alt Hacker NewsYeah, weird-shaped windows are definitely not something that should make a comeback. Just because you could doesn't mean you should.
> Today, all Windows desktop apps look the same as they are the same; they are all built on crap React, Electron, electronbun, and Tauri browser wrappers that mimic the real Desktop apps.
Desktop apps should look the same because they should use the OS GUI framework; that has nothing to do with React and Electron. I can't quite understand this argument; being webview based enables applications to look different from each other, like websites do, not similar. If they still do look similar, that's a good thing.
> The point was usually not usability. It was identity.
Yeah. And usability is sort of a big deal. Applications that implement their own widgets or color schemes or nonstandard shapes usually pay zero attention to usability or accessibility. They almost invariably lack all standard affordances and disregard the standard UX guidelines.
Also, ironically the applications with the most "identity" today tend to be control panels and other accessories by HW manufacturers bundled with device drivers, and they also happen to be the crappiest, most terrible bloatware that an average user is likely to encounter.
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Accessibility is really important as well, as there's different laws and regulations covering people's rights here too. Modern cross-platform GUI frameworks (as heavy as they can be) have no issues supporting screen readers and HiDPI for people with sight difficulties.
I don't know. They look cool. If someone wants to bring them back it's a viable option. I'd definitely welcome it.
There's a wave of "desktop games" on Steam. Most of them are Idle genre or tamagochi like.
For those I find these exoctic shaped windows are fun and a great differentiator.
Example:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2666510/Rustys_Retirement...
Bundle with a ton of these games:
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/48558/BottomOfYourScre...
Agreed. I remember seeing quite a few non-standard designs in the days of Vista, especially when Microsoft was heavily promoting the Windows Presentation Foundation framework and using XAML for UI design.
The problem with setups like this is that the moment you need to resize them, place them in a specific spot, or move them to a larger or smaller monitor, they tend to scale terribly and end up causing all kinds of “death by a thousand cuts” issues.
> Yeah, weird-shaped windows are definitely not something that should make a comeback. Just because you could doesn't mean you should.
My opinion here is the exact opposite of yours. Make computers cool again! They used to look like an alien spaceship, now everything looks like paperwork.
We can make it cool again! We can make it fun.
All the fun parts of life are optional.
Quite. And the era when everyone was trying to "do their own thing" with UI design wasn't exactly pleasant or usable. Just have a look at some of these designs, for example
You're thinking of apps for work. There's no reason why people should not be able to have fun when not working
Not to mention that the statement is wrong. Windows applications do NOT look the same, and that's bad.
Oh... except for their lack of a title bar, which prevents you from telling which application you're looking at. Is this PDF open in Edge, or Acrobat? Who knows. The windows look the same.
Beyond that... it's a disgraceful mess. You have applications now with no menu bar, but instead a bunch of hamburger buttons and "gear" buttons scattered all over the place. And common, standard functions like "save file" are further hidden behind "more" labels even in THOSE menus.
Another example of Windows's galling regression: the abolition of the File dialog in many apps, which have replaced it with a giant page of crudely-drawn, unlabeled, super-wide text boxes and a bunch of plain text. There's no file structure shown, so you have no idea where you are about to save a file... It's truly a clinic on dogshit UI. Pathetic.
> that has nothing to do with React and Electron
Not only that, but I think that Electron leads to the opposite problem: all apps look and behave differently, they don't follow platform guidelines, they look out of place.