5 ms·

Yeah, but if you use Qt like I did, you're shipping libstdc++, some other crap and Qt.

timcobb 1mo ago
Yeah, I was kind of surprised recently that there's no solid native way to build desktop apps on Linux! I was thinking I'd build something actually native with AI but then the options were QT or or gtk...
- disiplus 1mo ago
  You don't care what were you trying to build but for a quick me alone Linux app I used Flutter. Honestly it's my go-to when I want to have a quick native app on any platform but dont want to bundle electron.
  - thewebguyd 1mo ago
    Flutter is solid choice, and Canonical seems to be putting weight behind it for Ubuntu as well. Canonical is also now the new lead maintainer of Flutter Desktop.
- ilikehurdles 1mo ago
  Well what does native mean? An XWindow? Native on gnome is different from native on kde or xfce or lxde…
- preg_match 1mo ago
  Qt is as solid as it gets. It's very, very high quality. Much higher quality than Microsoft's frameworks on Windows.
  - cptskippy 1mo ago
    How would you know? It's impossible to have done a thorough analysis of all the Windows UI frameworks, five have been released since I started typing...
  - timcobb 1mo ago
    Well yes, I was surprised by the situation in Windows too! So my stack is now split like this - Apple: SwiftUI/AppKit - Android: Jetpack - Windows + Linux: Avalonia (C#) Avalonia seems good so far. I couldn't do Qt because I can't deal with that qBittorrent look. GTK is aesthetically pleasing for me, but it only runs on Linux. Avalonia lets me target both of these UI-toolkit-less platforms with something native-ish. Flutter is probably good too, but I am using uniffi-rs and that doesn't generate Dart bindings AFAIK. Would love to hear other options.
    - andai 1mo ago
      Isn't Qt themeable? I also recall at one point they "emulated" native widget look and feel in their own renderer but I might be misremembering.
      - timcobb 1mo ago
        It looks like you can
  - rubymamis 1mo ago
    Indeed! I wrote my note-taking app with a block editor (like Notion) in Qt with QML for the UI and C++ for the logic and it's been an incredible experience![1] [1] https://rubymamistvalove.com/block-editor https://rubymamistvalove.com/block-editor
    - timcobb 1mo ago
      Very nice, thank you for sharing!
- blep-arsh 1mo ago
  QT and GTK are as native (and solid, I guess) as it gets, since there's no "default" UI toolkit that's shipped along with the kernel, unlike e.g. Windows or macOS. Speaking of Windows, why do they even ship browser-UI apps as a part of the OS? Do they find native Windows UI development too hard or feature-limited even with LLM assistance?
  - thewebguyd 1mo ago
    Because Microsoft screwed up their native UI story. They are slowly starting to go native again with WinUI3, but Microsoft went through a rough period with UI frameworks, I mean how many do they have now all still "supported"? WinForms, WPF, MFC, WinUI, MAUI, etc.?
    - blep-arsh 1mo ago
      Yeah, I've lost track years ago. Still, if there is a "modern" one (WinUI 3, I guess), it should be possible to build a nice weather app in it. Anyway, I've just realized they ship a HTML-based UI in order to be able to serve HTML/JS-based ads through it.
- bpfrh 1mo ago
  I mean there is the no true linux argument, but covering the main stream desktops you basically have kde which is written with qt(so qt is native) or gnome which is written with gtk and both frameworks/DEs do implement other things besides "just" the gui, so you are native.
- dingaling911 1mo ago
  Qt is great. I also shipped on Windows and MacOS

Yeah, I was kind of surprised recently that there's no solid native way to build desktop apps on Linux! I was thinking I'd build something actually native with AI but then the options were QT or or gtk...

disiplus 1mo ago
You don't care what were you trying to build but for a quick me alone Linux app I used Flutter. Honestly it's my go-to when I want to have a quick native app on any platform but dont want to bundle electron.
- thewebguyd 1mo ago
  Flutter is solid choice, and Canonical seems to be putting weight behind it for Ubuntu as well. Canonical is also now the new lead maintainer of Flutter Desktop.
ilikehurdles 1mo ago
Well what does native mean? An XWindow? Native on gnome is different from native on kde or xfce or lxde…
preg_match 1mo ago
Qt is as solid as it gets. It's very, very high quality. Much higher quality than Microsoft's frameworks on Windows.
- cptskippy 1mo ago
  How would you know? It's impossible to have done a thorough analysis of all the Windows UI frameworks, five have been released since I started typing...
- timcobb 1mo ago
  Well yes, I was surprised by the situation in Windows too! So my stack is now split like this - Apple: SwiftUI/AppKit - Android: Jetpack - Windows + Linux: Avalonia (C#) Avalonia seems good so far. I couldn't do Qt because I can't deal with that qBittorrent look. GTK is aesthetically pleasing for me, but it only runs on Linux. Avalonia lets me target both of these UI-toolkit-less platforms with something native-ish. Flutter is probably good too, but I am using uniffi-rs and that doesn't generate Dart bindings AFAIK. Would love to hear other options.
  - andai 1mo ago
    Isn't Qt themeable? I also recall at one point they "emulated" native widget look and feel in their own renderer but I might be misremembering.
    - timcobb 1mo ago
      It looks like you can
- rubymamis 1mo ago
  Indeed! I wrote my note-taking app with a block editor (like Notion) in Qt with QML for the UI and C++ for the logic and it's been an incredible experience![1] [1] https://rubymamistvalove.com/block-editor https://rubymamistvalove.com/block-editor
  - timcobb 1mo ago
    Very nice, thank you for sharing!
blep-arsh 1mo ago
QT and GTK are as native (and solid, I guess) as it gets, since there's no "default" UI toolkit that's shipped along with the kernel, unlike e.g. Windows or macOS. Speaking of Windows, why do they even ship browser-UI apps as a part of the OS? Do they find native Windows UI development too hard or feature-limited even with LLM assistance?
- thewebguyd 1mo ago
  Because Microsoft screwed up their native UI story. They are slowly starting to go native again with WinUI3, but Microsoft went through a rough period with UI frameworks, I mean how many do they have now all still "supported"? WinForms, WPF, MFC, WinUI, MAUI, etc.?
  - blep-arsh 1mo ago
    Yeah, I've lost track years ago. Still, if there is a "modern" one (WinUI 3, I guess), it should be possible to build a nice weather app in it. Anyway, I've just realized they ship a HTML-based UI in order to be able to serve HTML/JS-based ads through it.
bpfrh 1mo ago
I mean there is the no true linux argument, but covering the main stream desktops you basically have kde which is written with qt(so qt is native) or gnome which is written with gtk and both frameworks/DEs do implement other things besides "just" the gui, so you are native.
dingaling911 1mo ago
Qt is great. I also shipped on Windows and MacOS