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> "native" apps are pain to develop, pain to port, pain to build, pain to debug, pain to install/deploy Not really. Languages and tools have been very good sin

by Rochus 3y ago

> "native" apps are pain to develop, pain to port, pain to build, pain to debug, pain to install/deploy Not really. Languages and tools have been very good since more than twenty years with comfortable IDEs and cross-platform frameworks, and the result can be a single, statically linked executable which you can just download and run. See e.g. Qt or Delphi. Of course, one can also make things unnecessarily complicated.

jampekka 3y ago
Even in the case you manage to make a statically linked executable that works consistently, you still have to compile it to all platforms. And have to debug it on all platforms. And still have to download, hunt down in the file system and potentially require admin to grant rights to run it. With web it's just link or url and works the same with any underlying OS if you're not using some bleeding edge features. And at least IMHO the languages and tools are far from very good. Qt Creator is horrid, Qt C++ is a weird language of its own and requires hackery like moc. And if you want to do something not included in Qt, it's often welcome to the hell that is CMake et all. Delphi is proprietary, Windows-only and the language is niche and IMHO not very good even compared to Qt C++.
- Rochus 3y ago
  > you still have to compile it to all platforms. And have to debug it on all platforms That's no problem at all. In case of Qt I only need a C++98 compiler for each platform, and also Qt Creator is available everywhere. Usually I only have to debug on the development platform though, since it is the same code on all platforms, and the framework in use abstracts the platform away. > And still have to download, hunt down in the file system and potentially require admin to grant rights to run it Downloading is not really an issue, is it? Just download one ZIP or TAR.GZ or DMG, unpack it and run the executable. No admin rights required. > Qt Creator is horrid, Qt C++ is a weird language of its own and requires hackery like moc Well, that's your opinion. In fact the tool is very good, the call and linking of moc and generated files is transparent, and C++ is an excellent work horse. > do something not included in Qt, it's often welcome to the hell that is CMake et all. No problem at all. Of course you have to know both Qt and C++ good enough, but that's something a developer can master. > Delphi is proprietary, Windows-only and the language is niche and IMHO not very good even compared to Qt C++ There is FreePascal/Lazarus which is open source and runs even on more platforms than Qt. Even Delphi runs on other platforms. Whether you prefer C++ or Object Pascal is a matter of taste.

by Rochus 3y ago

jampekka 3y ago

Even in the case you manage to make a statically linked executable that works consistently, you still have to compile it to all platforms. And have to debug it on all platforms. And still have to download, hunt down in the file system and potentially require admin to grant rights to run it. With web it's just link or url and works the same with any underlying OS if you're not using some bleeding edge features. And at least IMHO the languages and tools are far from very good. Qt Creator is horrid, Qt C++ is a weird language of its own and requires hackery like moc. And if you want to do something not included in Qt, it's often welcome to the hell that is CMake et all. Delphi is proprietary, Windows-only and the language is niche and IMHO not very good even compared to Qt C++.

Rochus 3y ago
> you still have to compile it to all platforms. And have to debug it on all platforms That's no problem at all. In case of Qt I only need a C++98 compiler for each platform, and also Qt Creator is available everywhere. Usually I only have to debug on the development platform though, since it is the same code on all platforms, and the framework in use abstracts the platform away. > And still have to download, hunt down in the file system and potentially require admin to grant rights to run it Downloading is not really an issue, is it? Just download one ZIP or TAR.GZ or DMG, unpack it and run the executable. No admin rights required. > Qt Creator is horrid, Qt C++ is a weird language of its own and requires hackery like moc Well, that's your opinion. In fact the tool is very good, the call and linking of moc and generated files is transparent, and C++ is an excellent work horse. > do something not included in Qt, it's often welcome to the hell that is CMake et all. No problem at all. Of course you have to know both Qt and C++ good enough, but that's something a developer can master. > Delphi is proprietary, Windows-only and the language is niche and IMHO not very good even compared to Qt C++ There is FreePascal/Lazarus which is open source and runs even on more platforms than Qt. Even Delphi runs on other platforms. Whether you prefer C++ or Object Pascal is a matter of taste.