[catdawg]

Could something like this be used as the renderer for desktop applications? Instead of running a full fledged browser like electron, you basically just write all the logic in rust, and render the UI with css+html.

[untog]

In theory. The Sciter engine is not far off that, though it uses its own scripting language:

https://sciter.com/

EDIT: reply to c-smile below (HN won’t let me reply, sigh):

My “in theory” was referring to Kosmonaut. Then I pointed out Sciter as evidence that something similar has already been done.

[UnnoTed]

The logic can be written in Rust with [1], it's exactly like he wants: rust[2] + css + html.

[1]: https://github.com/sciter-sdk/rust-sciter [2]: https://github.com/sciter-sdk/rust-sciter/blob/master/exampl...

[c-smile]

Why "in theory"? Here are real life applications: https://sciter.com/#customers

[untog]

My “in theory” was referring to Kosmonaut. Then I pointed out Sciter as evidence that something similar has already been done.

[hiccuphippo]

Maybe Azul[0]? It uses the Mozilla web renderer but instead of HTML you write DOM in a react-style way.

[0] https://azul.rs/

[nikki93]

Some UI rendering engines for games do something like this, eg. https://coherent-labs.com -- talk by one of the devs of that at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yy8jQgmhbAU

[rapsey]

Depends on how dependent it is on the javascript engine. Servo unfortunately was inseperable from js.

[throwaway894345]

Can you give more information (link?) about why Servo was inseparable from JS?

[chc4]

Servo has JavaScript own and collect the DOM nodes. At least, it did in 2014. https://research.mozilla.org/2014/08/26/javascript-servos-on...

[throwaway894345]

That was very early in the project, but moreover, I would expect that simply means that Servo can allow someone else to own DOM nodes; not that it depends on a JS implementation specifically, no?

[guerrilla]

Isn't that what GNOME is doing but in C (and whatever Gtk+ binds to)? [1]

[1]. https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeShell/Development