1043: I’m Using GPUI For Everything

Scott and Wes ditch Electron and Tauri for GPUI, the GPU accelerated Rust UI framework from the Zed team. They get into its React-like API, styling that feels a lot like Tailwind, GPUI Kit components, the community fork drama, and the tiny desktop apps Scott has built with it.

Show Notes

• 00:00 Welcome to Syntax!

• GPUI (gpui.rs)

• 01:24 Electron, Tauri, and the Trouble With Web Views

• 04:05 Enter GPUI: Why We Don’t Take Money to Talk About Tools

• 05:32 Brought to you by Sentry.io (sentry.io/syntax)

• 05:59 What GPUI Is: GPU Accelerated, Cross Platform, Native All the Way Down

• 06:50 A React Like API in Rust: Divs, Flex, and Chained Methods

• 09:35 Components, Props, and State in GPUI

• Scott’s GPUI Demo Gist (gist.github.com/stolinski/234d65a09d65a81b99d6…)

• 11:21 How Much of CSS Does GPUI Actually Reimplement?

• 12:52 Flexbox Everywhere, But Where Is CSS Grid?

• 14:17 Where Does Your App Logic Live? No RPC Layer Needed

• 15:53 Render vs RenderOnce: Stateful and Static Components

• 16:57 GPUI Kit: The shadcn of GPUI

• 18:46 GPUI CE: The Community Fork and Ecosystem Tension

• 21:29 Apps Scott Built With GPUI: Gendo, File Bro, and Mr. Space

• 22:48 Why Tiny Utility Apps Should Stay Tiny

• 24:25 File Bro: File Automations a la Hazel

• 25:27 Mr. Space: Building a macOS Window Manager

• 27:05 The Downsides: No Native UI Elements and No Browser DOM

• Scott’s Rust Best Practices Skill (github.com/stolinski/s-stack/tree/main/skills/…)

• 29:56 Testing GPUI Apps With Jev and the Accessibility Tree

• github.com/stolinski/gpui-agent

• 30:39 GPUI Mobile: Experimental, But It Works

• GPUI Kit Mobile Docs (gpui-kit.com/docs/mobile)

• github.com/longbridge/gpui-mobile

• 31:52 Final Verdict: GPUI for Personal Desktop Software

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