Electron is a widely hated framework on Linux, but what about the alternatives like Neutralinojs?

In their own words: In Electron and NWjs, you have to install Node.js and hundreds of dependency libraries. Embedded Chromium and Node.js make simple apps bloaty — in most scenarios, framework weights more than your app source. Neutralinojs offers a lightweight and portable SDK which is an alternative for Electron and NW.js. Neutralinojs doesn’t bundle Chromium and uses the existing web browser library in the operating system (Eg: gtk-webkit2 on Linux). Neutralinojs implements a secure WebSocket connection for native operations and embeds a static web server to serve the web content. Also, it offers a built-in JavaScript client library for developers.

Do you experience alternatives like Njs to blend more in the desktop layout, install less junk, use less memory, are more compatible with Wayland,?

  • Secret300
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    6 months ago
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    Are there any good electron apps? Like genuinely

    • cygnus
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      VSCode and Obsidian work great.

      • unalivejoyEnglish
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        Until you want to integrate with the system and use gtk window controls.

      • Secret300
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        I hear great things about obsidian but I haven’t used it since it’s not open source

        • why
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          Im willing to give them a pass on that since they don’t vender lock the notes I’m taking.

        • cygnus
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          Sure, but all it does it give you a nice UI for local markdown files. There’s no lock-in.

    • acockworkorange
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      I will catch flak for this, but discord works fine. You could be fooled into thinking it’s native. Audio, video, attachments pretty seamless. Zoom sucks ass though.

      • morrowind
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        Count yourself lucky because discord desktop is one of the worst pieces of crap I’ve ever used

        • slazer2auEnglish
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          Na, Teams is worse than discord any day.

      • missingno
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        Desktop audio streaming has never worked. Bug report has been outstanding since the beginning and Discord has just never addressed it.

      • dan
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        You could be fooled into thinking it’s native.

        It doesn’t look like a native app at all though. It’s not really following any operating system’s design guidelines.

        • acockworkorange
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          It’s not like all native apps do either. It’s obviously a foreign toolkit. My point was there were no obvious issues accessing hardware, files, drag and drop, etc.

          • dan
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            The best native apps do look native to the platform though.

      • 4am
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        Hey hey; discord is rumored to be doing ads now. No talking good about them!

      • Secret300
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        Really? Even on windows I feel like it’s slow and you can tell it’s an electron app.

      • winnie
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        Is zoom Electon?

        It looks like shit and feels like shit. I thought it was native tbh given how chunky UI is. Looks like GDI programming to me. Or they took design from Android 2 and ported it to Desktop.

        • acockworkorange
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          I’m at least 60% sure the Linux client is. Either way, it’s sandboxed as hell. I have to copy backgrounds to its own special snowflake folder or it can’t use them.

      • kugmoEnglish
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        I would say it’s seemless on Windows, not Linux.

        • acockworkorange
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          I wouldn’t know, I don’t use Windows. But I have no complaints on Mint.

      • SteveTechEnglish
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        It starts to break down on Wayland though, screen sharing doesn’t work, drag and drop looks to work but errors when sending, and probably other things.

        Edit: Yes I’m already running it with --ozone-platform-hint=auto

        • acockworkorange
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          Well, Wayland support is something new for most distros. Can’t really fault the app for not being ahead of the curve.

          • SteveTechEnglish
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            Yeah, but also I really didn’t expect Zoom to have working screen sharing on wayland before discord.

      • InternetCitizen2
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        I don’t like Discord much, but don’t understand the dislike for the app. Perhaps because I use it rarely.

        • acockworkorange
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          The company sucks, but the app works fine to me. I don’t get the hate either. I use the flatpak version in Linux and don’t feel any friction for it being an Electron app. There are native flatpak apps that cause me grief.