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by Wowfunhappy 2232 days ago
So, obviously, "native" is a spectrum. On OS X, Cocoa > QT > Java > Wine > Docker + X11 forwarding.

But one thing I think is being missed here is that Lua, Python, and other scripting languages are just a lot more resource efficient than electron, in terms of runtime size, memory usage, cpu usage, etc. A very highly optimized Electron app like VS Code might outperform a more run-of-the-mill Lua app, but that's an outlier.
2 comments
SahAssar 2232 days ago
You're comparing apples to oranges. Lua is a language runtime. Electron is a full browser and a language runtime.

If you want to compare them then compare node.js or JavaScriptCore to lua. Or compare Electron with a lua runtime that has a webkit/chromium engine integration.

I don't especially like Electron, and sometimes like writing lua, but the two are not solving the same problem or competing in the same space.

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saagarjha 2232 days ago
Actually, for a while Java was just below Cocoa for "nativeness" the LAF for it was maintained by Apple itself.
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Wowfunhappy 2232 days ago
I'd heard that before! I kind of debated whether to put Java or QT first—it came down to the fact that QT apps just feel closer to me on macOS. Although I don’t know how ugly they are under the hood.

Edit: What does LAF stand for?

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saagarjha 2232 days ago
LAF stands for "look and feel", which is basically Java's name for "UI theme". Another fun fact: Cocoa had official Java bindings at some point!
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didibus 2232 days ago
The Java SWT toolkit uses Cocoa native widgets under the hood. So it is a native UI toolkit. That said, like parent said, native doesn't necessarily translate to a user experience of being performant.

The rest of the application, being in Java, will often means it will have your typical JVM high memory usage and slow startup times.

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