11 ms·

They could have done better. They chose the path of least resistance, putting in the least amount of effort, spending the least amount of resources into accompl

They could have done better. They chose the path of least resistance, putting in the least amount of effort, spending the least amount of resources into accomplishing a task. There's nothing "good" about electron. Hell, there are even easier ways of getting high performance cross platform software out there. Electron was used because it's a default, defacto choice that nobody bothered with even researching or testing if it was the right choice, or even a good choice. "It just works". A rabid raccoon mashing its face on a keyboard could plausibly produce a shippable electron app. Vibe-bandit development. (This is not a selling point.) People claiming to be software developers should aim to do better.

Gooblebrai 8mo ago
> They could have done better. They chose the path of least resistance, putting in the least amount of effort, spending the least amount of resources into accomplishing a task You might as well tell reality to do better: The reality of physics (water flows downhill, electricity moves through the best conductor, systems settle where the least energy is required) and the reality of business (companies naturally move toward solutions that cost less time, less money, and less effort) I personally think that some battles require playing within the rules of the game. Not to wish for new rules. Make something that requires less effort and resources than Electron but is good enough, and people will be more likely to use it.
- observationist 8mo ago
  Shaming the use of electron? I'll do that every day and twice on sunday. Same with nonsense websites that waste gigabytes on bloat, spam users with ads, and feed the adtech beast. And I'll lay credit for this monument to enshittification we call the internet at the feet of Google and Facebook and Microsoft. Using electron and doing things shittily is a choice. If you're ever presented with a choice between doing something well and not, do the best you can. Electron is never the best choice. It's not even the easiest, most efficient choice. It's the lazy, zero effort, default, ad-hoc choice picked by someone who really should know better but couldn't be bothered to even try.
  - llbbdd 8mo ago
    What alternative did you have in mind when you said there are even easier ways of getting high-performance cross-platform software built?
    - dmix 8mo ago
      I might hate Qt apps more than I hate Electron so I'm curious about the answer too.
      - prizzom 8mo ago
        As a recent toe-dipper into linux (now running Arch on a powerful minipc and KDE plasma) I'm shocked at how little progress has been made on the native UI side.
        KETHERCORTEX 7mo ago
        Well, it's not that surprising, considering that as soon as something radically new appears, there is always some mistreatment from all sides: platform owners, app developers and users. Windows' Metro/Modern UI was pretty good from different perspectives, but didn't have enough effort put into it to make it a universal thing fit for multiple purposes (half of the Windows settings was still in Control Panel for quite some time), wasn't familiar for users (so they hated it) and wasn't familiar for developers (so they created hideous apps). In the opposing Linux camp, GNOME made Gtk 4 with Libadwaita UI library with "everything is a phone app" mindset that not every app can adopt. For example, there's no application menu (a line with File, View, Edit, etc.) component shipped by default, you should make it yourself or get it somewhere. So now GIMP is developed using Gtk 3 (not modern 4) because it has all the components GIMP needs. Trying to get GNOME developers to implement some stuff outside of their vision is a futile effort.
      - wolvesechoes 8mo ago
        Whats is wrong with Qt apps? Take too little RAM?
deleted 8mo ago
[deleted]
3oil3 8mo ago
I agree with you, I even think it's shameful. When I saw it was elctron, I sighted so long I almost choked. Can't even cmd+g nor shift+cmd+f to search, context menu has nothing. Can't even swipe, no gestures etc. ELctron is better than nothing, and I'm grateful, but it tastes bitter. As for performance, somebody if I remember correctly, once asked here "what's the point of 512GB RAM on the mac Studio?" And then someone replied "so you can run two electron apps".

Gooblebrai 8mo ago

> They could have done better. They chose the path of least resistance, putting in the least amount of effort, spending the least amount of resources into accomplishing a task You might as well tell reality to do better: The reality of physics (water flows downhill, electricity moves through the best conductor, systems settle where the least energy is required) and the reality of business (companies naturally move toward solutions that cost less time, less money, and less effort) I personally think that some battles require playing within the rules of the game. Not to wish for new rules. Make something that requires less effort and resources than Electron but is good enough, and people will be more likely to use it.

observationist 8mo ago
Shaming the use of electron? I'll do that every day and twice on sunday. Same with nonsense websites that waste gigabytes on bloat, spam users with ads, and feed the adtech beast. And I'll lay credit for this monument to enshittification we call the internet at the feet of Google and Facebook and Microsoft. Using electron and doing things shittily is a choice. If you're ever presented with a choice between doing something well and not, do the best you can. Electron is never the best choice. It's not even the easiest, most efficient choice. It's the lazy, zero effort, default, ad-hoc choice picked by someone who really should know better but couldn't be bothered to even try.
- llbbdd 8mo ago
  What alternative did you have in mind when you said there are even easier ways of getting high-performance cross-platform software built?
  - dmix 8mo ago
    I might hate Qt apps more than I hate Electron so I'm curious about the answer too.
    - prizzom 8mo ago
      As a recent toe-dipper into linux (now running Arch on a powerful minipc and KDE plasma) I'm shocked at how little progress has been made on the native UI side.
      - KETHERCORTEX 7mo ago
        Well, it's not that surprising, considering that as soon as something radically new appears, there is always some mistreatment from all sides: platform owners, app developers and users. Windows' Metro/Modern UI was pretty good from different perspectives, but didn't have enough effort put into it to make it a universal thing fit for multiple purposes (half of the Windows settings was still in Control Panel for quite some time), wasn't familiar for users (so they hated it) and wasn't familiar for developers (so they created hideous apps). In the opposing Linux camp, GNOME made Gtk 4 with Libadwaita UI library with "everything is a phone app" mindset that not every app can adopt. For example, there's no application menu (a line with File, View, Edit, etc.) component shipped by default, you should make it yourself or get it somewhere. So now GIMP is developed using Gtk 3 (not modern 4) because it has all the components GIMP needs. Trying to get GNOME developers to implement some stuff outside of their vision is a futile effort.
    - wolvesechoes 8mo ago
      Whats is wrong with Qt apps? Take too little RAM?

deleted 8mo ago

[deleted]

3oil3 8mo ago

I agree with you, I even think it's shameful. When I saw it was elctron, I sighted so long I almost choked. Can't even cmd+g nor shift+cmd+f to search, context menu has nothing. Can't even swipe, no gestures etc. ELctron is better than nothing, and I'm grateful, but it tastes bitter. As for performance, somebody if I remember correctly, once asked here "what's the point of 512GB RAM on the mac Studio?" And then someone replied "so you can run two electron apps".