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Deno Desktop

docs.deno.com

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Re: Deno Desktop

#41

Post by DiabloD3 »

vinkelhake wrote: post #35
DiabloD3 wrote: post #31

I don't get the point of this. The world is trying to make computers faster and more accessible, more web UI slop isn't going to help that. Dumping Javascript entirely is the first step on that road.

I've seen variants of this comment for many years. The alternative to "web UI slop" would presumably be one of the many native toolkits. I see it in a different way. The fact that "web UI slop" has managed to make great inroads on the desktop is an indictment of the state of native toolkits. If you think it's a problem that desktop apps are being written with web toolkits, the solution for that isn't to shame (as the…

It hasn't made any inroads on the desktop though... all anyone did was just package their own SWA into a self-contained browser that serves its own content. They continue to be websites, with all the pitfalls of them.

I don't need to spend 2GB-4GB of RAM just to have a over-glorified IRC clone!

Also, the native toolkits are fine. Windows has two toolkits, the ShellUI/MFC family (which does everything required, although it doesn't always get hidpi on legacy apps correct; it gets integration for blind people and also unicode/multilingual correct, and also works with touch interfaces), and WinUI does it more modernly (and ticks all the boxes). OSX has its toolkit, seems to nail everything correctly. Linux has Qt (lets ignore GTK for now, only reason you use GTK is if you want to appear Gnome-native), and Qt also does native++ uplifting on other toolkits (ie, native widget + additional feature expansion, plus perfect mimicry of native look for entirely new widgets), plus Qt does everything you need to do correctly and easily.

There are also new UI toolkits coming up through the ranks that are trying to knock Qt off that #1 position. None of the WebUIs would even place in this race.

Web UI toolkits always look non-native, are hard to interpret, often use low contrast (and frankly ugly) colorschemes, are easy to use in ways that do not comply with usability standards across OSes, and usually do nothing for A11Y.

The opportunity to improve those toolkits was always there, and the ball was dropped.

Re: Deno Desktop

#42

Post by swiftcoder »

bel8 wrote: post #26

I'm happy for competition in this space, specially because Deno can run true TypeScript directly and not just strip types like the current Node implementation. With that said, this is going to eat a lot of Tauri market. Why would I use Tauri now? The 150mb of additional bundle size is just an extra 1 to 10 seconds of download time in most internet connections and you get a reliable rendering engine.

> and you get a reliable rendering engine

How is it more reliable than Tauri - aren't they both using the system webview?

Re: Deno Desktop

#43

Post by jpace121 »

bel8 wrote: post #26

I'm happy for competition in this space, specially because Deno can run true TypeScript directly and not just strip types like the current Node implementation. With that said, this is going to eat a lot of Tauri market. Why would I use Tauri now? The 150mb of additional bundle size is just an extra 1 to 10 seconds of download time in most internet connections and you get a reliable rendering engine.

> Why would I use Tauri now?

You’re “backend” isn’t JavaScript.

Re: Deno Desktop

#44

Post by bel8 »

swiftcoder wrote: post #42
bel8 wrote: post #26

I'm happy for competition in this space, specially because Deno can run true TypeScript directly and not just strip types like the current Node implementation. With that said, this is going to eat a lot of Tauri market. Why would I use Tauri now? The 150mb of additional bundle size is just an extra 1 to 10 seconds of download time in most internet connections and you get a reliable rendering engine.

> and you get a reliable rendering engine How is it more reliable than Tauri - aren't they both using the system webview?

Deno Desktop can bundle CEF (Chromium Embedded Framework) according to https://docs.deno.com/runtime/desktop/comparison

Re: Deno Desktop

#46

Post by fiatpandas »

swiftcoder wrote: post #42
bel8 wrote: post #26

I'm happy for competition in this space, specially because Deno can run true TypeScript directly and not just strip types like the current Node implementation. With that said, this is going to eat a lot of Tauri market. Why would I use Tauri now? The 150mb of additional bundle size is just an extra 1 to 10 seconds of download time in most internet connections and you get a reliable rendering engine.

> and you get a reliable rendering engine How is it more reliable than Tauri - aren't they both using the system webview?

Deno desktop can use system web view OR embed CEF. Tauri is just system web view.

Re: Deno Desktop

#47

Post by Zetaphor »

ThatMedicIsASpy wrote: post #39
pjmlp wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it is mostly laziness and cost cutting at the expense of users. Nowadays there isn't even an excuse anymore, just vibe code it away in native frameworks.

When I can modify my desktop/theme (KDE) with css I will happily start doing it since that sounds easy.

Good news!

https://9to5linux.com/kdes-new-css-based-style-engine-union-...

Re: Deno Desktop

#49

Post by noufalibrahim »

conradludgate wrote: post #15
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…

How is it a poor choice of words? It might not be "native" UI, but they never claimed as such. I've always felt that native UI on Linux always looks incredibly ugly and I'd much rather use a nicely styled HTML+CSS layout instead. In my experience, Electron mostly gets flak for being bloated and slow, it not being native is sometimes a secondary point people add on top. I've always wanted to build a direct-browser int…

I don't mind the idea of using HTML components and widgets to style desktop applications. CSS and the DOM are widely known and reusing those for desktop apps is probably a good idea.

The problem, as you've pointed out, is that electron apps are bloated and slow. If they became the default and my editor, chat client, terminal, and everything else that I keep open were just thin layers around web applications, I'd rather figure out a way to move things into a browser rather than pull a piece of the browser out to wrap these applications.

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