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I do front end stuff for a living and have been in the javascript space for several years. I do other backend development as well and I can't see why people thi

I do front end stuff for a living and have been in the javascript space for several years. I do other backend development as well and I can't see why people think like you honestly. Most other GUI libraries is in a much worse state than front end web dev. That is probably also the reason why people use front end tech to make native apps today, because you can customize and make apps much faster than in basically any other way. I think front end gui development is very easy today and very powerful as well and we have progressed a lot. Making stuff with web components isn't event that hard and if you want you can just use one of the many available syntax sugar libraries that exist like Lit and others.

Devasta 3y ago
Devs use web frontend tech because it is installed on every machine, will never have anything less than the full backing of the browser devs for the next hundred years, and gets around corporate filters. No need to deal with IT security losers to get your app installed, no need to get ports opened, just everything down port 443 until the end of time. INTERCAL could win with that feature set.
- ecmascript 3y ago
  If that is the case, why are people writing desktop apps with Electron / other web tech?
- paulddraper 3y ago
  I think you missed the point. > why people use front end tech to make native apps today Even when you have to deal with IT security losers to get apps installed, implementing it w/ web tech is extremely popular. E.g. the #1 IDE by popularity [1] is a desktop app developed with web tech. (And yes, it was later ported to browsers, but it didn't start there.) [1] https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2022#section-most-popular-technologies-integrated-development-environment https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2022#section-most-popular-te...
mardifoufs 3y ago
Exactly. I'm starting to understand the push for web UI now that I've started to use qt for a small GUI. I'm sure qt is good for some type of apps. But for my smaller scale project where the graphic interface is not where we want to spend most of our dev time, I'd rather take javascript/react at this point.
- josephg 3y ago
  I feel the same after playing with SwiftUI and UIKit on iOS and trying to make something simple like a text editor with a hideable keyboard. The whole platform feels half baked, with various overlapping features that each have serious, barely documented drawbacks and bugs. “I’m getting a warning about my constraints being defined badly” “oh just ignore that - you can’t make it work without that warning”. “Everything in my project looks the same as the example but mine doesn’t work” “Try deleting your constraints and re-adding them. Sometimes Xcode is just buggy like that”. “I tried but Xcode hard crashed”. Etc. The web feels downright cohesive, stable and well documented in comparison.
  - ecmascript 3y ago
    And then you don't even have come to the real meat, the freedom the web gives you. Freedom to deploy whenever, freedom from app stores with arbitrary rules set by big boring corporate interests. Why publish with restrictions when you can be free?
whartung 3y ago
> Most other GUI libraries is in a much worse state than front end web dev. I'm certainly not going to suggest you're wrong. But I would like a sincere comparison between JavaFX (because I sorta know it) and "the web". Maybe its unfair, since the Web is "just the DOM", an empty vessel many of the other techs are built upon, which is why there's so many options. I'm not a front end person, by any means, and have been striving to make things work with FX. I mostly "get" FX, how it does things with its containers and layouts and properties and bindings and events and UI thread. It has CSS, I mostly don't use it (better living through gray!). The web, honestly, intimidates me. It intimidates me with its vast variety, its complex build processes, the apparently galaxy of dependencies and tools and what not. Cross browser stuff terrifies me. And maybe that's the wrong reality, but that's the impression I get. I'm managing to Forest Gump my way through FX, but I have a Java background.

Devasta 3y ago

Devs use web frontend tech because it is installed on every machine, will never have anything less than the full backing of the browser devs for the next hundred years, and gets around corporate filters. No need to deal with IT security losers to get your app installed, no need to get ports opened, just everything down port 443 until the end of time. INTERCAL could win with that feature set.

ecmascript 3y ago
If that is the case, why are people writing desktop apps with Electron / other web tech?
paulddraper 3y ago
I think you missed the point. > why people use front end tech to make native apps today Even when you have to deal with IT security losers to get apps installed, implementing it w/ web tech is extremely popular. E.g. the #1 IDE by popularity [1] is a desktop app developed with web tech. (And yes, it was later ported to browsers, but it didn't start there.) [1] https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2022#section-most-popular-technologies-integrated-development-environment https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2022#section-most-popular-te...

mardifoufs 3y ago

Exactly. I'm starting to understand the push for web UI now that I've started to use qt for a small GUI. I'm sure qt is good for some type of apps. But for my smaller scale project where the graphic interface is not where we want to spend most of our dev time, I'd rather take javascript/react at this point.

josephg 3y ago
I feel the same after playing with SwiftUI and UIKit on iOS and trying to make something simple like a text editor with a hideable keyboard. The whole platform feels half baked, with various overlapping features that each have serious, barely documented drawbacks and bugs. “I’m getting a warning about my constraints being defined badly” “oh just ignore that - you can’t make it work without that warning”. “Everything in my project looks the same as the example but mine doesn’t work” “Try deleting your constraints and re-adding them. Sometimes Xcode is just buggy like that”. “I tried but Xcode hard crashed”. Etc. The web feels downright cohesive, stable and well documented in comparison.
- ecmascript 3y ago
  And then you don't even have come to the real meat, the freedom the web gives you. Freedom to deploy whenever, freedom from app stores with arbitrary rules set by big boring corporate interests. Why publish with restrictions when you can be free?

whartung 3y ago

> Most other GUI libraries is in a much worse state than front end web dev. I'm certainly not going to suggest you're wrong. But I would like a sincere comparison between JavaFX (because I sorta know it) and "the web". Maybe its unfair, since the Web is "just the DOM", an empty vessel many of the other techs are built upon, which is why there's so many options. I'm not a front end person, by any means, and have been striving to make things work with FX. I mostly "get" FX, how it does things with its containers and layouts and properties and bindings and events and UI thread. It has CSS, I mostly don't use it (better living through gray!). The web, honestly, intimidates me. It intimidates me with its vast variety, its complex build processes, the apparently galaxy of dependencies and tools and what not. Cross browser stuff terrifies me. And maybe that's the wrong reality, but that's the impression I get. I'm managing to Forest Gump my way through FX, but I have a Java background.