3 ms·

> web technologies for UI … slow, and heavy It’s not the web platform features that are slow and heavy. It’s all the JavaScript on top of it. You can make a UI

> web technologies for UI … slow, and heavy It’s not the web platform features that are slow and heavy. It’s all the JavaScript on top of it. You can make a UI on the web with just HTML and a bit of CSS. Nothing beats that in terms of performance and small size*. But if you add several MBs of JavaScript frameworks on top of that, then it becomes what you described. *Try the HTML version of Gmail in your browser https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/ https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/. Just HTML and CSS. It’s the fastest email client in the world. edit: I timed it. HTML Gmail loads and fully renders in about 1 second.

isaacaggrey 4y ago
> Try the HTML version of Gmail in your browser https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/ https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/. Just HTML and CSS. It’s the fastest email client in the world. I use Fastmail on a regular basis and it's snappier than the HTML version of Gmail.
- zagrebian 4y ago
  How long does it take to load and fully render HTML Gmail on your device? For me, it’s 1.15 seconds, and that’s from the moment I click the above link to the moment rendering is complete.
criddell 4y ago
> Nothing beats that in terms of performance and small size Native controls do. For example, Steve Gibson wrote a DNS benchmarking utility[1] and the executable is 159k. No matter what you do, an HTML & CSS is still being rendered by a slow interpreter. BTW, when I clicked on that link for HTML GMail, Google made me click through a warning trying to scare me off. I'm not sure why they would care if I use the HTML version. In the end, I don't think the speed of CSS + HTML controls matters much. It's limiting and not a great choice for an operating system UI toolkit. [1]: https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm
- zagrebian 4y ago
  I don’t understand why you’re mentioning a DNS utility.
  - criddell 4y ago
    You couldn't write a web-based version that was anywhere near as fast and small. A browser sitting there showing a blank page is bigger.

isaacaggrey 4y ago

> Try the HTML version of Gmail in your browser https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/ https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/h/. Just HTML and CSS. It’s the fastest email client in the world. I use Fastmail on a regular basis and it's snappier than the HTML version of Gmail.

zagrebian 4y ago
How long does it take to load and fully render HTML Gmail on your device? For me, it’s 1.15 seconds, and that’s from the moment I click the above link to the moment rendering is complete.

criddell 4y ago

> Nothing beats that in terms of performance and small size Native controls do. For example, Steve Gibson wrote a DNS benchmarking utility[1] and the executable is 159k. No matter what you do, an HTML & CSS is still being rendered by a slow interpreter. BTW, when I clicked on that link for HTML GMail, Google made me click through a warning trying to scare me off. I'm not sure why they would care if I use the HTML version. In the end, I don't think the speed of CSS + HTML controls matters much. It's limiting and not a great choice for an operating system UI toolkit. [1]: https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm https://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm

zagrebian 4y ago
I don’t understand why you’re mentioning a DNS utility.
- criddell 4y ago
  You couldn't write a web-based version that was anywhere near as fast and small. A browser sitting there showing a blank page is bigger.