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Is this just one more Electron but with Lisp? It seems to require web-browser, thus not a real GUI framework.

by xvilka 5y ago

reikonomusha 5y ago
Isn’t a GUI framework anything that lets you make… GUIs? What’s a “real” GUI framework? Maybe you mean one that uses the provided operating system’s APIs directly, sometimes called “native GUIs”.
- jonathanstrange 5y ago
  I think I can explain that. A real GUI provides more than just visualization, otherwise you'll have to re-invent the wheel and will likely miss important platform conventions. You need support for drag & drop from and to outside the application, standard folders and standard file/folder Open and Save dialogs, command/action abstractions to implement unlimited Undo/Redo, near arbitrary keyboard shortcuts for all menu entries (which adapt to the platform conventions somehow), standard Quit, Print, Page Setup and Help menus, support for internationalization, support for platform-specific layout guidelines (spacing, default buttons, button ordering), tray icon support, support for platform-specific notification and indexing APIs, programmer access to file icons (surprisingly tricky on Linux), standard packaging and deployment, support for code signing, and so on and so forth. Most "browser-based" applications don't even get basic keyboard shortcuts right. Only few of them are really usable and not a single one has better functionality then its native counterparts. There is a bit of a bubble around web "apps" created by a startup culture. The problem is that most of those startups die within a few years. I'm not saying that a browser-based app cannot be useful, but it's equally important to be aware that many types of applications require a real GUI. It doesn't have to be native (e.g. Qt is not "native" in the traditional sense), but it needs to be fairly complete and respect platform APIs.
bitwize 5y ago
In the real world, where time to market basically trumps all, using the web as a presentation layer is almost a must for desktop applications because of the time and money saved.
openfuture 5y ago
There are also real common lisp gui frameworks. There's a tcl binding thing, this thing, mature qt and gtk bindings, a native common lisp solution (mcclim). Honestly I was a bit surprised when I was looking around how much there was, check awesome-cl.com

Is this just one more Electron but with Lisp? It seems to require web-browser, thus not a real GUI framework.

by xvilka 5y ago

Is this just one more Electron but with Lisp? It seems to require web-browser, thus not a real GUI framework.

Isn’t a GUI framework anything that lets you make… GUIs? What’s a “real” GUI framework? Maybe you mean one that uses the provided operating system’s APIs directly, sometimes called “native GUIs”.

jonathanstrange 5y ago
I think I can explain that. A real GUI provides more than just visualization, otherwise you'll have to re-invent the wheel and will likely miss important platform conventions. You need support for drag & drop from and to outside the application, standard folders and standard file/folder Open and Save dialogs, command/action abstractions to implement unlimited Undo/Redo, near arbitrary keyboard shortcuts for all menu entries (which adapt to the platform conventions somehow), standard Quit, Print, Page Setup and Help menus, support for internationalization, support for platform-specific layout guidelines (spacing, default buttons, button ordering), tray icon support, support for platform-specific notification and indexing APIs, programmer access to file icons (surprisingly tricky on Linux), standard packaging and deployment, support for code signing, and so on and so forth. Most "browser-based" applications don't even get basic keyboard shortcuts right. Only few of them are really usable and not a single one has better functionality then its native counterparts. There is a bit of a bubble around web "apps" created by a startup culture. The problem is that most of those startups die within a few years. I'm not saying that a browser-based app cannot be useful, but it's equally important to be aware that many types of applications require a real GUI. It doesn't have to be native (e.g. Qt is not "native" in the traditional sense), but it needs to be fairly complete and respect platform APIs.

bitwize 5y ago

In the real world, where time to market basically trumps all, using the web as a presentation layer is almost a must for desktop applications because of the time and money saved.

openfuture 5y ago

There are also real common lisp gui frameworks. There's a tcl binding thing, this thing, mature qt and gtk bindings, a native common lisp solution (mcclim). Honestly I was a bit surprised when I was looking around how much there was, check awesome-cl.com