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Inspecting Web Views in macOS

blog.jim-nielsen.com

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Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#21

Post by disposedtrolley »

I wasn't surprised to see the Family Sharing pane in the first screenshot. It's easily the most janky part of System Preferences that I've had to struggle with:

- Loading indicators for several seconds when switching between categories in the left sidebar, on a very decent internet connection.

- Janky animations and transitions when opening modals, like clicking the "Details..." button on a family member.

- Within the "Invite people to your family" modal, clicking "Not Now" causes the "Invite People" button (the default, highlighted action) to blink before the modal closes.

Yes while these are absolutely nitpicks, I feel that Apple has lost some of the attention to detail that set them apart.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#22

Post by soheil »

Not really. There is a webview for certain account related stuff that gets loaded from a web page which happens to be a React app. Most other settings are native code and not loaded from a remote URL. Completely misleading post/title.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#23

Post by eropple »

userbinator wrote: post #12

This might explain why, although I'm not a constant user of Mac, whenever I've had to use it, the UI has felt a little (and in the newer versions, significantly) more sluggish than Windows on the same hardware. It's not hard to see how someone accustomed to that level of responsiveness could find Electron not too different from a "native" app that's actually doing much the same thing.

It's like three webviews in the system preferences app.

So probably not.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#24

Post by SkyMarshal »

adamnemecek wrote: post #3

GUI development is really fucking broken. I get it, it's hard to compete with a standardized platform with a probably billion man hours poured into it but I'm really hoping that Rust will make it possible to write native and web experiences from one codebase.

> I get it, it's hard to compete with a standardized platform with a probably billion man hours poured into it

Are you talking about the MacOS System Preferences app, which has probably been around since Macs switched to Intel, or about React? Either could fit that description.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#25

Post by oefrha »

johnfn wrote: post #10

Wow. I always thought the argument in favor of using web technologies on the desktop was that cross-platform became easier. And yet here is an example of the most unambiguously single-platform app I can possibly imagine, and under the hood it uses web - and React of all things! Crazy.

A settings view that is largely shared between macOS System Preferences, iOS Settings and icloud.com is not single-platform. Windows Settings uses React Native for the same reason.[1]

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30384494

Edit: mention iOS Settings.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#28

Post by maxloh »

adamnemecek wrote: post #3

GUI development is really fucking broken. I get it, it's hard to compete with a standardized platform with a probably billion man hours poured into it but I'm really hoping that Rust will make it possible to write native and web experiences from one codebase.

How about flutter? It uses native views.

Re: Inspecting Web Views in macOS

#29

Post by ksec »

woodruffw wrote: post #9
efortis wrote: post #2

Awesome! Do you know more Web Views in use?

Don't quote me on this, but I believe that Apple Music (nee iTunes) has used web views for a long time; probably over a decade. The entire thing probably isn't a web view, but my recollection is that the store components were.

Yes, both iTunes and Apple Music. That is why they are slow, comparatively speaking.

But they are finally rewriting Apple Music app to full native.

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