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Comment by dymk | Hacker News Reader

Opening up a webpage is easier than cloning a repo, compiling, and running a binary

... if you only do it once.

Okay, for the sake of the argument, let's assume at some point you amortize the fixed costs of native compilation down to zero.

Tell me how running a native binary is inherently easier than opening a webpage?

To open a webpage you have first to run a native binary. So, running a native binary is necessarily easier than opening a webpage.

You are confusing "Number of steps" with "Easy".

They're also the same number of steps. If I tell my OS to open an `html` file, it opens a browser window.

If doing task B requires doing task A first, then doing task A is necessarily easier than doing task B.

I think you're confusing "simple" and "easy". One task vs two is simpler, yes.

The performance and user experience of a native binary is on a whole other level.

It's really not with wasm. Sure, there is a performance difference. It is not a "whole other level".

The user experience is still on a whole other level, not living inside the browser. And the number of times I've used a wasm app, more than once, that actually had some theft do it. Well, I can't think of a single one. So, we will see how well it does in practice.

Wasm is great, but if the goal is to move native applications do the webb it isn't something I look forward to.

which is actually pretty often for a demo!

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