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Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

slint.dev

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Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#131

Post by satvikpendem »

nu11ptr wrote: post #42
serial_dev wrote: post #21

The comparison sections are very confusing. It says you will compare your UI toolkit with, for example, Flutter and then there is no comparison there at all. I thought the site is broken on mobile, I tried different browsers, etc, because the comparison was just not there. If you don't have any real content there because you don't want to start a flame war, you could try something like what the Flutter team did, they…

This is what I do: - Write the backend in Rust - Write the UI in Flutter - Tie them together using gRPC. You get an API and ability to run client and server on different machines as well I looked at the flutter to rust bridge and started to play with it, but assuming your UI can withstand the slight overhead of gRPC I found it a simpler way to proceed (although I'm not that far in yet)

Have you seen flutter_rust_bridge? I use that to write business logic in Rust, if I need to use Rust crates. I did that recently for a CRDT library called Automerge.

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#132

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

nologic01 wrote: post #81
timeon wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (pressumably) Why do you suppose this in particular?

my lack of imagination as to what might be otherwise motivating HN members to "engage" in this way :-) I mean I can't imagine anybody having an independent interest in the project (like I do) and actually thinking that the comparison provided was adequate. As said in my original comment, this is an area where a sense of sub-optimal status quo is palpable and people search for some sort of rationalization of the vario…

People downvote perfectly reasonable questions or comments here plenty often. And even more pile on if you dare to call this infantile behavior out.

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#133

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

CoastalCoder wrote: post #45
madnirua wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclaimer: I work for Slint I suppose you are referring to the "Embedded Add-on per application" pricing? At least the non-commercial use is hopefully clear :) Yes, we need find a better way to show the pricing there since it's dependent on 2 variables - volume and type of embedded system. Maybe some sort of a online calculator?

I always assumed "call us" pricing was to give a salesperson the opportunity to negotiate the best deal for the seller.

I would think they want to hear what your device sells for. If you're going to charge me $1 per unit on something that costs only three figures, I'm telling you to take a hike.

Qt hasn't quite learned this. Their embedded pricing is absurd.

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#134

Post by monroewalker »

nu11ptr wrote: post #90
monroewalker wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm looking at something similar with Go as the backend. Why gRPC instead of a pipe? I started with that as well since it was really easy to set up but that comes with the caveat of requiring network permissions even though it's local to local communication.

Pros and cons: with a pipe it will be up to you to create your own message delimiters and protocol, so a pipe is somewhat lower level. You also limit comm. to just that machine, but that may be a pro if that is what you are looking for (omits need for things like username/password or locking to 'localhost'). Lastly, you do not gain an API for your users to consume (if that makes sense for your app - it doesn't always…

Protoc actually generates "writeDelimitedMessage" and "readDelimitedMessage" functions for each type. The only thing I needed to add was some buffering on the Dart side to ensure the full message was available. The Go side was able to read the stream and block until input became available

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#136

Post by lbres »

DontchaKnowit wrote: post #89
meepmorp wrote: post #19

Is it named after the band?

If youre reading this, go listen to spiderland by slint. Awesome and super unique album

I’ve always hoped that HN was a place that appreciated music like Slint, now I have my answer.

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#137

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

nyanpasu64 wrote: post #84

The toolkit still seems quite incomplete for desktop use (as opposed to embedded/appliance UIs), as it doesn't support menu bars in an issue open since 2020: https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/38

What is a "menu bar?" Something other than a regular application menu?

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#138

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

random78965 wrote: post #103
TobyTheDog123 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh it's certainly not for me, no question about it. Yet, it's curious that you compare Slint to LVGL/Flutter/Electron (I don't know about Qt) when none of them have this intrusive requirement. --- >What's intrusive about it? (a) Display the AboutSlint widget in an "About" screen or dialog that is accessible from the top level menu of the Application. (b) Display the Slint attribution badge on a public webpage, where…

Not a dev, but I've often seen software that acknowledge their dependencies in About sections and on their websites. Is that particularly intrusive? Especially given that you could always use the GPL too if you want.

This goes beyond that. I didn't see that list of requirements; some places only say "attribution."

I would have no problem listing a library in the About dialog, but dictating the use of special icons and then all of those other requirements goes further than I've seen in any similar product.

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#139

Post by ogoffart »

ealhad wrote: post #53

This looks really neat, I played with it a bit and the DSL is well thought out. One thing I can't figure though: how do we set default values for internal Struct? Said default values are mentionned in the documentation (here: https://slint.dev/releases/1.0.2/docs/slint/src/reference/ty... >). // ok even if a is missing, it will just have the default value

Currently the default is just whatever empty value for that type (so 0 or "")

But since this is something that was asked before, I created an issue: https://github.com/slint-ui/slint/issues/2936

Re: Show HN: Slint – A declarative UI toolkit for embedded and desktop

#140

Post by ogoffart »

codethief wrote: post #99

The in-browser demos (using WebAssembly) are surprisingly fast and responsive (very different from the Flutter demos that I remember). Very cool! Also, I just realized I had checked out this project before when it was still called SixtyFPS, https://slint.dev/blog/sixtyfps-becomes-slint . Maybe it would make sense to mention the name change in your post.

It has been over a year since we renamed the project. We previously had a note on every page with the former name. But the new website design no longer includes this note.
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