<story><title>Electron is flash for the desktop (2016)</title><url>https://josephg.com/blog/electron-is-flash-for-the-desktop/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>SquareWheel</author><text>&amp;gt;Electron is only the best way to do something when someone knows only javascript and web dev but doesn&amp;#x27;t want to learn a new language.&lt;p&gt;Why is there always someone ready to jump in with this elitist nonsense?  There&amp;#x27;s plenty of reasons to use a web stack even if you know other languages.  It&amp;#x27;s inherently crossplatform, has an extensive library, and is extremely quick to iterate on.&lt;p&gt;Slack and Discord building in Electron means they only need to maintain one codebase across web, desktop, and mobile.  They don&amp;#x27;t need separate teams for building in Java, Swift, and C#.  They only need to write a new feature &lt;i&gt;once&lt;/i&gt;. 
 Crazy, right?&lt;p&gt;This &amp;quot;web programmers are dumb&amp;quot; attitude is nothing but elitist rhetoric.  Cut it out.</text></item><item><author>AboutTheWhisles</author><text>No it isn&amp;#x27;t, flash was the best way to do many things for the years it was popular.  Video, vector animation, simple interactivity.&lt;p&gt;Electron is only the best way to do something when someone knows only javascript and web dev but doesn&amp;#x27;t want to learn a new language. Maybe a case could be made for severe misconceptions also helping electron like &amp;#x27;a custom native app has to be made for each platform&amp;#x27;, even though C++ and Qt and many other combinations can be written once with 99% of the source being the same for every platform.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sixstringtheory</author><text>I keep seeing this &amp;quot;extremely quick to iterate on&amp;quot; point being brought up in defense of Electron. Slack released threads 2 years ago and we still can&amp;#x27;t post snippets, images, or use many slash commands inside them. Their last genuinely new features in the last year were synced DM drafts and the little lock badge on workspaces you&amp;#x27;re signed out of. Where&amp;#x27;s the iteration?&lt;p&gt;Meanwhile, almost daily I hit so many issues with the macOS application that I have to walk away from my computer in frustration. It makes my working life miserable due to its poor performance and bugs, and it encourages awful organizational and communication habits.</text></comment>
<story><title>Electron is flash for the desktop (2016)</title><url>https://josephg.com/blog/electron-is-flash-for-the-desktop/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>SquareWheel</author><text>&amp;gt;Electron is only the best way to do something when someone knows only javascript and web dev but doesn&amp;#x27;t want to learn a new language.&lt;p&gt;Why is there always someone ready to jump in with this elitist nonsense?  There&amp;#x27;s plenty of reasons to use a web stack even if you know other languages.  It&amp;#x27;s inherently crossplatform, has an extensive library, and is extremely quick to iterate on.&lt;p&gt;Slack and Discord building in Electron means they only need to maintain one codebase across web, desktop, and mobile.  They don&amp;#x27;t need separate teams for building in Java, Swift, and C#.  They only need to write a new feature &lt;i&gt;once&lt;/i&gt;. 
 Crazy, right?&lt;p&gt;This &amp;quot;web programmers are dumb&amp;quot; attitude is nothing but elitist rhetoric.  Cut it out.</text></item><item><author>AboutTheWhisles</author><text>No it isn&amp;#x27;t, flash was the best way to do many things for the years it was popular.  Video, vector animation, simple interactivity.&lt;p&gt;Electron is only the best way to do something when someone knows only javascript and web dev but doesn&amp;#x27;t want to learn a new language. Maybe a case could be made for severe misconceptions also helping electron like &amp;#x27;a custom native app has to be made for each platform&amp;#x27;, even though C++ and Qt and many other combinations can be written once with 99% of the source being the same for every platform.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>saagarjha</author><text>&amp;gt; Slack and Discord building in Electron means they only need to maintain one codebase across web, desktop, and mobile. They don&amp;#x27;t need separate teams for building in Java, Swift, and C#.&lt;p&gt;Did you know that Slack has native iOS and Android apps, as well as a cross-platform C++ &amp;quot;LibSlack&amp;quot; run by another separate team?</text></comment>