Ask HN: Which app that shouldn't use Electron.js, yet it is?

15 pointsacrophobic6y ago11 comments

Hi guys,

As we all know, Electron.js is a powerful cross platform desktop app framework. Unfortunately, it's quite bloated and heavy on resource which make it not exactly suitable for some app. Thanks to this I've taught myself to use GTK, Qt and QML to build desktop app.

Right now I think I'm quite decent on using QML (as in I could make a simple app and it works properly without crashing). So now I want to challenge myself by porting an Electron app into QML.

With that said, are there any Electron.js app that you know, that really simple and shouldn't be using Electron, yet it is ?

Thanks !

11 comments

rvz6y ago

> are there any Electron.js app that you know, that really simple and shouldn't be using Electron, yet it is ?

I could do a lot with a very fast Git GUI client that is able to index at least 50K - 100K+ commits that are pulled from its repository and to be able to bisect and find a regression or to search for a specific commit in the history.

Unfortunately I have tried GitHub for Desktop, GitKraken and a VSCode extension "GitLens" which are horrendous for these tasks and essentially destroy the disk and memory space on my MacBook and as a bonus for every search it takes a couple of minutes to find the commit. I find them painful to use.

This is the reason why several devs working with repositories of that magnitude of commits use the terminal "git" command instead of these Electron ones. I use Fork [0] and GitAhead [2] as my Git clients on Mac and Linux respectively and I am very pleased that they both exist.

[0] https://fork.dev/

[1] https://gitahead.com/

itake6y ago

This to me just seems like Github Desktop and Gitlens are just poorly optimized for large repositories. If the git cli can handle large repositories, then so should the JS ones. There wouldn't be anything inherently bad about using electron for this.

jafingi6y ago

How about Sublime Merge? [0]

From the guys behind Sublime Text. Amazingly fast (and native).

[0] https://www.sublimemerge.com/

gtirloni6y ago

That's a question that cant really be answered. If Electron made sense to the author, then it should be used. If it makes efficient use of hardware resources, that's another question.

You can get a list of apps here: https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome-electron/blob/master...

catacombs6y ago

Slack. Ugh.

juststeve6y ago

Instead of doing a port, you could assist in expanding the QML ecosystem?

acrophobicOP6y ago

Unfortunately, I don't think I'm good enough to do that.

Besides, porting an app IMHO is a great way to learn a new language. It give me a clear goal and let me focus on coding instead of making design decision.

billconan6y ago

text editors and terminal emulators. Speed matters a lot.

dmlittle6y ago

VSCode is built on Electron and it works fine. I don’t think it’s a matter of whether you’re using Electron or not but rather how you’re using it.

muzani6y ago

To Do lists or anything regarding workflow too. The lag kills trains of thought.

m3tr0s6y ago

GitKraken

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