
Electron v5.0 Timeline - jedixit
https://electronjs.org/blog/electron-5-0-timeline
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kethinov
Does anyone know if the idea of creating a runtime mode for Electron is on the
roadmap? (A runtime mode would be allowing multiple apps to share one
installed Electron dependency rather than bundling Electron with every
Electron app.)

~~~
Renaud
Then you get into the issue of keeping apps and runtime in sync so you don't
get issues with older apps not working well with a new version of the runtime
required by newer apps...

You end-up having to keep multiple runtimes and hoping they don't step on
each-other's toes...

After a while you're still downloading 200+MB runtimes to run your particular
app that still requires Runtime 5.05 and hasn't been updated to work with
Runtime 6.12 that is required for newer updates of an app that used to work
with Runtime 5.84...

Maybe a better idea would be to make Electron's install specific to each app
and only include the bits you actually need so it's a 30MB bundle instead?

Just wondering if calling for a runtime isn't going to make things worse in
the long run. It 's already often a pain to install an app that target any
framework version in particular that may not be installed or may conflict on
some user's target machines. Sometimes it's unavoidable, but I'm wondering if
this is really the case here.

~~~
black_puppydog
easy. you just add sth like elsched.exe that keeps checking for updates in the
runtime, then opens a popup saying "Electron Update Available".

~~~
Renaud
Then the Electron Runtime is updated but breaking the particular App that was
relying on a feature that has changed since its publication. The problem is
not updating the Runtime, it's ensuring that the apps relying on the runtime
still work properly after feature updates in the runtime.

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tonyedgecombe
Those poor Electron devs, they will be pushing that Sisyphean boulder up the
hill forever. It reminds me of the thesis of Joel Spolsky's essay Fire and
Motion.

[https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/01/06/fire-and-
motion/](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/01/06/fire-and-motion/)

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cdnsteve
What is the upgrade process like for existing applications built on the
Electron framework? Is it well documented and a first consideration or are you
thrown to the wind? Will 4 be able to move to 5 or are we talking about
rewrites?

~~~
WorldMaker
It's pretty well documented.

If you are just using Electron "off the shelf" to host your web app it's
generally `npm install` the updated binary, test, and deploy.

Sometimes an Electron-only API changes, but that's pretty rare and most of
them aren't "mission critical" if they break. That's always documented well in
the release notes and the API and Electron for the most part seems to follow a
"deprecate for a version ahead" pattern that you should have plenty of
warning.

If you are using native libraries is where things get complicated. At that
point you are likely building your own Electron binary, and need to find
updated versions of your libraries that support the upgrade NodeJS and/or
Chromium versions. Most of that is the same documentation whether or not
Electron was in the project, check the related documentation for the
appropriate NodeJS and/or Chromium versions, rebuild as needed using the usual
tools.

~~~
cdnsteve
Great response, thank you!

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zamadatix
As someone who has only ever created some basic quick apps in Electron and
NW.js why is it Electron sees a much slower release cadence? Is there a
different scope of integration with the underlying components?

~~~
ravedave5
Chromium changes a lot. One of my teams tried integrating it directly and
couldn't keep up with the API change. We went with a 3rd party library that
wraps it to shield us from it.

~~~
ttoinou
Which 3rd party library ? :)

~~~
ravedave5
jxbrowser. It's worked well for us.

~~~
ttoinou
Java :-(

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yodon
Looking over the donors page, I'm pretty amazed at slack's absence. Ditto for
Microsoft Teams. Way to give back to the community.

~~~
briandear
I’d rather Slack just stop using electron and write a real native app; they
can certainly afford it. Meanwhile, Slack remains an incredible resource hog.

~~~
aportnoy
Slack takes 5-7 seconds to start up and connect on an ultra low latency 300
Mbit connection. I really wish there were a native app on Mac.

~~~
nikivi
There is:

[https://www.sblack.online](https://www.sblack.online)

~~~
lloeki
AFAICT that is not native:

> Sblack works exactly like a browser with small tweaks. We inject the dark
> mode style at the end of the Slack’s html, and that’s it

I bet it's just embedding a WebView, and the app is small because it uses the
system's WebKit2

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theredbox
Using Electron is a travesty. Why not something like "sciter" ?

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StellarTabi
Surely you could make a more positive contribution than mindlessly bashing the
topic and assume anyone has heard of the random drive-by name drop?

~~~
theredbox
People can surely utfg what sciter is in the context of a gui solution ?

