I always liked native applications. One of the things which got me into software development were nicely built tools for the desktop. I also wanted to create such tools and applications.
Just look at Sublime Text vs VSCode or at Git Tower vs GitKraken. The native applications feel much nicer and more fluent. I'm not saying that I'm against electron applications, especially not for smaller applications. I know that it has its place, and I've tried and used multiple electron applications in the past, but I will always choose a native one if available, even though VSCode is one of the best electron apps out there.
Many years ago I've tried Qt, Java Swing, a bit of Java FX, and Objective-C with Cocoa. I didn't really build anything big with these frameworks because they were pretty complex or expensive just to build an application. Since I didn't have a good idea, it got boring before I even bothered learning these frameworks more deeply.
Then NodeJS came, and we are now able to create cross-platform applications just with HTML, CSS and JavaScript. The only problem is the performance and feel of it. Also, many electron applications use too many resources for my taste and feel pretty heavy when using it.
Therefore, the truth, which is just my truth, still holds. I always prefer native applications. The time has also changed within this decade. I'm not using Windows or Linux as my main device anymore since I've almost fully switched to Apple products. I can now use Swift instead of Objective-C and SwiftUI to create macOS, tvOS, watchOS and iOS to create applications for the products I love to use myself.
I am mainly a full stack developer but want to learn more especially about macOS and iOS development. I think that most of the users will sooner or later mostly use mobile devices like tablets and smartphones if they don't do it already. Web applications are really nice, and I love to create these. Now I also want to learn to create native applications not only because I think they are pretty nice, but also because this is what has awakened my passion for development in general.
I always loved not only creating applications but to create beautiful looking applications which don't only fulfill the user's needs in functionality but also make the user like using it because it gives a good user experience.
That is why my goal for the year 2021 is to learn Swift and SwiftUI. I'm going to share my learnings in this blog.