> We've rebuilt GitHub Desktop from the ground up in Electron to create a simplified user experience focused squarely on how you use GitHub<p>Would be really interested to see some benchmarks comparing the performance of the Electron version and the previous version. Start-up time, time to perform common actions etc.<p>Personally I think it's a bit of a shame, since I seem to remember the previous version making use of the platform's native toolkits and widgets, e.g. WPF on Windows and Cocoa on Mac. I suspect the overall UX will now suffer. I guess it's easier to develop though, and works on Linux now?<p>Edit: Oh, there's still no build for Linux.<p>They do detail some of the reasoning (<a href="https://githubengineering.com/how-four-native-developers-wrote-an-electron-app/?" rel="nofollow">https://githubengineering.com/how-four-native-developers-wro...</a>) behind this decision in the GitHub engineering blog and it looks like they've put a lot of work into this. But even the menu bar they've come up with (<a href="https://github.com/desktop/desktop/pull/991?" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/desktop/desktop/pull/991?</a>) for Windows is <i>obviously</i> not native. The decision seems to boil down to (paraphrasing) "lots of people are doing web stuff" and "now we can reuse our code" ... which is fine, but again seemingly prioritises the development over the user experience.
I don't know why these kinds of applications aren't developed in far better performing frameworks and languages. Github desktop has to process a lot of textual information. With the current version, I've frozen it and crashed it many times due to large files. I actually can't use it anymore due to that. Make it in c++ with QT or some other native toolkits, like every other gilded application of old has. It will 'Just work', which is what developers need. Not fancy UI's
>a new release of Atom with Git and GitHub Integration and the new GitHub Desktop Beta, completely redesigned on Electron.<p>So how many gigabytes of RAM does it take to run both of these at once?
2012: <a href="https://github.com/blog/1151-designing-github-for-windows" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/blog/1151-designing-github-for-windows</a><p>>We specifically made the decision to write each application in a language native to the platform, and this has turned out to be hugely beneficial to us. Because of this separation we've been free to tackle the problems that are most pressing for each platform and work in the best possible tools instead of being constrained to the lowest common denominator.<p>2017: GitHub discovers software development is hard, falls back on lowest common denominator.<p>EDIT:<p>80MB installer. Automatically unzips into %ROAMING%. 140 MB of RAM used with a single repo loaded. Yep, sounds like Electron.<p>Oh, also, it doesn't even list any of my repos after logging in.
So they went from a subpar native application to an even more subpar application on Electron. I think I'll stick with SourceTree. At least that won't take 10 seconds to boot up.
Sometimes i think Electron is literally the worst thing that happened to desktop apps. Fuck these bloated, +10 seconds startup on a i7 + SSD , non native looking "desktop applications".
Will the native versions also be open sourced when they're retired?<p>I'd be willing to volunteer some time to bring the Windows one back up to speed. All I wanted in a new version was for it to respect my system accent color and switch to using system webviews internally (neither of which this new version does either).
Congratulations Github team!<p>One thing that worrying to me is that you include an 'undo' button that rewrites history. This is bad, as it could affect everyone downstream of you. That button should be turned into a 'revert' button.
I use git and github regularly for my hobby/side projects and even for contributing patches to some open source projects hosted on github. My typically workflow is using git command line for commits and the usual things and then a git push to my remote github repo and use their website to submit PRs, respond to reviews etc...<p>I am curious, how people use desktop app for github and what value it adds when compared to just using github website.
If my browser had the capability to set watch on multiple different directories for a service worker, you could have an almost desktop like experience without a different software.<p>With service workers, this would be pretty much do everything that the Dropbox or Github clients can do.
I use VSCode now days, as my primary git commit interface. Some improvement are required in diff / merge, but it is very clean interface and never caused any ambiguity.<p>It is also an Electron application, but taking 1/2 battery then Slack, so reasonably efficient.
Between git command line, gitk, and git gui I don't really see the need to try tools like SourceTree or this new GitHub Desktop Beta. Is there a compelling reason I'm missing?
In this thread you'll find many native app developers who are dismissing Electron because they feel threatened.<p>Cross platform apps are the future. Each day I run at least three Electron apps simultaneously and have no problem whatsoever. You have to be paying close attention to notice, and the reality is that most people do not care.<p>In fact, I was so intrigued by Electron, that I started developing my own app. So far the experience has been pure bliss.