Date: Tue, 23 Feb 2021 09:38:45 +0100
From: Arsen =?utf-8?Q?Arsenovi=C4=87?= <arsen@aarsen.me>
To: Timmy Douglas <mail@timmydouglas.com>
Cc: ~sircmpwn/public-inbox@lists.sr.ht
Subject: Re: electron alternatives: wayland-like widget toolkits/GUI
 frameworks
Message-ID: <20210223083845.iarzrth4yx746k7y@bstg>
Mail-Followup-To: Timmy Douglas <mail@timmydouglas.com>,
	~sircmpwn/public-inbox@lists.sr.ht
References: <871rd7icvp.fsf@timmydouglas.com>
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> 1. Has anyone created a realistic alternative to HTML/CSS--maybe a
> binary DOM that has a reasonable API for manipulation? I supposed it'd
> also need some sort of rendering engine
No, and there's no real need for one. Existing GUI frameworks (none of whic=
h are
small enough, but they work well enough) already are very mutable from APIs;
such a DOM would be no improvement, in fact, the only reason DOM manipulati=
on
is so needed in the Electron world is because HTML is *not* a UI language, =
and
it shows; it's a markup language unfit for program UIs.
In that regard, Qt is not terrible, it produces good GUIs, even though it a=
cts
like a bit of a virus in any codebase, and sadly exposes a C++ API instead =
of a
C one.

> 2. Has anyone created a Wayland-like protocol for #1 so that you may
> create an app that communicates through a socket to manipulate the DOM
> and receive events? Basically you could use any programming language you
> like, and you would speak the binary protocol to create windows,
> manipulate the DOM, handle events, etc. A "binary web view" could be a
> separate executable that just connects back to a socket specified as an
> argument to the program. This binary web view just renders the DOM and
> handles events and would be reusable across applications. Then your
> widget toolkit SDK speaks the binary format over the wire and is written
> in your programming language of choice.
This sounds massively over engineered, just link a library, let it render y=
our
bitmaps and blit them on the screen for you, and that's it, which is how it
worked for the last three or so decades.

--=20
Arsen Arsenovi=C4=87

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