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I don't have much experience in the world of UI/cross-platform, so the following question might have some obvious answers, however: Why would someone opt for,

by maest 7y ago

I don't have much experience in the world of UI/cross-platform, so the following question might have some obvious answers, however: Why would someone opt for, say, Qt to design an app, when they can develop something in browser and have that run cross platform? (My guess is that the browser is insufficient for power users / sophisticated use cases.)

RossBencina 7y ago
First you'd need to work out why someone would develop a desktop application rather than a browser-based application. Even once that's resolved it is not a given that you'd choose Qt. Factors that might weigh in favour of developing a desktop application: Some applications expect access to native platform features -- for example audio IO, or custom data acquisition, or access to native hardware capabilities, or last-20% performance. Although there are workarounds to access this kind of stuff from a Web UI, sometimes it is considered easier to just write everything in one platform-native language. Obviously over time some of these technologies come to the web (e.g. Web audio, WASM) but some people prefer to program a real machine, not a W3C specified VM. There is a perception that web or Atom applications use more resources than a well tuned C++ desktop application. If your application is already resource intensive then putting a resource intensive web UI on it doesn't necessarily make sense. Personally I have the perception that web technologies are too volatile to take a long term bet on. I don't consider that rewriting my application every few years is a good use of my time. That said, the release churn on Qt is now way too high for my liking. I wouldn't underestimate the "If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail" mindset -- if you're a C++ programmer, developing a desktop / Qt application might be more appealing than using web technologies. Of course it goes the other way too. Once you've determined to make a desktop application, then you can ask why you would use Qt for cross-platform UI (note that there are other reasons to use Qt, such as for embedded UI). No doubt your "insufficient for power users / sophisticated use cases" is sometimes applicable. But I think this is mostly related to "native desktop app" vs "browser-based" rather than Qt / not-Qt. There are many cross-platform desktop applications that choose not to use Qt. So you really have to look at the problem Qt deals with. UI APIs on each platform are radically different: no matter how you approach it, cross-platform UI requires a portable UI architecture, and Qt provides this architecture off the shelf. Qt also provides a whole lot of other frameworky stuff that you may or may not want or need. It's a one stop shop. Some application developers want something close to native look-and-feel but want to outsource-cross platform UI (a kind-of write once, run everywhere, at least for the UI). In this sense Qt is one of the middle options in the "Native / cross-platform / web" continuum.
- maest 7y ago
  That makes sense, thanks for taking the time to write that up.

by maest 7y ago

RossBencina 7y ago

First you'd need to work out why someone would develop a desktop application rather than a browser-based application. Even once that's resolved it is not a given that you'd choose Qt. Factors that might weigh in favour of developing a desktop application: Some applications expect access to native platform features -- for example audio IO, or custom data acquisition, or access to native hardware capabilities, or last-20% performance. Although there are workarounds to access this kind of stuff from a Web UI, sometimes it is considered easier to just write everything in one platform-native language. Obviously over time some of these technologies come to the web (e.g. Web audio, WASM) but some people prefer to program a real machine, not a W3C specified VM. There is a perception that web or Atom applications use more resources than a well tuned C++ desktop application. If your application is already resource intensive then putting a resource intensive web UI on it doesn't necessarily make sense. Personally I have the perception that web technologies are too volatile to take a long term bet on. I don't consider that rewriting my application every few years is a good use of my time. That said, the release churn on Qt is now way too high for my liking. I wouldn't underestimate the "If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail" mindset -- if you're a C++ programmer, developing a desktop / Qt application might be more appealing than using web technologies. Of course it goes the other way too. Once you've determined to make a desktop application, then you can ask why you would use Qt for cross-platform UI (note that there are other reasons to use Qt, such as for embedded UI). No doubt your "insufficient for power users / sophisticated use cases" is sometimes applicable. But I think this is mostly related to "native desktop app" vs "browser-based" rather than Qt / not-Qt. There are many cross-platform desktop applications that choose not to use Qt. So you really have to look at the problem Qt deals with. UI APIs on each platform are radically different: no matter how you approach it, cross-platform UI requires a portable UI architecture, and Qt provides this architecture off the shelf. Qt also provides a whole lot of other frameworky stuff that you may or may not want or need. It's a one stop shop. Some application developers want something close to native look-and-feel but want to outsource-cross platform UI (a kind-of write once, run everywhere, at least for the UI). In this sense Qt is one of the middle options in the "Native / cross-platform / web" continuum.

maest 7y ago
That makes sense, thanks for taking the time to write that up.