I completely understand the sentiment: you're right that platforms like Electron are the ONLY way for many small and mid-sized dev shops to build cross-platform apps. I love Electron and want to use it myself. But bloaty software development approaches like this are contributing to major global problems. They're the reason why perfectly reasonable machines become outdated after a couple of years even though the user's needs haven't changed much. They waste resources, both in terms of energy usage and obsolete hardware. Also, betting that everyone's machine will have 16 GB and the horsepower to run an Electron app could be more risky than it seems.
So, nah. But wouldn't platforms like React Native for Desktop - where JavaScript and React's JSX are used to compile into a native binary - be the ideal solution here? (Sadly, RN for MacOS/Windows seem very far away from maturity at this point.)
Would this approach not work much better, while providing the same benefits?
I completely understand the sentiment: you're right that platforms like Electron are the ONLY way for many small and mid-sized dev shops to build cross-platform apps. I love Electron and want to use it myself. But bloaty software development approaches like this are contributing to major global problems. They're the reason why perfectly reasonable machines become outdated after a couple of years even though the user's needs haven't changed much. They waste resources, both in terms of energy usage and obsolete hardware. Also, betting that everyone's machine will have 16 GB and the horsepower to run an Electron app could be more risky than it seems.
So, nah. But wouldn't platforms like React Native for Desktop - where JavaScript and React's JSX are used to compile into a native binary - be the ideal solution here? (Sadly, RN for MacOS/Windows seem very far away from maturity at this point.)
Would this approach not work much better, while providing the same benefits?
wxPython. Xamarin. If I were feeling a little experimental, maybe Kivy.
Electron is not the only way for small/mid-sized dev shops to build cross-platform apps. It's merely the one that's caught the zeitgeist.