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Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

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Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#51

Post by fknop »

deadlydose wrote: post #33
fknop wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you don't want a good looking UI, but it's safe to say that at least 90% of users want a good looking UI. Good looking UI is a major part of user experience.

Not saying I don't believe you, but do you have a source for that 90% claim?

It's a "random" guess. But in my experience, for a website, if it doesn't look good at first sight, a user might just leave instantly. As someone pointed out in the comments, just looking at sites like:

https://riverbankcomputing.com/software/pyqt/intro https://electronjs.org/

Your eye will probably be more attracted by the good design of the electron website.

I'm not saying an app should be only good looking, but it's clearly a major part.

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#52

Post by TickleSteve »

chatmasta wrote: post #30
kelnos wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this an issue? Before Electron and other HTML/CSS-based "native" apps became all the rage (which is fairly recently), native apps were built using Qt, GTK, Cocoa, WPF, WinForms, MFC, etc., and they did just fine. Perhaps we just really don't need these "effects" and just need consistent, simple UIs of the sort that toolkits that paint native widgets can give you. Whenever I install an app that's built using so…

It’s the difference between HipChat and Slack. Like it or not, the users do.

Do you mean this?

The Slack desktop app is the prime example for how bad Electron apps are. Its literally notorious for it.

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#53

Post by fnl »

alexandernst wrote: post #20
fnl wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you aware of QML, which is part of the Qt framework? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/QML

Yes. QML is a step in the right direction, but the syntax is kind of awkward, and you still need C++ on the background, which makes it harder to use, more expensive (in terms of man/hours cost) and slower to develop than + HTML/CSS.

Not that most companies would care, as dev cost seems to be all that matters these days, but the upsides are much faster and leaner applications than what you get from Electron.

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#54

Post by monkmartinez »

mherrmann wrote: post #43
monkmartinez wrote: post #22

> "PyQt is dual licensed on all supported platforms under the GNU GPL v3 and the Riverbank Commercial License. Unlike Qt, PyQt is not available under the LGPL. You can purchase the commercial version of PyQt here. More information about licensing can be found in the License FAQ." Except this sucks if, you know, you want to make some money on your app... Kicking the tires for a potentially commercial app is a FULL sto…

> Except this sucks if, you know, you want to make some money on your app... Why is that a problem? You get a commercial license for PyQt and are good to go(?) > I love Python, but it has stagnated hard in the last few years. The 2 to 3 transition really hurt the Python ecosystem [...] I disagree. I think the ecosystem is more vibrant than ever. > Furthermore, packaging for different platforms is still a problem in 2…

$500 dollars... is "not expensive"?

Beside the ML/AI sub-community, I am having a hard time finding GUI innovation in the Python ecosystem. Perhaps, you could show me an option that doesn't suck? I've tried Kivy, PyQt, PySide, Eel, gooey, etc... I am not a JS dev and had an electron/react app up and running that I easily ported to my Android phone in under an hour.

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#56

Post by addicted »

kelnos wrote: post #17
_em6m wrote: post #4

The main problem with "other toolkits" vs Electron apps is that they are not as simple to use in order to create a very good looking UIs. Compare how easy it is to use HTML and CSS in order to create a very complex UIs with all sort of effects vs how utterly complicated is to override, let's say, Qt's ::paint() method in order to achieve rich text inside a label. Let me repeat it. Rich text inside a label. Such a sim…

How is this an issue? Before Electron and other HTML/CSS-based "native" apps became all the rage (which is fairly recently), native apps were built using Qt, GTK, Cocoa, WPF, WinForms, MFC, etc., and they did just fine. Perhaps we just really don't need these "effects" and just need consistent, simple UIs of the sort that toolkits that paint native widgets can give you. Whenever I install an app that's built using so…

Linux and Mac weren’t as popular OSes either. And frankly, Windows apps didn’t need to look decent because people on the Windows/Linux side of the world were ok with really bad looking apps.

Now that Desktop apps compete with web apps those toolkit’s are falling short. They are falling short in ease of development, cross compatibility, lack of trained developers (relative to web), and lack of good looking UIs and UI patterns.

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#57

Post by makecheck »

Loic wrote: post #41

I have been developing in HTML/Python for a while now. This works wonderfully. You just need to put all your business logic in Python, use PyQt to run all the platform specific code like file dialogs, printing, etc. but keep the main interface with React. You do that by having a webview with a service object being the bridge between Python and the JS view[0]. If you are a bit careful with the amount of information go…

I’m curious, does that work with sandboxing on the Mac?

One of the things that Mac file dialogs do is implicitly expand the sandbox for the process that opens the file dialog. Is the other side of the bridge still able to access the selected path?

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#58

Post by mherrmann »

monkmartinez wrote: post #54
mherrmann wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Except this sucks if, you know, you want to make some money on your app... Why is that a problem? You get a commercial license for PyQt and are good to go(?) > I love Python, but it has stagnated hard in the last few years. The 2 to 3 transition really hurt the Python ecosystem [...] I disagree. I think the ecosystem is more vibrant than ever. > Furthermore, packaging for different platforms is still a problem in 2…

$500 dollars... is "not expensive"? Beside the ML/AI sub-community, I am having a hard time finding GUI innovation in the Python ecosystem. Perhaps, you could show me an option that doesn't suck? I've tried Kivy, PyQt, PySide, Eel, gooey, etc... I am not a JS dev and had an electron/react app up and running that I easily ported to my Android phone in under an hour.

I guess it depends on how much time you spend on an app. I've been working on my PyQt app [1] for 2331 hours (I track my time). $500 is nothing in comparison.

[1]: https://fman.io

Re: Show HN: Cross-platform desktop applications with PyQT

#59

Post by negativegate »

chatmasta wrote: post #30
kelnos wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this an issue? Before Electron and other HTML/CSS-based "native" apps became all the rage (which is fairly recently), native apps were built using Qt, GTK, Cocoa, WPF, WinForms, MFC, etc., and they did just fine. Perhaps we just really don't need these "effects" and just need consistent, simple UIs of the sort that toolkits that paint native widgets can give you. Whenever I install an app that's built using so…

It’s the difference between HipChat and Slack. Like it or not, the users do.

I don't think you can attribute Slack's success to choosing Electron over Qt WebEngine, which is used by HipChat.
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