I’m talking the most native look and feel for the Windows platform.
Is it XAML and C#?
Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
1–10 of 107 posts
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#2Electr..HEY...[gets beaten to a bloody pulp]
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#3Delphi is probably the best, but I can't afford it. Lazarus is pretty good, except for the documentation, which needs a huge refactoring effort.
You can put together small applications in minutes.
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#4.NET Multi-platform App UI (MAUI) is for cross platform development but certainly targets native apps on Windows:
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#5The answer is: pick your poison. There is no best way. Microsoft would have you believe it is WinUI, but there is also WinForms, WPF, UDP, Xamarin Forms, .NET MAUI, Avalonia, Uno, and several other solutions.
Even the landing page for WinUI starts off by comparing the differences between two versions of it.
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#6Asking Microsoft, it looks to be either WPF or WinForms.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/?view=netde...
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#7To make an app with the same "nativeness" as the "Settings" app, you need to use UWP, or WinUI 2.7+. But not 3.0+.
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#8Without more details, this is the way to get the most native Windows 11 look and feel:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/winui/winui3/
Disclosure: I work at Microsoft on a team that works on visual look and feel for Windows.
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#9Delphi is probably the best, but I can't afford it. Lazarus is pretty good, except for the documentation, which needs a huge refactoring effort. You can put together small applications in minutes.
What does the free personal version of Delphi not give you?
Re: Ask HN: What is the best way to build a desktop app in Windows in 2023?
#10You need to check whatever half-arsed framework "that will be universal and encompass everything" Microsoft is promoting this specific month, and then violently ignore it and use proven things like wxWidgets or WinForms instead.
(There is no native look and feel on Windows any more. Microsoft pissed on that concept a long time ago.)