Deno Desktop

#1

Post by GeneralMaximus » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 5:38 AM UTC

Deno Desktop
docs.deno.com

Re: Deno Desktop

#2

Post by solarkraft » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:18 AM UTC

This is a smart thing to ship. For me it would totally be a consideration when deciding on a platform to use.

Re: Deno Desktop

#3

Post by jorisw » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:19 AM UTC

> Web technology is the most widely-known UI toolkit in the world.

Poor choice of words there IMHO.

The reason Electron apps get a lot of flak is because they are everything _but_ a UI toolkit. They consistently miss the mark in adopting UI patterns from their host OS.

Web tech is just web tech. Yes it will allow you to render a button, but even unstyled, the button won't necessarily look native to the OS, and will vary between browsers.

Re: Deno Desktop

#4

Post by sjeno » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:19 AM UTC

solarkraft wrote: post #2

This is a smart thing to ship. For me it would totally be a consideration when deciding on a platform to use.

agree, small footprint & cross-platform looks like a nice alternative to electron or tauri..

Re: Deno Desktop

#5

Post by sheept » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:19 AM UTC

I was wondering how this integrates with Deno's permission system, which is one of its biggest strengths especially for letting agents run amok on your device.

The CLI reference page[0] notes,

> The permissions you grant at compile time are baked into the compiled binary:

I think it would be nice if this could be surfaced to the user somehow, like letting the user know and decide which permissions they want to give access to.

[0]: https://docs.deno.com/runtime/reference/cli/desktop/#runtime...

Re: Deno Desktop

#6

Post by lillesvin » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:24 AM UTC

As much as I like cross-platform stuff, I also really like native UIs that follow native UX patterns, etc.

Re: Deno Desktop

#7

Post by nimchimpsky » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:24 AM UTC

[dead]

Re: Deno Desktop

#8

Post by wilg » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:24 AM UTC

jorisw wrote: post #3

> Web technology is the most widely-known UI toolkit in the world. Poor choice of words there IMHO. The reason Electron apps get a lot of flak is because they are everything _but_ a UI toolkit. They consistently miss the mark in adopting UI patterns from their host OS. Web tech is just web tech. Yes it will allow you to render a button, but even unstyled, the button won't necessarily look native to the OS, and will v…

None of that changes whether it's a UI toolkit, which it surely is.

Re: Deno Desktop

#9

Post by utopiah » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:26 AM UTC

jorisw wrote: post #3

> Web technology is the most widely-known UI toolkit in the world. Poor choice of words there IMHO. The reason Electron apps get a lot of flak is because they are everything _but_ a UI toolkit. They consistently miss the mark in adopting UI patterns from their host OS. Web tech is just web tech. Yes it will allow you to render a button, but even unstyled, the button won't necessarily look native to the OS, and will v…

> look native to the OS

Is that a problem? A button with a legible label is a button. The host OS doesn't have to look exactly like the applications it runs.

Re: Deno Desktop

#10

Post by utopiah » Mon, Jun 22, 2026, 6:28 AM UTC

Interesting but IMHO as we see on mobile providing WebViews work. Maybe instead of having Electron, Tauri, Electrobun, now Deno desktop but also plenty of alternatives then desktop browsers should provide WebViews on desktop with sandbox and permissions that make those applications usable. The alternatives listed here would just be fallback for a transition period until the WebViews are "good enough".