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What's a native UI? The only thing closeish to a native UI is macOS and iOS AppKit and UIKit. Winforms aka Win32 is still a thing, but Microsoft has been undog

by epcoa 2y ago

What's a native UI? The only thing closeish to a native UI is macOS and iOS AppKit and UIKit. Winforms aka Win32 is still a thing, but Microsoft has been undogfooding that and putting out alternatives for years, now WinUI3 will definitely kill off Winforms for good! What is native on Linux? Gtk, Qt, Motif (lol)? And then Android? Ironic then that Google is the one behind Flutter. The concept of native outside of MacOS/iOS is pretty busted at this point. At best it just means something non-web.

dotancohen 2y ago
I would consider both GTK and Qt native on Linux.
- epcoa 2y ago
  So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Fat chance of that on anything but yet another music player or other relatively trivial UI app. In any event, that still doesn't answer what it means to be "native"? And my point is I think most definitions are dumb or useless. If I'm running a GTK desktop, Qt apps are generally not "native" no matter how much theme fuckery one tries. Native can also speak to other common UI affordances and design guidelines, and there sure as hell is nothing like there is in the MacOS world for linux. Some core GNOME and KDE desktop apps maybe, but overall there isn't much adopted standardization in Linux world. 90% of the work I get done involving a GUI outside a browser on Linux usually involves Java, whether it be Intellij, ghidra, etc. Maybe I'll pick up blender from time to time. Audacity, there's a good one, targeting (for now) a cross-platform toolkit that pretends you can have your cake and eat it too - wxWidgets never fooled anyone - they sure as hell don't look native on MacOS, and they invariably look much closer to what they riffed off of, a 90s MFC app. (And wxWidgets wraps GTK and AppKit, so is it native? If so, native is meaningless IMHO. If not, why not?)
  - einpoklum 2y ago
    > So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Doesn't it mean that you can target _either_ and be considered native? Also, I'm not sure I buy the claim that of "GTK and Qt are native" in the first place. I'd say either that there is no native UI, or if I must call something native, it's the toolkit the desktop environment uses. And yes, that does mean that there is no "Linux nativeness" like there is Windows nativeness, as every DE is different. And rightly so, because one could in principle write a different DE over the Windows kernel, whose UI would behave differently.
    - epcoa 2y ago
      > Doesn't it mean that you can target _either_ and be considered native? Well, no because I was agreeing with you, if you're going to grudgingly accept your definition for native, the toolkit the desktop environment uses, that means you would have to target both Qt and GTK unless you want to draw a line in the sand and say fuck it to one of GNOME or KDE as assume they don't exist. Sorry GNUStep. And this is nothing to say of GTK 2-4. I agree that just saying GTK or Qt are native in a vacuum outside of DE is a completely useless definition, and even taking DE into account is a tenuous one. As for Windows, what GUI toolkit does the desktop environment there use? That's a trick question.
  - dotancohen 2y ago
    > So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Incorrect. Target one or the other, not both.
    - epcoa 2y ago
      How is Qt within a GNOME or Xfce environment any more "native" than Qt on Windows or Mac? You have reduced the definition of "native" to merely compatible with X11/Wayland (that's the only common denominator). Well now, Tk, FLTK, Swing, and even Wine are all native.
      - notpushkin 2y ago
        Both Qt and GTK have facilities for integrating into each other’s desktop environments (see [1]). Sometimes they blend in nicely, sometimes they stand out a bit, but I think it works out pretty okay. [1]: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Uniform_look_for_Qt_and_GTK_applications https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Uniform_look_for_Qt_and_GTK...
        epcoa 2y ago
        > Both Qt and GTK have facilities for integrating into each other’s desktop environments Neither Qt nor GTK are desktop environments and Qt certainly isn’t defined by a dominant desktop environment - KDE isn’t even what pays their bills. You’re still proving my point. The common denominator here (on Linux) is just X11/Wayland. If it works out “pretty okay”, then score one for a cross platform toolkit. Still no idea what über alles “native” means. Let’s go back to the original comment I responded to… why should I not just continue with the Qt “stupid” “hobbyhorse”
        account42 2y ago
        GTK doesn't much care about integrating into a Qt environment and doesn't really implement anything to make that work besides in some cases implementing the same Freedesktop standards. Even for basic things like the look of widgets you need a style that has implementations for GTK - there is no compatibility layer to use Qt styles. Gnomies in general don't care about anything outside their world. The other way around is a bit better, e.g. there is QGtkStyle but AFAIK it is stuck at GTK2 and does not support using GTK3 styles. Still, behavior between GTK and Qt applications is very noticeably different. It would be great if there was a shared ABI applications could use but GUI toolkits are too complicated for this to be feasible.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
jeremyjh 2y ago
Win32 is the native GUI toolkit on Windows. Winforms is a .NET wrapper to it. There isn't any debate to be had there. Yes, the same vendor provides other toolkits. Linux is a kernel project, and different distributions are for many purposes best considered to be different OS's. Desktops based on Linux mostly are either GTK or QT, and so the native toolkit depends on the desktop you are using. Is this too much fragmentation for users on those platforms to realistically expect commercial software to support them natively? Yes, of course, but that doesn't mean there is any confusion about what it would mean to do so.
- int_19h 2y ago
  Win32 is no longer the native GUI toolkit on Windows, given how much of the OS GUI itself is not using it (new Settings etc). If the argument is that it ships in the box, well, so does UWP XAML.
- epcoa 2y ago
  > Linux is a kernel project, Is that useful pedantry? From context, you really think that's my confusion here? I didn't include *BSD either, but it isn't any different for the relative handful of people using that for a desktop system. > Win32 is the native GUI toolkit on Windows. Winforms is a .NET wrapper to it. There isn't any debate to be had there. Except for Microsoft's numerous attempts to supplant it and the fact that the base OS doesn't even use it consistently for their own system. Microsoft's own File Explorer and Settings app that only had to live along with Control Panel for a decade, was that not native? They aren't "Win32". If you insist on pedantry, you should know Win32 isn't a GUI toolkit either, it's an anachronistic term for the Windows API. Nobody casually calls it USER though, and the bulk of people still targeting it do so through .NET these days via Winforms. If native just means provided by the vendors base system, ok, but then if there are 10 different forms of it, other than the distribution issue there isn't some great intrinsic benefit over just targeting Qt or Flutter. Especially when someone like Microsoft can't settle on a consistent design language through the years.
  - jeremyjh 2y ago
    >Is that useful pedantry? From context, you really think that's my confusion here? I don't know what could possibly confuse anyone about the role of GTK and QT in the Linux ecosystem.
foresto 2y ago
> What is native on Linux? Gtk, Qt, Motif (lol)? Linux is not something that encompasses a GUI, so this is a misguided way to frame the underlying concern. One might as well ask what toolkit is native on smartphones, or what language is natively spoken by humans. We should instead ask what is native on Plasma, or on GNOME. "Oh, bother. That would mean I have to think of four things instead of three." Well, yes, Pooh. But the things that make them different are the things that make them, them.
- epcoa 2y ago
  Ok but this is in response to this: "Just build native UIs. I don't know why cross platform UI has been such a hobbyhorse for so many for so long: it's a stupid idea." The stupid idea is thinking that building native UIs is targeting a clean, non-moving target and implying it is not astronomically harder than doing something cross platform that is between mediocre and good enough for everybody. Whenever someone says “just do native” it always turns out they have a cockamamie definition of native, otherwise they would realize the gravity and general unreasonableness of what they were asking. On a side note, what’s a major* reasonably complex app that isn’t a music player or an IRC client, or something with a simple shell around a canvas like a browser, that targets both Plasma and GNOME natively. * And whether anyone likes it or not, few people care (as revealed by $$, not bitching on a forum). Blame electron, the web, but even Microsoft cannot even define and maintain a native LnF for their core operating system. As I alluded to, the only small community that cares are those on MacOS and iOS, where there is a HIG that more than 2 people have read and give a shit about, and there is a small market of people that value well integrated Mac apps that will actually spend money. Targeting Win USER32 +/- XAML, Qt, GTK, and AppKit is costly and thankless when you probably could have just used Qt, JavaFX, or Flutter, etc.
dgellow 2y ago
WinUI3 doesn’t kill WinForms… WPF, WinUI, WinForms all exist together
- epcoa 2y ago
  You missed the sarcasm. If all can exist together, which one is the “native” one? If the answer is all of the above, then the consistency argument for native doesn’t hold much water.

by epcoa 2y ago

dotancohen 2y ago

I would consider both GTK and Qt native on Linux.

epcoa 2y ago
So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Fat chance of that on anything but yet another music player or other relatively trivial UI app. In any event, that still doesn't answer what it means to be "native"? And my point is I think most definitions are dumb or useless. If I'm running a GTK desktop, Qt apps are generally not "native" no matter how much theme fuckery one tries. Native can also speak to other common UI affordances and design guidelines, and there sure as hell is nothing like there is in the MacOS world for linux. Some core GNOME and KDE desktop apps maybe, but overall there isn't much adopted standardization in Linux world. 90% of the work I get done involving a GUI outside a browser on Linux usually involves Java, whether it be Intellij, ghidra, etc. Maybe I'll pick up blender from time to time. Audacity, there's a good one, targeting (for now) a cross-platform toolkit that pretends you can have your cake and eat it too - wxWidgets never fooled anyone - they sure as hell don't look native on MacOS, and they invariably look much closer to what they riffed off of, a 90s MFC app. (And wxWidgets wraps GTK and AppKit, so is it native? If so, native is meaningless IMHO. If not, why not?)
- einpoklum 2y ago
  > So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Doesn't it mean that you can target _either_ and be considered native? Also, I'm not sure I buy the claim that of "GTK and Qt are native" in the first place. I'd say either that there is no native UI, or if I must call something native, it's the toolkit the desktop environment uses. And yes, that does mean that there is no "Linux nativeness" like there is Windows nativeness, as every DE is different. And rightly so, because one could in principle write a different DE over the Windows kernel, whose UI would behave differently.
  - epcoa 2y ago
    > Doesn't it mean that you can target _either_ and be considered native? Well, no because I was agreeing with you, if you're going to grudgingly accept your definition for native, the toolkit the desktop environment uses, that means you would have to target both Qt and GTK unless you want to draw a line in the sand and say fuck it to one of GNOME or KDE as assume they don't exist. Sorry GNUStep. And this is nothing to say of GTK 2-4. I agree that just saying GTK or Qt are native in a vacuum outside of DE is a completely useless definition, and even taking DE into account is a tenuous one. As for Windows, what GUI toolkit does the desktop environment there use? That's a trick question.
- dotancohen 2y ago
  > So that means one has to target both GTK and Qt to be native on Linux. Incorrect. Target one or the other, not both.
  - epcoa 2y ago
    How is Qt within a GNOME or Xfce environment any more "native" than Qt on Windows or Mac? You have reduced the definition of "native" to merely compatible with X11/Wayland (that's the only common denominator). Well now, Tk, FLTK, Swing, and even Wine are all native.
    - notpushkin 2y ago
      Both Qt and GTK have facilities for integrating into each other’s desktop environments (see [1]). Sometimes they blend in nicely, sometimes they stand out a bit, but I think it works out pretty okay. [1]: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Uniform_look_for_Qt_and_GTK_applications https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Uniform_look_for_Qt_and_GTK...
      - epcoa 2y ago
        > Both Qt and GTK have facilities for integrating into each other’s desktop environments Neither Qt nor GTK are desktop environments and Qt certainly isn’t defined by a dominant desktop environment - KDE isn’t even what pays their bills. You’re still proving my point. The common denominator here (on Linux) is just X11/Wayland. If it works out “pretty okay”, then score one for a cross platform toolkit. Still no idea what über alles “native” means. Let’s go back to the original comment I responded to… why should I not just continue with the Qt “stupid” “hobbyhorse”
      - account42 2y ago
        GTK doesn't much care about integrating into a Qt environment and doesn't really implement anything to make that work besides in some cases implementing the same Freedesktop standards. Even for basic things like the look of widgets you need a style that has implementations for GTK - there is no compatibility layer to use Qt styles. Gnomies in general don't care about anything outside their world. The other way around is a bit better, e.g. there is QGtkStyle but AFAIK it is stuck at GTK2 and does not support using GTK3 styles. Still, behavior between GTK and Qt applications is very noticeably different. It would be great if there was a shared ABI applications could use but GUI toolkits are too complicated for this to be feasible.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

jeremyjh 2y ago

Win32 is the native GUI toolkit on Windows. Winforms is a .NET wrapper to it. There isn't any debate to be had there. Yes, the same vendor provides other toolkits. Linux is a kernel project, and different distributions are for many purposes best considered to be different OS's. Desktops based on Linux mostly are either GTK or QT, and so the native toolkit depends on the desktop you are using. Is this too much fragmentation for users on those platforms to realistically expect commercial software to support them natively? Yes, of course, but that doesn't mean there is any confusion about what it would mean to do so.

int_19h 2y ago
Win32 is no longer the native GUI toolkit on Windows, given how much of the OS GUI itself is not using it (new Settings etc). If the argument is that it ships in the box, well, so does UWP XAML.
epcoa 2y ago
> Linux is a kernel project, Is that useful pedantry? From context, you really think that's my confusion here? I didn't include *BSD either, but it isn't any different for the relative handful of people using that for a desktop system. > Win32 is the native GUI toolkit on Windows. Winforms is a .NET wrapper to it. There isn't any debate to be had there. Except for Microsoft's numerous attempts to supplant it and the fact that the base OS doesn't even use it consistently for their own system. Microsoft's own File Explorer and Settings app that only had to live along with Control Panel for a decade, was that not native? They aren't "Win32". If you insist on pedantry, you should know Win32 isn't a GUI toolkit either, it's an anachronistic term for the Windows API. Nobody casually calls it USER though, and the bulk of people still targeting it do so through .NET these days via Winforms. If native just means provided by the vendors base system, ok, but then if there are 10 different forms of it, other than the distribution issue there isn't some great intrinsic benefit over just targeting Qt or Flutter. Especially when someone like Microsoft can't settle on a consistent design language through the years.
- jeremyjh 2y ago
  >Is that useful pedantry? From context, you really think that's my confusion here? I don't know what could possibly confuse anyone about the role of GTK and QT in the Linux ecosystem.

foresto 2y ago

> What is native on Linux? Gtk, Qt, Motif (lol)? Linux is not something that encompasses a GUI, so this is a misguided way to frame the underlying concern. One might as well ask what toolkit is native on smartphones, or what language is natively spoken by humans. We should instead ask what is native on Plasma, or on GNOME. "Oh, bother. That would mean I have to think of four things instead of three." Well, yes, Pooh. But the things that make them different are the things that make them, them.

epcoa 2y ago
Ok but this is in response to this: "Just build native UIs. I don't know why cross platform UI has been such a hobbyhorse for so many for so long: it's a stupid idea." The stupid idea is thinking that building native UIs is targeting a clean, non-moving target and implying it is not astronomically harder than doing something cross platform that is between mediocre and good enough for everybody. Whenever someone says “just do native” it always turns out they have a cockamamie definition of native, otherwise they would realize the gravity and general unreasonableness of what they were asking. On a side note, what’s a major* reasonably complex app that isn’t a music player or an IRC client, or something with a simple shell around a canvas like a browser, that targets both Plasma and GNOME natively. * And whether anyone likes it or not, few people care (as revealed by $$, not bitching on a forum). Blame electron, the web, but even Microsoft cannot even define and maintain a native LnF for their core operating system. As I alluded to, the only small community that cares are those on MacOS and iOS, where there is a HIG that more than 2 people have read and give a shit about, and there is a small market of people that value well integrated Mac apps that will actually spend money. Targeting Win USER32 +/- XAML, Qt, GTK, and AppKit is costly and thankless when you probably could have just used Qt, JavaFX, or Flutter, etc.

dgellow 2y ago

WinUI3 doesn’t kill WinForms… WPF, WinUI, WinForms all exist together

epcoa 2y ago
You missed the sarcasm. If all can exist together, which one is the “native” one? If the answer is all of the above, then the consistency argument for native doesn’t hold much water.