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Honest question, when solutions like https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri exist out there that promise smaller build sizes an

by zhs 4y ago

Honest question, when solutions like https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri https://github.com/tauri-apps/tauri exist out there that promise smaller build sizes and similar developer experiences, are folks still using Electron to build new apps?

doodlesdev 4y ago
Unfortunately despite Tauri being very performant, small, and having good UX it looks like most projects are still using Electron. I've built a prime number calculator which draws a graph in the webview using Tauri [0], this has was part of a series of projects of mine that calculated prime numbers and displayed them to compare performance of browsers and backend languages. The application does all the calculation in Rust and I got to say I will never ever go back to even considering Electron again. I believe the reason why people look to still be using Electron is simillar to why people use React. Sure it's a bit bloated, a bit hard to master, it has some design flaws, but it's well adopted, and hundreds of successful companies use it in production. Meanwhile Tauri is rust the new kid in the block. [0]: https://github.com/DoodlesEpic/GraphPrime https://github.com/DoodlesEpic/GraphPrime
zamadatix 4y ago
There is something to be said for a unified frontend and backend that closely mirror the existing browser API just extended. It comes with it's downsides too, where Tauri obviously shines, but really I see Tauri and Electron as two different approaches not direct competition. Last I checked Rust was still the only native backend too, that changing may help its story. Of course there is always the ecosystem size difference too but that normally sorts itself out with time.
aliencat 4y ago
One problem with Tauri is that it doesn't bundle Node runtime, meaning that you can't take advantage of the npm packages that works outside of a browser environment. It does allow you to use Rust packages, but that's another story than Javascript.
- schemescape 4y ago
  Yes. As a user, I’m rooting for Tauri, but as a developer, I could probably build my app faster using Electron. Unfortunately, past experience tells me that companies usually optimize for ease of development instead of performance, most of the time :(
stu2b50 4y ago
It's not really the same developer experience. Because it's a browser JS engine it's much less powerful than electron, and you need to write more rust as a result. For many people that's probably not a demerit but for others it will be.
timcobb 4y ago
Yeah Tauri is in Rust, whereas I want to write the backend and frontend in the same language (TS) and share code
- heapwolf 4y ago
  Rust is a non-starter for the majority of web devs. That’s why Tauri had remained niche. Maybe try https://github.com/socketsupply/socket https://github.com/socketsupply/socket
  - Ygg2 4y ago
    > That’s why Tauri had remained niche. > try https://github.com/socketsupply/socket https://github.com/socketsupply/socket Points to an even less popular niche.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - heapwolf 4y ago
      It was just open sourced, if your pointing out how few stars it has. It also hasn't been officially announced. But HTML, CSS, and JS are far less niche than Rust.
      - bitfracas 4y ago
        Correct. This is objective.
      - Ygg2 4y ago
        I'm pointing the inconsistency of the argument. If you want popularity, there is already Electron.
mysterydip 4y ago
I've heard of electron, but not tauri. Maybe it's just not known enough to be included in the decision?
- david422 4y ago
  Same. I figured I could be out of the loop but ... so are other people.
rizky05 4y ago
[dead]
nassimsoftware 4y ago
A reason to keep using Electron rather than Tauri is when you need to make sure the UI is going to be displayed the same way on each platform. Tauri uses the OS's native webview which means that there can be differences in how the DOM is displayed. It's not the same browser engine being used for each platform.
aerhardt 4y ago
I’ll reply to your question with a question: once VSCode has proved one could build hyperscale complex apps that perform well, would you be fast to bet for less proven tech? I’ve had a great experience using VSCode on occasion (I’m a JetBrains guy), and loads of other people, including some great programmers, rave about it. I’ve similarly had a fairly solid experience with Spotify desktop across different platforms. I’m asking genuinely, is it such a subpar choice when there’s such proven success cases?
- 2h 4y ago
  > VSCode has proved one could build hyperscale complex apps that perform well did it though? It might perform "good enough", but its still an order of magnitude worse than native solutions. the only reason to ever use Electron or similar is for rapid prototyping. once you have an MVP, you should immediately work towards a native solution. people seem to forget that part, out of laziness or ignorance.
  - simonw 4y ago
    What's your theory on why the VS Code team haven't migrated to native solutions for their app?
    - AlotOfReading 4y ago
      They do have a native solution you might be familiar with, "Visual Studio". It took them a solid decade to port it even from 32->64 bit (finally released last year). Hard to blame them for some institutional PTSD around the whole idea of native apps.
  - Renaud 4y ago
    You have to define ‘worse’ because raw performance isn’t really everything and vscode’s popularity proves it. Feature set and extensibility have clearly won here. At a certain performance point, it’s good enough and what you can do with it matters more. I’m not sure you could achieve the sane flexibility in a more native, “bare-metal”, development environment. Possible, yes, but it would probably not be as successful as developing for it would be somewhat harder. Vscode is “fast” enough. Its extensibility and its ecosystem are what makes it so popular and successful. I’m not sure you can build the same without trade offs.
nocommandline 4y ago
Electron is very well known & has a large footprint - lots of existing tutorials, extensions/plugins/libraries, regular bug fixes. There are also lots of existing large Apps that can serve as reference. If you Google - building cross-platform desktop Apps, most of the results will point to electron. If you already know JavaScript (lots of people do) & are trying to quickly get your App up & running, then it can make sense to just go with Electron rather than trying to learn a new language like Rust. Both reasons were why I picked electron to build https://nocommandline.com https://nocommandline.com Yes, Electron Apps are big but in the grand scheme of things, they might not matter so much for now (laptops are being built with bigger memories, Apps are being improved to manage memory).
tomkarho 4y ago
Here's a couple - Not everyone wants to learn Rust but want to use the same language throughout their stack - Tauri is still new which means it is not considered "tried and true" - More developers know how to use Electron or at least know enough Javascript to learn which means larger talent pool = cheaper and easier to replace developers if need be - Last I checked (was not recently I admit), the build time for Tauri was abysmal - I would argue very few gives a damn about smaller build sizes unless the problem space actually requires size to matter In short, Electron is established tech and "good enough" while Tauri is the new kid in the block. It takes time for it to carve a space for itself. With all the Rust hype going on, I don't doubt it will happen. Fun fact: I actually embarked on a project recently where my plan is to build the app in Electron first and once I had a change to learn Rust, I'll probably try to migrate the Electron app to something like Tauri.
croes 4y ago
If the OS webview gets breaking changes your tauri app breaks too. Electron bundles the browser therefore the size.
CJefferson 4y ago
I tried using Tauri (about 6 months ago, so things maybe have improved), and found lots of inconsistencies and issues between platforms. It did work well on my "dev platform", but then things often misbehaved on other platforms. I'm not sure many people are refusing electron apps due to the size, but they would definitely reject a buggy app that didn't work on their platform.
mmgutz 4y ago
Tauri and similar are only as good as the webviews on the system. My trials with webview based alternatives showed they use slightly less ram as electron at startup, but later use more memory and perform worse in FPS. (Linux) Not really seeing an advantage other than a smaller binary.

by zhs 4y ago

doodlesdev 4y ago

Unfortunately despite Tauri being very performant, small, and having good UX it looks like most projects are still using Electron. I've built a prime number calculator which draws a graph in the webview using Tauri [0], this has was part of a series of projects of mine that calculated prime numbers and displayed them to compare performance of browsers and backend languages. The application does all the calculation in Rust and I got to say I will never ever go back to even considering Electron again. I believe the reason why people look to still be using Electron is simillar to why people use React. Sure it's a bit bloated, a bit hard to master, it has some design flaws, but it's well adopted, and hundreds of successful companies use it in production. Meanwhile Tauri is rust the new kid in the block. [0]: https://github.com/DoodlesEpic/GraphPrime https://github.com/DoodlesEpic/GraphPrime

zamadatix 4y ago

There is something to be said for a unified frontend and backend that closely mirror the existing browser API just extended. It comes with it's downsides too, where Tauri obviously shines, but really I see Tauri and Electron as two different approaches not direct competition. Last I checked Rust was still the only native backend too, that changing may help its story. Of course there is always the ecosystem size difference too but that normally sorts itself out with time.

aliencat 4y ago

One problem with Tauri is that it doesn't bundle Node runtime, meaning that you can't take advantage of the npm packages that works outside of a browser environment. It does allow you to use Rust packages, but that's another story than Javascript.

schemescape 4y ago
Yes. As a user, I’m rooting for Tauri, but as a developer, I could probably build my app faster using Electron. Unfortunately, past experience tells me that companies usually optimize for ease of development instead of performance, most of the time :(

stu2b50 4y ago

It's not really the same developer experience. Because it's a browser JS engine it's much less powerful than electron, and you need to write more rust as a result. For many people that's probably not a demerit but for others it will be.

timcobb 4y ago

Yeah Tauri is in Rust, whereas I want to write the backend and frontend in the same language (TS) and share code

heapwolf 4y ago
Rust is a non-starter for the majority of web devs. That’s why Tauri had remained niche. Maybe try https://github.com/socketsupply/socket https://github.com/socketsupply/socket
- Ygg2 4y ago
  > That’s why Tauri had remained niche. > try https://github.com/socketsupply/socket https://github.com/socketsupply/socket Points to an even less popular niche.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - heapwolf 4y ago
    It was just open sourced, if your pointing out how few stars it has. It also hasn't been officially announced. But HTML, CSS, and JS are far less niche than Rust.
    - bitfracas 4y ago
      Correct. This is objective.
    - Ygg2 4y ago
      I'm pointing the inconsistency of the argument. If you want popularity, there is already Electron.

mysterydip 4y ago

I've heard of electron, but not tauri. Maybe it's just not known enough to be included in the decision?

david422 4y ago
Same. I figured I could be out of the loop but ... so are other people.

rizky05 4y ago

[dead]

nassimsoftware 4y ago

A reason to keep using Electron rather than Tauri is when you need to make sure the UI is going to be displayed the same way on each platform. Tauri uses the OS's native webview which means that there can be differences in how the DOM is displayed. It's not the same browser engine being used for each platform.

aerhardt 4y ago

I’ll reply to your question with a question: once VSCode has proved one could build hyperscale complex apps that perform well, would you be fast to bet for less proven tech? I’ve had a great experience using VSCode on occasion (I’m a JetBrains guy), and loads of other people, including some great programmers, rave about it. I’ve similarly had a fairly solid experience with Spotify desktop across different platforms. I’m asking genuinely, is it such a subpar choice when there’s such proven success cases?

2h 4y ago
> VSCode has proved one could build hyperscale complex apps that perform well did it though? It might perform "good enough", but its still an order of magnitude worse than native solutions. the only reason to ever use Electron or similar is for rapid prototyping. once you have an MVP, you should immediately work towards a native solution. people seem to forget that part, out of laziness or ignorance.
- simonw 4y ago
  What's your theory on why the VS Code team haven't migrated to native solutions for their app?
  - AlotOfReading 4y ago
    They do have a native solution you might be familiar with, "Visual Studio". It took them a solid decade to port it even from 32->64 bit (finally released last year). Hard to blame them for some institutional PTSD around the whole idea of native apps.
- Renaud 4y ago
  You have to define ‘worse’ because raw performance isn’t really everything and vscode’s popularity proves it. Feature set and extensibility have clearly won here. At a certain performance point, it’s good enough and what you can do with it matters more. I’m not sure you could achieve the sane flexibility in a more native, “bare-metal”, development environment. Possible, yes, but it would probably not be as successful as developing for it would be somewhat harder. Vscode is “fast” enough. Its extensibility and its ecosystem are what makes it so popular and successful. I’m not sure you can build the same without trade offs.

nocommandline 4y ago

Electron is very well known & has a large footprint - lots of existing tutorials, extensions/plugins/libraries, regular bug fixes. There are also lots of existing large Apps that can serve as reference. If you Google - building cross-platform desktop Apps, most of the results will point to electron. If you already know JavaScript (lots of people do) & are trying to quickly get your App up & running, then it can make sense to just go with Electron rather than trying to learn a new language like Rust. Both reasons were why I picked electron to build https://nocommandline.com https://nocommandline.com Yes, Electron Apps are big but in the grand scheme of things, they might not matter so much for now (laptops are being built with bigger memories, Apps are being improved to manage memory).

tomkarho 4y ago

Here's a couple - Not everyone wants to learn Rust but want to use the same language throughout their stack - Tauri is still new which means it is not considered "tried and true" - More developers know how to use Electron or at least know enough Javascript to learn which means larger talent pool = cheaper and easier to replace developers if need be - Last I checked (was not recently I admit), the build time for Tauri was abysmal - I would argue very few gives a damn about smaller build sizes unless the problem space actually requires size to matter In short, Electron is established tech and "good enough" while Tauri is the new kid in the block. It takes time for it to carve a space for itself. With all the Rust hype going on, I don't doubt it will happen. Fun fact: I actually embarked on a project recently where my plan is to build the app in Electron first and once I had a change to learn Rust, I'll probably try to migrate the Electron app to something like Tauri.

croes 4y ago

If the OS webview gets breaking changes your tauri app breaks too. Electron bundles the browser therefore the size.

CJefferson 4y ago

I tried using Tauri (about 6 months ago, so things maybe have improved), and found lots of inconsistencies and issues between platforms. It did work well on my "dev platform", but then things often misbehaved on other platforms. I'm not sure many people are refusing electron apps due to the size, but they would definitely reject a buggy app that didn't work on their platform.

mmgutz 4y ago

Tauri and similar are only as good as the webviews on the system. My trials with webview based alternatives showed they use slightly less ram as electron at startup, but later use more memory and perform worse in FPS. (Linux) Not really seeing an advantage other than a smaller binary.