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Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

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Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#51

Post by _pmf_ »

pknopf wrote: post #9

This reminds me of the project I am currently working on. .NET/QML https://github.com/pauldotknopf/net-core-qml Not quite production yet, but it will be soon. I'd love to here some input. You can check the unit tests for how things are working currently. At a certain point, I will also implement a Qml debugger in visual studio code.

Very nice. I have used both WPF/XAML and QML and definitely find QML's model much more intuitive (anchors make things so much easier). Looking forward to trying it out!

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#52

Post by romanovcode »

kristiandupont wrote: post #38

Ok, I normally find myself disagreeing with HN every time Electron comes up. Basically, I think the upsides are worth the size and performance tradeoffs. However, this seems to be almost an entire server deploy as well as a complete renderer all in one package. That does seem excessive to me for a desktop app.

Node.js does the same on "standard" electron apps. What's your point here?

This could actually be faster since C# is faster language than Node.

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#53

Post by cm2187 »

bsaul wrote: post #47
pjmlp wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the latest Windows Developer Day, Xamarin.Forms is that framework in what concerns Microsoft. As for the rest, sorry for being so blunt, but it is just not wanting to learn. We we were writing applications across multiple OS and hardware architectures for ages now. It is easy, no, as it requires actually putting some effort into a proper architecture and OS/hardware abstractions, but it is surely doable.…

"It feels like devs now want to write apps without spending any real effort on them." I think what people are fed up with, is to spend effort learning the "method du jour" of putting a button on a screen and updating the view on a click. This is pretty much a solved problem, and has been since MVC was invented in the 70s (not saying it's perfect, but it does the job). So there should be an easy an portable way of doi…

It's even worse than that. It makes apps expensive and slower to develop across platforms, makes different version more complicated to maintain and keep in sync, creates more attack surface, etc. And even from a non technical point of view, there is a consistency of experience across platforms point of view. There are very good reasons to have fully cross platform apps that you develop only once.

And in general, I don't think developers are being lazy by going for higher level languages like java, c# or python. Ease of use has a lot of value, particularly if the underlying problem you are trying to solve isn't simple.

The last thing is forward compatibility. If I write an objective-c app, it will only be compatible with apple's platform. Say a new kind of platform appears that takes a significant market share (AR?), there is a lot of value in your app being compatible with this platform without needing even to recompile it, just because the cross platform framework you use will be ported to that platform.

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#54

Post by j_s »

lwansbrough wrote: post #20

I think this highlights the need for Microsoft to open source Edge’s new rendering engine. I’d love to be able to use the renderer in .NET Core for a whole host of applications (including rendering dynamic HTML to OpenGL) but unfortunately EdgeHTML has remained closed source! With many components of the .NET stack being open sourced, and even some of the Edge stack, I had high hopes for seeing the rendering engine op…

I voted for the Developer Feedback issue you linked.

> Currently we have to use CEF [https://cefsharp.github.io]

https://bitbucket.org/geckofx

What benefits would an open-source Edge provide to developers that the combination of Chrome and Firefox don't already?

PS. 100% managed C# HTML renderer: https://github.com/ArthurHub/HTML-Renderer

[edited]

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#55

Post by alkonaut »

yoodenvranx wrote: post #41
alkonaut wrote: post #21

Can't we just make a proper, easy to use portable desktop application framework please? I really don't care what language is used so log as JS is avoidable (It can still be a compilation target so it could even be JS), and I can make a snappy desktop app that takes 10 not 100mb. I'm not even sure which one I'm hoping for at the moment. Xamarin seems to have bet fully on mobile. Avalonia looks nice but feels like it w…

> Can't we just make a proper, easy to use portable desktop application framework please? We should just go back to Delphi, it was/is one of the best ways of doing GUIs.

Isn't delphi procedural just like e.g. Swing/AWT or Windows Forms? (Been a long time since I worked with Delphi). I think XAML/XUL and similar declarative GUIs are better.

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#56

Post by hacker_9 »

cm2187 wrote: post #26
roryisok wrote: post #12

I was really excited when I saw this because I thought someone had finally brought us a .net alternative to electron, using xaml. Unfortunately this seems to be electron but with a .net webapp running in the background? You still need node and webkit for the UI it seems. If that's what this is, it was already possible to do with edge.js and electron so I'm not sure what advantage there is here.

Agree. To me the solution will be webassembly. I entertain the hope that there will be a .net runtime for webassembly, in which case you will be able to write a full cross platform application without having to write a line of JavaScript. Won’t be XAML+.net but will be HTML+.net.

DOM interaction and Garbage Collectors are still a heavy research topic within the WebAssembly community, and aren't part of the MVP [1]. Plus MS would need to create a custom C# -> WASM compiler as they don't use LLVM internally. All this means you are probably going to be waiting at least another 5 years before you can compile .Net GUI apps straight to the web.

[1] http://webassembly.org/docs/future-features/

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#57

Post by jcelerier »

bsaul wrote: post #47
pjmlp wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the latest Windows Developer Day, Xamarin.Forms is that framework in what concerns Microsoft. As for the rest, sorry for being so blunt, but it is just not wanting to learn. We we were writing applications across multiple OS and hardware architectures for ages now. It is easy, no, as it requires actually putting some effort into a proper architecture and OS/hardware abstractions, but it is surely doable.…

"It feels like devs now want to write apps without spending any real effort on them." I think what people are fed up with, is to spend effort learning the "method du jour" of putting a button on a screen and updating the view on a click. This is pretty much a solved problem, and has been since MVC was invented in the 70s (not saying it's perfect, but it does the job). So there should be an easy an portable way of doi…

> QT seems to be the kind of framework, but it's C++ so i won't qualify it as "easy".

http://qmlbook.github.io/en/ch04/index.html

it's really easy

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#58

Post by fsloth »

headmelted wrote: post #23
alkonaut wrote: post #21

Can't we just make a proper, easy to use portable desktop application framework please? I really don't care what language is used so log as JS is avoidable (It can still be a compilation target so it could even be JS), and I can make a snappy desktop app that takes 10 not 100mb. I'm not even sure which one I'm hoping for at the moment. Xamarin seems to have bet fully on mobile. Avalonia looks nice but feels like it w…

Standard WinForms and/or Java isn't too far off what you're describing if you're willing to install runtimes, but I know that's not what you're looking for and I see your point. The difficulty is that people used to agree (and at varying times, sue each other) over which metaphors to use. The desktop platforms are growing further apart on this front. Linux has so much work-in-progress happening at any one time that s…

"The difficulty is that people used to agree (and at varying times, sue each other) over which metaphors to use"

I think you hit the nail on the head. A UI common library should not provide metaphors but direct access to the renderdable elements, their layout routines, etc. A proper UI library would resemble a modern 3D game engine more by its interface.

The level where UI metaphors step in would be built on top of this basic substrate.

There are oh-so-many projects out there trying to use this pattern but for some reason they've not reached popularity.

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#59

Post by j_s »

lwansbrough wrote: post #20

I think this highlights the need for Microsoft to open source Edge’s new rendering engine. I’d love to be able to use the renderer in .NET Core for a whole host of applications (including rendering dynamic HTML to OpenGL) but unfortunately EdgeHTML has remained closed source! With many components of the .NET stack being open sourced, and even some of the Edge stack, I had high hopes for seeing the rendering engine op…

> some sort of UI subsystem that all vendors target

Like the X Window System?

Re: Electron.Net: Build cross platform desktop apps using .NET core and ASP.NET core

#60

Post by yunyu »

j_s wrote: post #54
lwansbrough wrote: post #20

I think this highlights the need for Microsoft to open source Edge’s new rendering engine. I’d love to be able to use the renderer in .NET Core for a whole host of applications (including rendering dynamic HTML to OpenGL) but unfortunately EdgeHTML has remained closed source! With many components of the .NET stack being open sourced, and even some of the Edge stack, I had high hopes for seeing the rendering engine op…

I voted for the Developer Feedback issue you linked. > Currently we have to use CEF [ https://cefsharp.github.io ] https://bitbucket.org/geckofx What benefits would an open-source Edge provide to developers that the combination of Chrome and Firefox don't already? PS. 100% managed C# HTML renderer: https://github.com/ArthurHub/HTML-Renderer [edited]

For me, the main thing is that scrolling on a touchpad in Windows feels extremely "off" on Chrome and Firefox, while Edge manages it perfectly. Additionally, Edge has lower power consumption than Chrome.
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