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I am curious if people would generally consider an editor / IDE a productivity app. If so, VS Code's popularity seems to be more than "many people do", in certa

I am curious if people would generally consider an editor / IDE a productivity app. If so, VS Code's popularity seems to be more than "many people do", in certain segments, it's the leading development environment [1]. And oddly, if we consider it an IDE (I would, if the relevant extensions are installed for whatever you are doing), it seems to use less resources than most of the others I use on a regular basis, while seeming more performant. It's really an odd app. [1] https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#technology-_-most-popular-development-environments https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#technology-_-...

mrweasel 5y ago
Personally I don't view browser based and Electron apps as equivalent. I don't really use any Electron apps, but to me they aren't as annoying as software which run within my browser window. Sometimes I just close my browser, because to many tabs have built up. I also want a Dock icon, PWAs and Electron apps will provide that and allow normal cmd+tab to work. PWAs are worse than Electron apps, because they die when you exit your browser. Google Chat is the worst, they had a standalone app, but now it's a PWA. So I either have to have Chrome running (a browser I don't actually use) or a window or tab open with the web-version. Electron apps are generally fine, from my perspective, they use more RAM and don't feel completely native, but in lack of better options they're completely fine.
- adflux 5y ago
  Under the hood, Electron is powered by the Chromium rendering engine and NodeJS. So why do you view browser based and electron apps as different? Because you cant see the browser menu bar?
  - mrweasel 5y ago
    Because they run as separate processes. I frequently just close all my browser windows, which would exit any browser based apps. Electron app are their own thing, and lives outside my browser window. Electron apps also have their own dock icon and exist independently when I tab through my open applications. That's also why I strongly dislike PWAs, they DO NOT exist independently of my browser. They are very much tied to the browser (well Chrome), which seem illogical, given that they have their own icons/launch thingy and pretend to exist as their own process. I get that Electron and browser based apps work more or less the same, but I interact with the two types applications in a very different way. That's what I care about, the interaction, the underlying technology is irrelevant.
  - goatlover 5y ago
    Because you're likely editing local files with an Electron powered editor as opposed to files on some other server.
- danielbarla 5y ago
  Yes, I can get behind this argument, it's significantly different from the standard opinion that Electron apps are trash quality in terms of performance. VS Code is generally either seen as a counter to that argument, or as the exception that proves the rule; nevertheless I am frequently left unsatisfied with such arguments. My core point is: the norm seems to be lazily written native apps, to the point that well written Electron apps can compete, assuming that the app is non-trivial. Clearly having an Electron app for a task list is unlikely to be a good idea, but as a core productivity tool that is open for months at a time, it's fine. Coincidentally, I stumbled upon StackBlitz [1] a long time ago, and was generally very impressed with it. It is essentially a very slick, online version of VS Code optimized for rapid prototyping, or small team projects. I could easily see people working with it as a main IDE. The argument then would be whether your browser of choice provides a nice enough environment for it to rival your OS when it comes to pinning tabs, navigating between them, etc. I would agree that it's unlikely to be an awesome experience, but with some work, it could be good enough. I mean, I guess a large percentage of people use Gmail via the web interface, and what is email if not the quintessential productivity app. [1] https://stackblitz.com/ https://stackblitz.com/

mrweasel 5y ago

Personally I don't view browser based and Electron apps as equivalent. I don't really use any Electron apps, but to me they aren't as annoying as software which run within my browser window. Sometimes I just close my browser, because to many tabs have built up. I also want a Dock icon, PWAs and Electron apps will provide that and allow normal cmd+tab to work. PWAs are worse than Electron apps, because they die when you exit your browser. Google Chat is the worst, they had a standalone app, but now it's a PWA. So I either have to have Chrome running (a browser I don't actually use) or a window or tab open with the web-version. Electron apps are generally fine, from my perspective, they use more RAM and don't feel completely native, but in lack of better options they're completely fine.

adflux 5y ago
Under the hood, Electron is powered by the Chromium rendering engine and NodeJS. So why do you view browser based and electron apps as different? Because you cant see the browser menu bar?
- mrweasel 5y ago
  Because they run as separate processes. I frequently just close all my browser windows, which would exit any browser based apps. Electron app are their own thing, and lives outside my browser window. Electron apps also have their own dock icon and exist independently when I tab through my open applications. That's also why I strongly dislike PWAs, they DO NOT exist independently of my browser. They are very much tied to the browser (well Chrome), which seem illogical, given that they have their own icons/launch thingy and pretend to exist as their own process. I get that Electron and browser based apps work more or less the same, but I interact with the two types applications in a very different way. That's what I care about, the interaction, the underlying technology is irrelevant.
- goatlover 5y ago
  Because you're likely editing local files with an Electron powered editor as opposed to files on some other server.
danielbarla 5y ago
Yes, I can get behind this argument, it's significantly different from the standard opinion that Electron apps are trash quality in terms of performance. VS Code is generally either seen as a counter to that argument, or as the exception that proves the rule; nevertheless I am frequently left unsatisfied with such arguments. My core point is: the norm seems to be lazily written native apps, to the point that well written Electron apps can compete, assuming that the app is non-trivial. Clearly having an Electron app for a task list is unlikely to be a good idea, but as a core productivity tool that is open for months at a time, it's fine. Coincidentally, I stumbled upon StackBlitz [1] a long time ago, and was generally very impressed with it. It is essentially a very slick, online version of VS Code optimized for rapid prototyping, or small team projects. I could easily see people working with it as a main IDE. The argument then would be whether your browser of choice provides a nice enough environment for it to rival your OS when it comes to pinning tabs, navigating between them, etc. I would agree that it's unlikely to be an awesome experience, but with some work, it could be good enough. I mean, I guess a large percentage of people use Gmail via the web interface, and what is email if not the quintessential productivity app. [1] https://stackblitz.com/ https://stackblitz.com/