lack of good distribution mechanisms

and a perception that the web is 'unstoppable'

well, the first is technical, but not the second

@mikehearn I'm waiting for the day of the Chromium Plugin for Firefox, the Firefox plugin for Edge, the Edge Plugin for Safari...

I know there are a few ports out there already

The Web is already on desktop via Electron

I hate to admit but Microsoft does a good job with VS Code.

i've been working with C# for the past two weeks myself. it's fine but it's not cross platform

(I know there are some initiatives, but I'm speaking broadly.)

@mikehearn I fear that the major changes to Java might hinder adoption or at least upgrade and eventually drive some people from the platform altogether. When you're forced to reimplement applications you might as well start looking for alternatives. Hopefully those people land on Kotlin and don't give up on the Java platform though.

well, i don't think anyone has to reimplement their apps. it's just annoying that it requires some changes.

@carlw Really sucks with the Qt licensing. I think they're shooting themselves in the foot

that said javafx specifically is at a somewhat perilous point in time

no website, unmaintained tutorials, etc. things are heading in the right direction but the community needs to be more organised still

@edvin yeah huh, there’s too heavy competition for now

ah well .... i have my little bit of the puzzle to work on 🙂

Hehe 🙂

Have you guys seen onshape.com by the way? If you want to see what's possible in the browser, these guys basically reimplemented SolidWorks in the browser, and it's fast. I thought it was a toy (because you know.. JavaScript), but it's actually incredibly powerful. Never thought it would be possible in such a shitty environment as the browser 🙂

@edvin better fire up that Chromium Plugin for Safari https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/comment/44145#Comment_44145

Maybe someone could run something in the browser?...a virtual? oh forget it

well, the web gets slightly less shitty every year, but it's so far behind. it's fascinating that OnShape's whole pitch is "it's normal CAD but in a browser"

@carlw I was talking about VS Code not VS Studio 🙂

they don't seem to have any other selling points

their video is all about how hard it is to maintain "old" CAD software i.e. desktop apps

@abhinay oh, i don't know that

VSCode is an editor built on top of Electron

whereas onshape is admin-free, they say

these claims feel a bit overblown, but it's true that most corporate IT departments are very poor performers and effectively outsourcing IT tasks to other companies can make sense.

that doesn't have to imply the web itself of course

@mikehearn I'd think a CAD user would be able to update his software himself instead of running to the IT guy, but apparently it's a thing there yet. But they also solve document management very well 🙂