They are always so heavy and inefficient. I sometimes run complex video encoding/upscaling tasks in the background that push my computer to it's limits (for hours on end) and you can really get a feel for which applications are badly made. Electron apps always perform worse even if what they are doing is relatively simple.

And there are always weird edge cases with OS integration with Electron apps. Sometimes it's done well, other times not so much.

[–] UNY0N@feddit.org 6 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I use obsidian extensively, and I love it. It certainly does seem to use WAY more system resources than it should though, and I assume that electron is to blame. It's a shame they didn't base it on a different framework.

Perhaps someone who knows more about web development can explain what sort of upsides electron brings with it.

[–] ProdigalFrog@slrpnk.net 3 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

As an aside for anyone else reading, Trillium Notes is a good open source alternative to Obsidian.

[–] TunaLobster@lemmy.world 6 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago) (3 children)

Programs run everywhere from the same codebase.

[–] nyan@lemmy.cafe 4 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

There are other options for that, though, and I'd rather have Java, with all its issues, any day.

I think it's more "people who trained only in web development can produce what they fondly think is a desktop application".

[–] szczuroarturo@programming.dev 6 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Naah its just that web development is most advanced in terms of ease of use and UI development.

Creating native apps in java or cpp was horrible.

[–] nyan@lemmy.cafe 1 points 22 hours ago

Easier ≠ better. Granted, most amateur-written UIs aren't that great, but I find anything created specifically for the web is almost always worse. They're massively bloated, they reinvent wheels all the time (and ship them out while they're still egg-shaped with off-centre axles), and they don't adapt well to systems with non-default settings.

As for Java UI coding, well, I did enough of it, back in the day. Tedious, sometimes nitpicky, but far from the worst thing I've ever done, codewise.

[–] UNY0N@feddit.org 2 points 23 hours ago

Well that's certainly a big plus point.

[–] entwine@programming.dev 0 points 15 hours ago

I think it's more that Electron apps can be written in javascript, and there are way more javascript developers than any other kind. So you're naturally going to see a lot more javascript software.

So it is, quite literally, a skill issue.

[–] Breezy@sopuli.xyz 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

It''s neat to learn about CSD. That flat frameless window with a custom title bar look is what I dislike the most about electron applications. Hopefully those become less apparent with these new updates.

[–] ell1e@leminal.space 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is a GNOME problem, not a Wayland problem. The article says "On X11, the window manager typically supplies a window’s title bar and frame decorations. But [...] on Wayland, all you get back from the compositor is a plain rectangle." which makes it sound like this is a Wayland problem, but this isn't true.

[–] Breezy@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Ah I think I might be misunderstanding then.

For this:

Many popular apps, including Visual Studio Code, Obsidian, and Discord, use frameless windows with custom title bars. Prior to Electron 41, frameless windows did not support CSD at all, so they looked like featureless rectangles on Wayland.

Am I misinterpreting that Electron on Wayland now supporting CSD for frameless windows would make it possible for developers currently using them to better mimic the look of Qt or Gtk apps (with shadows and rounded corners, etc.)?

I'm using KDE Plasma and Electron apps sometimes have that sharp-cornered, shadowless window vs the way Qt or Gtk apps are rendered. The most noticeable difference for me is the lack of outline, rounded corners, or shadow.

But do correct me if I'm wrong since I don't know much about Electron development.

[–] ell1e@leminal.space 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Basically, on any sane window manager no matter if Wayland or X11, you'll get the same frame for all apps for free.

From all the big desktops it's only GNOME that somehow decided server-side decorations weren't a good idea implement, and now all Wayland apps have to hand-roll a hacky workaround. The "flat frameless window" look was Electron's GNOME workaround. What the article is describing is a more elaborate GNOME workaround. On e.g. KDE, none of these problems existed in the first place.

[–] Vittelius@feddit.org 4 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

That's only mostly true and more importantly not what this is about. Yes Gnome and Mutter don't support server side decorations. But Electron on Linux uses GTK to construct the application window. And GTK offers client side system styled window decorations. Meaning that electron applications aleady supported decorations that look and feel like server side decorations even if they are not.

Electron already had some support for client-side decorations, provided by a class called ClientFrameViewLinux which uses GTK to paint convincing native window frames. These look very similar to the ones GNOME used to supply on X11, but they are produced entirely in-framework.

No, the problem is with custom styled window decorations. Developers who wanted to do CSDs couldn't without major downsides. And that was also true on KDE Plasma, as evidenced by this screenshot from the article you evidently didn't read

See how the window for VS Code doesn't throw a shadow compared to Dolphin? That's because electron didn't support CSDs properly. And now that it does the window looks like this:

That's what we are talking about.

[–] ell1e@leminal.space 3 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago) (1 children)

I appreciate the clarification! However, 1. the original comment seemed to be talking about a simple uncustomized frame not looking correct, which sounds like the GNOME problem. And 2. the article still seems to imply Wayland means no SSD, as far as I can tell, which to my knowledge as a general statement isn't true.

Therefore, I apologize for misreading the main intention of the article, but I think there are multiple reasons why people might misread it. Perhaps some clarifications could help?

[–] Breezy@sopuli.xyz 1 points 16 hours ago

Yeah, what Vittelius mentioned is correct, it's more that I don't like how most Electron apps on Linux look due to the lack of CSD, causing that flat shadowless look in the screenshot with VS Code next to Dolphin. So, if anything here's to hoping more devs will test their Electron apps on Linux Desktop Environments/windowing systems to make their apps look more native in these environments. But I do appreciate the clarification on SSD, it's nice for me to finally learn the terminology used to describe why I find most Electron apps on Linux to look janky.

[–] pipe01@programming.dev 10 points 1 day ago

I think whoever wrote this likes Evangelion lol

[–] olafurp@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

All good stuff, been waiting for this.