the look and feel of this mac version, though.
- solarkraft 8y ago
  > if this were an Electron UI, would we instantly have a Linux version as well? Many Electron apps are only written in JS without any (or no neccessary) platform specific code, but some also interface with the platform. In this case, if it just calls lsof through the shell and the versions are the same, it might actually just work. If it ships with its own binary it'd need to be switched out.
- ourcat 8y ago
  That's right. Once you've got the equivalent commands for each platform, it should be possible to build and package for all of them (Mac/Win/Linux). I've just done a tri-platform Electron app which handles quite a few platform-specific commands. (For drive listing, SD-card formatting, file decryption (in custom C apps), etc.) It does take a lot more work (and lots of time-consuming testing). But it can be done.
- lawnchair_larry 8y ago
  Taking something as lightweight as an lsof command line tool and putting an entire web browser and node.js instance on top seems like we are moving in the wrong direction. It’s like we are going to need a terabyte of RAM and a Tesla battery to run basic apps of the future with even half of the performance we got out of our systems 2 decades previously.
  - kitsunesoba 8y ago
    It’d be like building a factory around a music box.
  - joppy 8y ago
    I'm not sure that I would call something with about 40 screens of man pages "lightweight".
    - yakshaving_jgt 8y ago
      The size of the program’s man page doesn’t impact the performance characteristics of the program, does it?
      - joppy 8y ago
        No, but "lightweight" doesn't necessarily mean performant. The size of the program's man page might be the thing that makes people want a different, more discoverable interface to the program.
  - canadaduane 8y ago
    I feel like this argument is the software engineer's version of "smaller government" political ideology. Yes, we want small, fast processes. Yes, we want efficiency. But we want efficiency _for the sake of usability_. For the Linux user, Sloth is (nearly) useless. Electron would have provided great value (at the cost of and under the burden of larger hardware, etc.) Complexity and resource usage creep isn't going away, although I applaud efforts to reduce complexity and use resources parsimoniously.
  - webninja 8y ago
    What are better starting points? QT?
    - lawnchair_larry 8y ago
      Yes
- tomc1985 8y ago
  The app is older than Electron. The people who this tool were written for would probably dislike a big, slow Electron app anyway And why Electron? Why not QT, or Java swing, or some other language with GTK?
  - dylan604 8y ago
    > And why Electron? Why not QT, or Java swing, or some other language with GTK? In this specific case, the app was targeted for MacOS and OS X earlier. Java really isn't a good solve on that platform. Which also makes it not a good solve for anything on the Mac platform. I have been wanting to build a UI tool for non-techies to be a front end to a collection of shell scripts that I have been using for day-to-day tasks. I have written the scripts to be a friendly as I can make them with drag-n-drop folders as inputs rather than requiring arguments to be provided. This looks like a good example for me to use as research.
    - jacobolus 8y ago
      Electron apps are also horrible on the Mac (and probably everywhere else too). Buggy, bloated resource hogs with nonstandard and limited UI and incredibly high input latency for simple actions. As a Mac user, when I hear “Electron app” I think “company that was too lazy/cheap to make a real Mac app.”
      - dylan604 8y ago
        Also, if Electron apps are just a packaged up webpage, could they even do things like run shell scripts locally? I'm also wanting to allow the user to browse for a file and have the full path intact instead of just the name of the file a browser would return.
        lawnchair_larry 8y ago
        Not only that, but they have pervasive cross-site scripting vulnerabilities that are now exposing the user to remote code execution! Also, they tend to have out of date dependencies, and are vulnerable to traditional code execution exploits that were fixed in upstream chrome long prior.
- fouc 8y ago
  Except how big is the Electron app going to be?
  - ourcat 8y ago
    Well, there's that ;) Between 50Mb and 80Mb for the installer. Over 100Mb installed, depending on what is used.
- pantalaimon 8y ago
  I wonder if it was possible to port the App to Linux using GnuStep or the Cocotron.
- ksherlock 8y ago
  GNUStep also exists in Linux. Maybe the Linux version is just a compile away.
ttsda 8y ago
Proper Mac UI, and it's 0.6MB! :)
- Rebelgecko 8y ago
  For me it looks like the binary is 1.4MB (which is still fantastic)
  - svth 8y ago
    Binary is ~200KB. The rest is mostly images, icons and whatnot, and the auto-update framework (Sparkle). Version 1.0 was 40KB zipped, back in 2004. O tempora, O bloat.
ryanmarsh 8y ago
It's not proper in that it is not properly signed. Gatekeeper complains that it cannot be opened because it is from an unidentified developer. What kind of security risk is this for me?
- svth 8y ago
  Author of Sloth here. I develop free software in my spare time and I'm not willing to pay Apple USD 100 per year for the "privilege" of developing for their platform. It's a sad state of affairs when independent developers like me have to shell out hard cash in order to give software away for free. True, USD 100 isn't much, but I'm opposed, on principle, to paying money to an enormously wealthy megacorporation just to make software for their platform. Not so very long ago, macOS had a vibrant independent developer community. It's now slowly being choked to death with this horrid App Store stuff.
  - MiddleEndian 8y ago
    Good for you, man. That was one of the reasons I stopped using OS X.
  - cjohansson 8y ago
    Keep up the good work, I agree with you on that. I can’t see any reason why Apple don’t give free developer certificates to serious developers
  - lawnchair_larry 8y ago
    I think that $100 is less of a cash grab and more of a gate to nefarious actors - they can’t trivially cycle through certificates for their malware without spending $100 every time, but $100 is likely not so much that it will hurt an independent developer. I see your perspective though. I have mixed feelings about it as well.
- tomovo 8y ago
  That is for you to assess. macOS gives you the opportunity to either override the security popup by right-clicking the app and launching it anyway, or not. Also, the "security risk" doesn't get a whole lot smaller when the app is signed. Only widely known malware apps will get their certificates revoked in time. The new "notarization" is slightly more thorough but the risk is still up to you and the app permissions for non-appstore non-sandboxed apps are indeed quite open. Malicious or not, an app that is not sandboxed can steal or damage your data anywhere in the filesystem. So again - all up to you to decide.

This is interesting to me because it's an example of the other side of the "Electron" argument. `lsof` exists in Linux. At least, my Ubuntu 16.04 has it. So if this were an Electron UI, would we instantly have a Linux version as well? Or is it not that simple? I do really enjoy the look and feel of this mac version, though.

solarkraft 8y ago
> if this were an Electron UI, would we instantly have a Linux version as well? Many Electron apps are only written in JS without any (or no neccessary) platform specific code, but some also interface with the platform. In this case, if it just calls lsof through the shell and the versions are the same, it might actually just work. If it ships with its own binary it'd need to be switched out.
ourcat 8y ago
That's right. Once you've got the equivalent commands for each platform, it should be possible to build and package for all of them (Mac/Win/Linux). I've just done a tri-platform Electron app which handles quite a few platform-specific commands. (For drive listing, SD-card formatting, file decryption (in custom C apps), etc.) It does take a lot more work (and lots of time-consuming testing). But it can be done.
lawnchair_larry 8y ago
Taking something as lightweight as an lsof command line tool and putting an entire web browser and node.js instance on top seems like we are moving in the wrong direction. It’s like we are going to need a terabyte of RAM and a Tesla battery to run basic apps of the future with even half of the performance we got out of our systems 2 decades previously.
- kitsunesoba 8y ago
  It’d be like building a factory around a music box.
- joppy 8y ago
  I'm not sure that I would call something with about 40 screens of man pages "lightweight".
  - yakshaving_jgt 8y ago
    The size of the program’s man page doesn’t impact the performance characteristics of the program, does it?
    - joppy 8y ago
      No, but "lightweight" doesn't necessarily mean performant. The size of the program's man page might be the thing that makes people want a different, more discoverable interface to the program.
- canadaduane 8y ago
  I feel like this argument is the software engineer's version of "smaller government" political ideology. Yes, we want small, fast processes. Yes, we want efficiency. But we want efficiency _for the sake of usability_. For the Linux user, Sloth is (nearly) useless. Electron would have provided great value (at the cost of and under the burden of larger hardware, etc.) Complexity and resource usage creep isn't going away, although I applaud efforts to reduce complexity and use resources parsimoniously.
- webninja 8y ago
  What are better starting points? QT?
  - lawnchair_larry 8y ago
    Yes
tomc1985 8y ago
The app is older than Electron. The people who this tool were written for would probably dislike a big, slow Electron app anyway And why Electron? Why not QT, or Java swing, or some other language with GTK?
- dylan604 8y ago
  > And why Electron? Why not QT, or Java swing, or some other language with GTK? In this specific case, the app was targeted for MacOS and OS X earlier. Java really isn't a good solve on that platform. Which also makes it not a good solve for anything on the Mac platform. I have been wanting to build a UI tool for non-techies to be a front end to a collection of shell scripts that I have been using for day-to-day tasks. I have written the scripts to be a friendly as I can make them with drag-n-drop folders as inputs rather than requiring arguments to be provided. This looks like a good example for me to use as research.
  - jacobolus 8y ago
    Electron apps are also horrible on the Mac (and probably everywhere else too). Buggy, bloated resource hogs with nonstandard and limited UI and incredibly high input latency for simple actions. As a Mac user, when I hear “Electron app” I think “company that was too lazy/cheap to make a real Mac app.”
    - dylan604 8y ago
      Also, if Electron apps are just a packaged up webpage, could they even do things like run shell scripts locally? I'm also wanting to allow the user to browse for a file and have the full path intact instead of just the name of the file a browser would return.
      - lawnchair_larry 8y ago
        Not only that, but they have pervasive cross-site scripting vulnerabilities that are now exposing the user to remote code execution! Also, they tend to have out of date dependencies, and are vulnerable to traditional code execution exploits that were fixed in upstream chrome long prior.
fouc 8y ago
Except how big is the Electron app going to be?
- ourcat 8y ago
  Well, there's that ;) Between 50Mb and 80Mb for the installer. Over 100Mb installed, depending on what is used.
pantalaimon 8y ago
I wonder if it was possible to port the App to Linux using GnuStep or the Cocotron.
ksherlock 8y ago
GNUStep also exists in Linux. Maybe the Linux version is just a compile away.

ttsda 8y ago

Proper Mac UI, and it's 0.6MB! :)

Rebelgecko 8y ago
For me it looks like the binary is 1.4MB (which is still fantastic)
- svth 8y ago
  Binary is ~200KB. The rest is mostly images, icons and whatnot, and the auto-update framework (Sparkle). Version 1.0 was 40KB zipped, back in 2004. O tempora, O bloat.

ryanmarsh 8y ago

It's not proper in that it is not properly signed. Gatekeeper complains that it cannot be opened because it is from an unidentified developer. What kind of security risk is this for me?

svth 8y ago
Author of Sloth here. I develop free software in my spare time and I'm not willing to pay Apple USD 100 per year for the "privilege" of developing for their platform. It's a sad state of affairs when independent developers like me have to shell out hard cash in order to give software away for free. True, USD 100 isn't much, but I'm opposed, on principle, to paying money to an enormously wealthy megacorporation just to make software for their platform. Not so very long ago, macOS had a vibrant independent developer community. It's now slowly being choked to death with this horrid App Store stuff.
- MiddleEndian 8y ago
  Good for you, man. That was one of the reasons I stopped using OS X.
- cjohansson 8y ago
  Keep up the good work, I agree with you on that. I can’t see any reason why Apple don’t give free developer certificates to serious developers
- lawnchair_larry 8y ago
  I think that $100 is less of a cash grab and more of a gate to nefarious actors - they can’t trivially cycle through certificates for their malware without spending $100 every time, but $100 is likely not so much that it will hurt an independent developer. I see your perspective though. I have mixed feelings about it as well.
tomovo 8y ago
That is for you to assess. macOS gives you the opportunity to either override the security popup by right-clicking the app and launching it anyway, or not. Also, the "security risk" doesn't get a whole lot smaller when the app is signed. Only widely known malware apps will get their certificates revoked in time. The new "notarization" is slightly more thorough but the risk is still up to you and the app permissions for non-appstore non-sandboxed apps are indeed quite open. Malicious or not, an app that is not sandboxed can steal or damage your data anywhere in the filesystem. So again - all up to you to decide.