The world of programming is concentrating on native apps other than web apps nowadays. The frameworks to build cross-platform mobile applications such as Flutter, React Native, Xamarin, Native Script are getting more popular. But what about cross-platform desktop application development? Electron.js, Meteor, Proton Native, Xojo, etc. are the frameworks to build cross-platform applications. One of the good options in this category is NW.js. In this tutorial, we can learn a little bit about NW.js and the advantages of choosing it for desktop application development.
What is NW.JS?
NW.js created by Roger Wang is a framework that uses HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for building desktop applications. The original name of the framework is Node Webkit, and he developed it while working at Inter Open Source Technology Center in China.
The framework is a combination of Node.js with Chromium and with this method, the application can load local sites, and react with the operating system through the JavaScript API.
Why do we need to use NW.js?
NW.js is becoming popular amongst programmers, as it is preferred for some obvious reasons. Even as a newbie, NW.js is recommended for building your application.
Now let’s look at the reasons why we need to use NW.js:
- Coding using JavaScript becomes more efficient with this framework. There is more efficiency in the correlation between the server and the client-side of the process. This increases efficiency with this framework, closing the frontend and backend developer.
- When it comes to building real-time apps, such as chatting apps, gaming, social media applications, and any app that needs communication in real-time choosing NW.js makes the development easier.
- There is increased productivity, using multiple tools and models. This is ensured with the Node Package Manager in this framework.
- It is perfect for enterprise apps with its microservices.
Advantages of Choosing NW.js
- The Electron.js, Meteor, Proton Native, etc. are the popular competitors of NW.js. But we have some advantages in choosing NW.js other than these. Let’s take a look at them.
- We can observe that NW.js gives programmers more freedom to work. And this makes it very popular among programmers.
- While comparing all of them, NW.js can be operated on all platforms and operating systems. They all use chromium engine UI, which provides an easy and smooth surface for operations.
- NW.js provides solid protection with its java source protection and you can get it on Linux, Mac OS, and Windows.
Conclusion
In the latest version of NW.js, there has been a tremendous improvement in start-up time. The improvement of the start-up time from the previous version is 30 percent. Memory issues can be investigated with heap dump capability. Available memory can be used instead of default memory for the javascript heap dump. So NW.js may become the best cross-platform desktop application development
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