4 ms·

Keep hoping, because it won’t happen. Practically no consumers care except for other software engineers complaining loudly on HN, and meanwhile companies save m

Keep hoping, because it won’t happen. Practically no consumers care except for other software engineers complaining loudly on HN, and meanwhile companies save millions by not handcrafting their CRUD apps in assembly.

jrockway 3y ago
The problem is having to target 5 operating systems. Extremely complicated web app runs on Linux, Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS. Carefully-crafted Native UI widgets only target one platform at a time. If you want to get rid of Electron, you personally have to volunteer to be responsible for 5x the work of anyone else, and accept bootcamp-graduate pay. Do you see why it's not happening?
- raverbashing 3y ago
  Exactly this. And HTML/CSS may have its quirks but I'll take it every day over fumbling with GTK or whatever
- satvikpendem 3y ago
  I just use Flutter instead, works great for all 5 OS.
- bombcar 3y ago
  Arguably the success of MacOS has caused the expansion of Electron, because developers are using macs and want to use macs even when programming tools for windows.
  - caycep 3y ago
    Some (maybe Apple) ought to make a Swift -> Windows/Linux cross compiler...
LtWorf 3y ago
Consumers care but have no choice. Like consumers that want to buy a phone that fit in the hand… there is none at a reasonable price.
- wiseowise 3y ago
  The demand for small phone is completely overblown online.
  - LtWorf 3y ago
    Because people who don't go online need BIGGER phones? For what?
    - paulmd 3y ago
      Objectively he’s right and there’s a reason the iPhone mini was discontinued. The demand for mini phones is niche but very loud online. It isn’t economical to support a mainstream product for the handful of people who are actually willing to pay for that specific niche feature point. Kinda like headphone ports and microSD slots on android phones. Are there models that do this? Yes! Is anyone willing to pay more for it? No! But they are very very loud online about it. There do exist smaller android phones as well, just like a headphone port nothing is stopping you from buying one instead of complaining on the internet!
      - LtWorf 3y ago
        People want a small phone, but perhaps not if it costs like 6 phones? How is this hard to understand? > Is anyone willing to pay more for it? No! Is anyone willing to pick a phone over another (despite what paulmd's opinion might be)? YES. > There do exist smaller android phones as well No they don't. There is NOTHING on the market currently that is sized and priced like a samsung S5 mini today.
        paulmd 3y ago
        > People want a small phone, but perhaps not if it costs like 6 phones? How is this hard to understand? iphone mini wasn't priced like 6 phones, and it still didn't sell well. again, you can't seem to grapple with the reality here that what you want is a very niche thing and it doesn't sell well as a mass-market product regardless of price. that is, after all, why apple stopped making that size once again. the iphone SE is about as small as the market wants. Below that is the domain of mini phones - which do exist, but mostly from smaller android vendors. > No they don't. There is NOTHING on the market currently that is sized and priced like a samsung S5 mini today. s5 mini: 131.1 x 64.8 x 9.1 mm cubot pocket 3: 133.2 x 55 x 12.3mm unihertz jelly pro: 92.4 × 43 × 13 mm just with literally a few minutes of searching.
wiseowise 3y ago
> Practically no consumers care except for other software engineers complaining loudly on HN, and meanwhile companies save millions by not handcrafting their CRUD apps in assembly. And you know that because you’ve analyzed whole market and know opinion of users of every web software? Definitely not because you only live in bubble of other software engineers so you’re not exposed to complaints of common folk?
- satvikpendem 3y ago
  No end consumers I know or even acquaintances of other people I know even know nor care about Electron. You might say that I'm in a bubble but at that point it's just the No True Scotsman fallacy.
  - wiseowise 3y ago
    Literally all of my acquaintances in previous company complained about Teams being slow and buggy. I also see it constantly being mentioned online.
    - jauntywundrkind 3y ago
      You can make slow & buggy software anywhere, with any stack. Teams themselves shipped a whole release focused around sucking significantly less & were getting much faster. Discord has gotten pretty solid, vscode is spit fast. The hate against Electron feels so selective & antagonistic, picks it's targets, never acknowledged any value, never recognizes any points for the other side. It is just incredibly lopsidedly biased. Over what doesn't feel real to so many. I was hoping Tauri would be the one, by using a shared library model. That would drop memory consumption down significantly. But they use webkit on Linux and I'm sorry but I want a much better base that supports more modern capabilities.
  - LtWorf 3y ago
    They don't know how it's called, they still hate when they are forced to use slow applications.
OCASMv2 3y ago
The arrogance to believe that their software is so well written already that the only way to improve their performance is by using handcrafted assembly. Just changing their high level data structures alone would yield 10x improvements, easily.
- presentation 3y ago
  The naivete to believe that consumers driving company sales even realize that performance is something they need to care about.
  - OCASMv2 3y ago
    If they knew the main reason they have to shell out hundreds of dollars to upgrade their computers and phones is because of lazy/shoddy developers they would care.

jrockway 3y ago

The problem is having to target 5 operating systems. Extremely complicated web app runs on Linux, Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS. Carefully-crafted Native UI widgets only target one platform at a time. If you want to get rid of Electron, you personally have to volunteer to be responsible for 5x the work of anyone else, and accept bootcamp-graduate pay. Do you see why it's not happening?

raverbashing 3y ago
Exactly this. And HTML/CSS may have its quirks but I'll take it every day over fumbling with GTK or whatever
satvikpendem 3y ago
I just use Flutter instead, works great for all 5 OS.
bombcar 3y ago
Arguably the success of MacOS has caused the expansion of Electron, because developers are using macs and want to use macs even when programming tools for windows.
- caycep 3y ago
  Some (maybe Apple) ought to make a Swift -> Windows/Linux cross compiler...

LtWorf 3y ago

Consumers care but have no choice. Like consumers that want to buy a phone that fit in the hand… there is none at a reasonable price.

wiseowise 3y ago
The demand for small phone is completely overblown online.
- LtWorf 3y ago
  Because people who don't go online need BIGGER phones? For what?
  - paulmd 3y ago
    Objectively he’s right and there’s a reason the iPhone mini was discontinued. The demand for mini phones is niche but very loud online. It isn’t economical to support a mainstream product for the handful of people who are actually willing to pay for that specific niche feature point. Kinda like headphone ports and microSD slots on android phones. Are there models that do this? Yes! Is anyone willing to pay more for it? No! But they are very very loud online about it. There do exist smaller android phones as well, just like a headphone port nothing is stopping you from buying one instead of complaining on the internet!
    - LtWorf 3y ago
      People want a small phone, but perhaps not if it costs like 6 phones? How is this hard to understand? > Is anyone willing to pay more for it? No! Is anyone willing to pick a phone over another (despite what paulmd's opinion might be)? YES. > There do exist smaller android phones as well No they don't. There is NOTHING on the market currently that is sized and priced like a samsung S5 mini today.
      - paulmd 3y ago
        > People want a small phone, but perhaps not if it costs like 6 phones? How is this hard to understand? iphone mini wasn't priced like 6 phones, and it still didn't sell well. again, you can't seem to grapple with the reality here that what you want is a very niche thing and it doesn't sell well as a mass-market product regardless of price. that is, after all, why apple stopped making that size once again. the iphone SE is about as small as the market wants. Below that is the domain of mini phones - which do exist, but mostly from smaller android vendors. > No they don't. There is NOTHING on the market currently that is sized and priced like a samsung S5 mini today. s5 mini: 131.1 x 64.8 x 9.1 mm cubot pocket 3: 133.2 x 55 x 12.3mm unihertz jelly pro: 92.4 × 43 × 13 mm just with literally a few minutes of searching.

wiseowise 3y ago

> Practically no consumers care except for other software engineers complaining loudly on HN, and meanwhile companies save millions by not handcrafting their CRUD apps in assembly. And you know that because you’ve analyzed whole market and know opinion of users of every web software? Definitely not because you only live in bubble of other software engineers so you’re not exposed to complaints of common folk?

satvikpendem 3y ago
No end consumers I know or even acquaintances of other people I know even know nor care about Electron. You might say that I'm in a bubble but at that point it's just the No True Scotsman fallacy.
- wiseowise 3y ago
  Literally all of my acquaintances in previous company complained about Teams being slow and buggy. I also see it constantly being mentioned online.
  - jauntywundrkind 3y ago
    You can make slow & buggy software anywhere, with any stack. Teams themselves shipped a whole release focused around sucking significantly less & were getting much faster. Discord has gotten pretty solid, vscode is spit fast. The hate against Electron feels so selective & antagonistic, picks it's targets, never acknowledged any value, never recognizes any points for the other side. It is just incredibly lopsidedly biased. Over what doesn't feel real to so many. I was hoping Tauri would be the one, by using a shared library model. That would drop memory consumption down significantly. But they use webkit on Linux and I'm sorry but I want a much better base that supports more modern capabilities.
- LtWorf 3y ago
  They don't know how it's called, they still hate when they are forced to use slow applications.

OCASMv2 3y ago

The arrogance to believe that their software is so well written already that the only way to improve their performance is by using handcrafted assembly. Just changing their high level data structures alone would yield 10x improvements, easily.

presentation 3y ago
The naivete to believe that consumers driving company sales even realize that performance is something they need to care about.
- OCASMv2 3y ago
  If they knew the main reason they have to shell out hundreds of dollars to upgrade their computers and phones is because of lazy/shoddy developers they would care.