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.NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

avaloniaui.net

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Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#221

Post by JamesSwift »

LeFantome wrote: post #108
judah wrote: post #6

This is interesting for sure. Kudos for bringing this capability to the web! One issue the demos reveal is, it doesn't _feel_ like the web. That is, I can't hit Ctrl+F to find text on a page. I can't select text with my cursor. I can't copy the address of a hyperlink. On my phone, I can't hard press on an image and share it to others. Screen readers can't handle it. I can't press a shortcut key to make everything lar…

MAUI was never intended for the web. This is not what Microsoft wants you to use it for. WASM is just one of the platforms that Avalonia supports and so, if you run MAUI on Avalonia, you can run it on WASM. If you do that though, it is going to be like rendering any other desktop GUI toolkit in WASM. It is not a web app. I mean, it is cool you can do it and MAUI in WASM is better than no web capability at all I guess…

Blazor+MAUI has absolutely been a focus of development from the start. What Im seeing with this is that MAUI is somewhat throwing in the towel and hoping to offload to avalonia to take the torch of development. I'm sad, because I was pretty in the weeds with MAUI at the start, as I was building a greenfield app at the time. It had a ton of potential to be a reimagining of Xamarin and how it fit into the broader .net ecosystem but they just shot themselves in the foot (both MAUI team and the broader MS dev efforts).

I havent been in that space for a couple years now so maybe they have gotten better, but I doubt that. I appreciate the heroic efforts of the MAUI team, but I think its just the unfortunate reality.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#222

Post by torben-friis »

cons0le wrote: post #207
torben-friis wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most mobile experiences (and macOS desktop) let you select unselectable stuff with OCR. For macOS is by screencap and selecting on preview, for phones in their respective “ai analysis views” usually long pressing the bottom. I know it’s a silly flow when it could be selectable straight away, just pointing it out.

This is why technology is becoming garbage. In 2025 instead of copy paste, we fire up a gpu in a datacenter. it feels like "software engineering" is just becoming a BS contest for "how much AI can we shoehorn into everything"

Not fully disagreeing, but this lack of copypaste is not an intended ai feature.

- The “magic ocr thingy” exists for things like taking a picture of the real world and grabbing text from it, or grabbing text from a video from something you saw recorded there. Think translating a foreign sign or whatever.

- interfaces have, for unrelated reasons, become more hostile to standard actions like copypaste.

As a result people end up having to ocr-scan interfaces with the tool.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#223

Post by JamesSwift »

maybewhenthesun wrote: post #193

These kind of announcements always suffer from 'creator knowledge bias' and never define their terms ;-) "What is the Avalonia MAUI Backend? At its core, the Avalonia MAUI Backend enables you to keep your MAUI codebase while replacing the rendering layer with Avalonia." Which tells me exactly nothing. what even is MAUI, maybe some polynesian deity? :-P I know, I know, I can google stuff. But still...

In this case, think of MAUI as a way to define a UI in XAML (ie XML). Avalonia is a way to compile that XAML to actual rendered views on the platform.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#224

Post by pshirshov »

Finally, finally, I can use something apart from Kotlin Multiplatform and Electron to build slow alien-looking applications with annoying animations and phone-styled UX for Linux (and, let me guess, there is no native Wayland backend). Of course the set of widgets is comprehensive - there are button and checkboxes, what else might we need.

I'm wondering why all the demos of modern UI toolkits look and feel worse than Delphi 1 demos from prehistoric age.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#225

Post by vjvjvjvjghv »

TiredOfLife wrote: post #204
oaiey wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer to that is well known: Windows division builds WinUI/Win32 as their native C++/COM API, Office division went to React on their path to the web and the dev division fills gaps (WPF) and provides tools for external and internal devs (Maui for cross platform uis). It is history not the lack of will. At one point the windows division was in shambles (remember vista) and WPF pops up. At another point, the windo…

> Windows division builds WinUI/Win32 as their native C++/COM API Windows for many years is just a pile of different browser engines stashed one atop another running broken javascript/xml with react native on top.

At the bottom of everything is Sharepoint though.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#226

Post by zamalek »

oaiey wrote: post #115
mattfrommars wrote: post #25

In the .NET ecosystem, I have noticed people to shame .NET MAUI because Microsoft themselves don't use this framework - Microsoft Team is built on Electron and not MAUI. Why build a product on MAUI when Microsoft aren't too sure about it.

The answer to that is well known: Windows division builds WinUI/Win32 as their native C++/COM API, Office division went to React on their path to the web and the dev division fills gaps (WPF) and provides tools for external and internal devs (Maui for cross platform uis). It is history not the lack of will. At one point the windows division was in shambles (remember vista) and WPF pops up. At another point, the windo…

As I understand it, Sinofsky is largely responsible for this mentality in the various places he worked across Microsoft: he instilled a distrust for anything originating out of other teams.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#227

Post by vjvjvjvjghv »

latentsea wrote: post #42
mattfrommars wrote: post #25

In the .NET ecosystem, I have noticed people to shame .NET MAUI because Microsoft themselves don't use this framework - Microsoft Team is built on Electron and not MAUI. Why build a product on MAUI when Microsoft aren't too sure about it.

Never build a frontend on a .NET technology. Period. They always end up unsupported in the end. Just use standard web technologies and thank yourself later. I've been a .NET dev for a decade now and that's what I've learnt.

Same for me. I used to do desktop dev with MFC and WPF but these days you would be suicidal to build any app that needs to last for a few years on .NET. If totally needed, WPF is still the best bet. Otherwise I am pushing everything I can to the web.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#228

Post by brokencode »

tjpnz wrote: post #185
glzone1 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does their market share back up your take of them as horrible apps? Are there QT or GTK competitors crushing them? I always hear how terrible electron apps are, but the companies picking electron seem to get traction QT or other apps don't and seem to have a good cross platform story as well.

They said horrible user experience apps, not horrible apps. You can still deliver an app with a horrible user experience and build a profitable business. Ever done an expense report? Companies aren't picking Electron due to inherent shortcomings in other platforms, they're picking it because it's easier (and cheaper) to find JavaScript devs who can get up to speed with it quickly.

Discord, VS Code, and Figma are all apps that individuals choose and are well liked despite many alternatives. Slack too I think, though I don’t have experience with it.

Your comment applies to Teams and I’m sure other electron apps. But the sweeping generalization that electron apps have terrible user experiences is pretty obviously incorrect.

Re: .NET MAUI is coming to Linux and the browser

#230

Post by thewebguyd »

cons0le wrote: post #207
torben-friis wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most mobile experiences (and macOS desktop) let you select unselectable stuff with OCR. For macOS is by screencap and selecting on preview, for phones in their respective “ai analysis views” usually long pressing the bottom. I know it’s a silly flow when it could be selectable straight away, just pointing it out.

This is why technology is becoming garbage. In 2025 instead of copy paste, we fire up a gpu in a datacenter. it feels like "software engineering" is just becoming a BS contest for "how much AI can we shoehorn into everything"

Some of it is because how people interact with and use tech has changed.

Mobile users have completely outpaced laptop/desktop users, and mobile users don't think in terms of files and text, so to them copy & paste is less important. The mythical "average user" moves arbitrary text and data around using screenshots and screen recordings instead of text and files.

Yes, it's incredibly inefficient, but I think it's evolved that day because selecting text is a real pain on a small touch screen, and companies have been trying to abstract away any concept of a filesystem for a long time.

So you or I might care and be bothered that we can't copy & paste something from UI chrome or content in a "web app" but the average person won't care, they'll just take a screenshot.

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