digital tool making tools

a simple list of tools to make apps/web-sites

written on 10/2020

some restrictions: cross-platform (especially mobile, and web would be dope), native ui

Flutter

Dart, which is basically Google’s version of Haxe
has hot-loading or whatever so you don’t have to re-build ‘n compile to see the UI, similar to a 2d scene editor
just works
quick, light, simple
backed by Google, yet open-source?
contemporary widgets both Android and iOS design guidelines
at the moment, this seems to be by far the best choice for cross-platform native ui

Xamarin

C#
old school Mono build ‘n compile workflow can be less intuitive and slow, especially if using Visual Studio, handling emulators ‘n crap
Mono is extremely well supported (Unity, Godot, MonoGame)
like .NET, it’s probably pays off for huge projects, since you get the features of C#, and is likely a fit choice by systems programmers

Cordova (aka PhoneGap)

i don’t remember what, but something about it’s implementation seemed a but strange to me. May it wasn’t 100% native? Not sure...

React Native

i’m not a fan of javascript or anything web-related. I’d rather write it in a systems language and let the transpiler do it’s magic
i’m def not a fan of Facebook!

dear imgui

C++
perhaps replaces qt?
“Dear ImGui is a bloat-free graphical user interface library for C++. It outputs optimized vertex buffers that you can render anytime in your 3D-pipeline enabled application. It is fast, portable, renderer agnostic and self-contained (no external dependencies).”... you can integrate it into game engines
tons of backends / maintained compatibility
this seems to be more for tooling purposes as opposed to public use...

HaxeUI

this is a super interesting option for game makers
the main problem with all things Haxe: just not enough open-source dev love, and almost zero commercial support
HaxeUI allows native bindings through wxWidgets for desktop targets, but there are no mobile native UI bindings
using this for server-side code is awesome though, and node.js bindings are well maintained
it seems possible to use NME and HaxeUI together to have the power of a core framework with native api bindings(?) and the UI logic of HaxeUI. This combo allows for a lot of creative freedom. ...but NME’s user-base is tiny
otherwise, can still use either Flixel/OpenFL/Lime, OpenFL/Lime, Heaps/HashLink, or Kha! Which is kinda amazing... Using Flixel or Heaps game engines to make apps?? Hahah. Why not!?

Kivy

so, HaxeUI only provides native UI for desktop targets via wxWidgets.
Heaps/HashLink, Flixel/OpenFL, NME, Kha all provide non-native UI for all targets (mobile, web, desktop)
- anyway, this is pretty fucking amazing, especially when you’re already familiar with a backend because it’s the same backend for a game engine! You could just add particle effects to button presses or crazy screen transitions or whatever cool games stuff to your apps! This is wayyyy coooler. Forget the native crap!
i’d guess NME is the best choice though, for native api bindings, in case you need to access something... say the camera, gps, windowing, or whatever

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