61–70 of 211 posts
I wonder what the numbers say about desktop applications now, and how much the arrival of Electron changed things up here. Nowadays, it seems to be that mobile apps have the "best metrics" for b2c software. I'd be interested to read a contemporary version of this article.
What 'best metrics'?
I'd wager there are more people paying for software for their smart phone than any other platform they use.
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its just waaaaaay easier to distribute a web app For some things a desktop app is required (more system access) or offers some competitive UX advantage (although this reason is shrinking all the time). Short of that user's are going to choose web 95% of the time.
This points to our failure as an industry to design a universal app engine that isn't a browser.
Ignoring the fragmentation of course; although that seems to be getting less and less each year (so long as you ignore Safari).
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its just waaaaaay easier to distribute a web app For some things a desktop app is required (more system access) or offers some competitive UX advantage (although this reason is shrinking all the time). Short of that user's are going to choose web 95% of the time.
This points to our failure as an industry to design a universal app engine that isn't a browser.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The original expression came out of an internal company discussion that someone summarized (paraphrased) as "when there's a tough choice to make, one is usually less evil. Make that choice." In the early days of Google in the public consciousness, this turned into "you can make money without being evil." (From the 2004 S-1.) Over time, it got shortened to "don't be evil." But this phrase became an obligatory catchphr…
Making a loud affair out its retirement rather than quietly letting it collect dust and be forgotten over time was most definitely not a good idea. The public already demonstrated that they adopted, misused and weaponized the maxim. Its retirement just sharpened the edge of that weapon. Now instead of "What happened to don't be evil?" it's become "Of course Google is being evil." and everything exists in that lens.
Almost all of Patrick's points are great if your software development goal is to make a buck . They don't seem to matter if you're writing open source, and I'd argue that desktop apps are still relevant and wonderful in the open source world. I just started a new hobby project, and am doing it as a cross-platform, non-Electron, desktop app because that's what I like to develop. The onboarding funnel: Only a concern i…
Going further, if you're a hobbyist, you're probably instinctively prioritizing the aspects of the hobby that you enjoy. My first app was a shareware offering in the 1980s, written in Turbo Pascal, that was easy to package and only had to run on one platform. Because expectations were low, my app looked just as good as commercial apps. Today, even the minimal steps of creating a desktop app have lost their appeal, bu…
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This points to our failure as an industry to design a universal app engine that isn't a browser.
No. We did, it is the browser.
It would have been great if browsers remained lightweight html/image/hyperlink displayers, and something separate emerged as an actual cross-platform API, but history is what it is.
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“Desktop Apps”? I’d say pre-Electron, the ones that existed that far back shipped desktop apps, but for the past 10-15 years it’s all been Electron slop, which hardly qualify as “desktop apps” in my book. If anything, it’s my very faint hope that AI would give companies - especially non-software companies - the bandwidth to release two real native apps instead of just 2 builds of a shitty Electron app. Fat chance tho…
For what it’s worth, I tried making a GTK4 app. I got started, created a window, created a header bar, then went to add a url/path entry widget and everything fell apart. Entry suggestions/completions are formally deprecated with no replacement since 2022. When I did get them working on the deprecated API there was an empty completion option that would segfault if clicked. The default behaviour didn’t hide completion…
QtWidgets is extremely good though, even if it is effectively in maintenance mode.
Avalonia also seems good too though I haven't used it myself.
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its just waaaaaay easier to distribute a web app For some things a desktop app is required (more system access) or offers some competitive UX advantage (although this reason is shrinking all the time). Short of that user's are going to choose web 95% of the time.
This points to our failure as an industry to design a universal app engine that isn't a browser.
Remember Livescript and early web browsers? It was almost cancelled by big tech because Java was supposed to be the cross platform system. The web and Javascript just BARELY escaped a big tech smack down. They stroked the ego of big tech by renaming to Javascript to honor Java. Licked some boots, promised a very mediocre, non threatning UI experience in the browser and big tech allowed it to exist. Then the whole world started using the web/javascript. It caught fire before big tech could extinguish. Java itself got labeled a security threat by Apple/Microsoft for threatening the walled gardens but that's another story.
You may not like browsers but they are the ONLY thing big tech can't extinguish due to ubiquity. Achieving ubiquity is not easy, not even possible for new contenders. Pray to GOD everyday and thank her for giving us the web browser as a feasible cross platform GUI.
Web browser UI available on all devices is not a failure, it's a miracle.
To top it all off, HTML/CSS/Javascript is a pretty good system. The box model of CSS is great for a cross platform design. Things need to work on a massive TV or small screen phone. The open text-based nature is great for catering to screen readers to help the visually impaired.
The latest Wizbang GPU powered UI framework probably forgot about the blind. The latest Wizbang is probably stuck in the days of absolute positioning and non-declarative layouts. And with x,y(z) coords. It may be great for the next-gen 4-D video game, but sucks for general purpose use.
Almost all of Patrick's points are great if your software development goal is to make a buck . They don't seem to matter if you're writing open source, and I'd argue that desktop apps are still relevant and wonderful in the open source world. I just started a new hobby project, and am doing it as a cross-platform, non-Electron, desktop app because that's what I like to develop. The onboarding funnel: Only a concern i…
And his point about randomly moving buttons to see if people like it better?
No fucking thanks. The last thing I need is an app made of quicksand.
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You simply can't get hung up on what could have been. Same applies to trying to time the stock market... should have bought, should have sold. Best thing is to know there's nothing that can be done about the past and move along and deal with what you can do now instead.
You're right. What gets me though is that unlike the stock market, bitcoin was an incredibly rare occurrence where anyone could have gotten extraordinarily rich without even incurring any risk! (besides a couple evenings spent learning how to use it.) Whereas to have $10MM today in GOOG stock, I would have had to invest over $300k in 2010.
That's not true at all, any number of things could have killed bitcoin in its infancy. The stakes were just low. Somewhere out there is a lost collection of wallets of mine, collectively holding ~100btc ($1000 at the time). If regulators cracked down hard, that 100btc would have become just as worthless and either way I'd be out $1000.
"Risk" is an epistemic claim about the future taking the worse path. Obviously looking back it looks like risk-free money. That's not how it looked at the time. The "currency of the future" thing was always niche, especially after the crash in 2013, until a much larger cultural shift happened around 2015-ish.
Plenty of people will chime in with early bitcoin stories, and how they always believed it was going to go to the moon, etc. I always find it curious because my memory of the time period is that it was a means to an end, and that's how the overwhelming majority saw it and treated it. Funnily enough, it was thanks to that overwhelming majority that led to it being worth anything at all. If it was just a bunch of yahoos clamoring about the "currency of the future" thing, it probably would have gone absolutely fucking nowhere. The irony that the yahoos ended up becoming the majority I think is underappreciated.