- cross-posted to:
- programmer_humor@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- programmer_humor@programming.dev
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Oh, but it absolutely is true. Microsoft really did decide to use React Native for parts of the Windows 11 Start menu. They’re also using it in sections of the Settings app.
The technical reality is even more absurd than the meme suggests. Microsoft is currently maintaining eight different UI frameworks for Windows, including their own .NET MAUI and WinUI 3 that were specifically built for their OS. Yet somehow they thought, “You know what this native operating system needs? A JavaScript framework originally designed for mobile apps.”
The CPU usage spikes aren’t necessarily from React Native itself being particularly heavyweight, but rather from the fundamental architectural choice of running a web-based rendering engine for core system UI elements. Every time you click Start, you’re essentially launching a mini web application just to display a menu.
What’s particularly galling is that Microsoft has acknowledged WinUI’s performance issues for years, to the point where they recommend their partners use the older WPF for performance-critical applications. So instead of fixing their native framework, they decided to add another layer of abstraction.
This is what happens when corporate development teams prioritize “developer experience” and trendy frameworks over system efficiency. Richard Stallman’s expression in that image perfectly captures the appropriate level of technical horror at this decision.
The old world built operating systems. The new world builds web apps that pretend to be operating systems.
React Native doesn’t render using a browser instance, it’s native code (as the name implies), it’s actually a layer over WinUI 3 (Previous versions used WPF/UWP)
So it’s in the same boat as MAUI, which is also a layer over WinUI 3.
They didn’t say it was?
The CPU usage spikes aren’t necessarily from React Native itself being particularly heavyweight, but rather from the fundamental architectural choice of running a web-based rendering engine for core system UI elements.
I suppose i lack an understanding of whether React Native is a web based rendering engine or not but i figured they could also be referring to edge implementation in the same feature.
Like saying coffee isn’t hot because of the mug it’s in but the brewing machine it came out of.
Oh, the pedants have arrived. How delightful.
Yes, technically The_Decryptor is correct - React Native doesn’t literally spin up a Chromium instance like Electron does. It transpiles JavaScript into native calls. But they’re completely missing the forest for the trees here.
The fundamental architectural absurdity remains unchanged: Microsoft is using a JavaScript framework - originally designed for mobile apps - to render core operating system UI elements. Whether that JavaScript gets compiled to native calls or interpreted in a browser engine is irrelevant to the core criticism.
Your coffee analogy is actually closer to the mark than The_Decryptor realizes. The performance issues aren’t just about the final native calls - they’re about the entire abstraction stack Microsoft has built.
You’ve got JavaScript -> React Native bridge -> WinUI 3 -> whatever underlying Windows API calls. Each layer adds overhead, complexity, and potential failure points. The_Decryptor saying “it’s in the same boat as MAUI” isn’t the defense they think it is - MAUI has its own performance issues precisely because of similar abstraction layers.
This is exactly the kind of technical bike-shedding that lets corporations get away with architectural disasters. Everyone argues about implementation details while the Start menu still stutters when you click it.
The old world would have written the Start menu in C++ and called it a day. The new world creates dependency graphs that look like spider webs and then argues about whether the spider web is technically made of silk or polyester.
Can’t they extract more data from a mobile set-up? I’m assuming that’s why they did it, they’re trying to take it to a phone experience for the corporations.
Nope.
The reason you do react native is because it’s easier to hire react native devs. Further, there’s a plethora of react native libraries that make it easier to make UXes above other UX frameworks.
The problem MS has is they have spent decades making platform locked UX frameworks because they were deathly afraid someone would use Linux instead of Windows.
Browser tech won because every major platform needs a browser and basically no organization was investing in multiplatform UX libraries. The likes of both Microsoft and Apple are openly hostile to such frameworks (QT and GTK come to mind).
The likes of both Microsoft and Apple are openly hostile to such frameworks (QT and GTK come to mind).
Funny thing, the OneDrive client app that ships with Windows, uses Qt
Holy fucking shit this isn’t just a meme, wtaf is going on at Microsoft.
The FOSS aficionados of Lemmy will probably be quick to tell me it’s always been shit, but this seems like a marked increase in bad decisions in the past 5-10 years
Business majors.
If you go back to an older version of Windows, it becomes clear how bad Microsoft has become. Try Windows 95 and you’ll be surprised how clean it is. How few distractions the OS is showing into your face. How tidy the menus are and they also give you little hints for the keyboard shortcuts
little hints for the keyboard shortcuts
FYI, those are called menu mnemonics. 😊
Menumonics, got it
deleted by creator
Same as everywhere else, management wants random shit done chop chop chop, fires actual developers who tell them they’re the dumbest pieces of shit they’ve seen in this lifetime and hire random bros who say “whatever dude, just wanna get paid” then copy-paste google results because bing sucks.
Fuck JavaScript in all its forms.
Ok, in a browser is fine. But HARD pass on electron and all this bullshit
Ok, in a browser is fine.
JavaScript was never fit for purpose even in a browser. We could’ve had Python or Scheme in the browser instead, but nooooo, Brandon Eich had to be fucking incompetent.
How about Lua? I don’t like Python that much.
I wasn’t idly speculating about languages that I personally happen to like better; I was listing the two languages that Netscape was actively considering at the time before they decided to glom on to the Java hype. When I say “we could’ve had Python or Scheme,” I mean Netscape almost picked Python or Scheme.
If it makes you feel any better, I get the impression that Scheme would’ve been the more likely of the two. Also, this was happening in 1995, so Lua was less than two years old at the time and, according to this page, not internationally known yet (that would happen in 1996).
Gonna be real, Lua would have been perfect for this. I get what you’re saying about netscape though,
It’s why I’m gonna change to Linux permanently come the end of Win10.
Recently something has changed and the start menu likes to search for apps in its browser (not my default app). I used to press windows key then type “snip” for the screenshot tool, now half of the time is does the wrong thing …
Also here’s a link to post talking about react in the start menu https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30384494
Yeah. It’s quite obnoxious how bad they’ve made their OS and it’s obvious they are FARMING searches on bing with these tactics lmao
New CPU benchmark: 100 start menu clicks per second.
I have a Windows laptop for the first time in well over a decade for a project I am working on. Even though it is overpowered (i7, 64gb ram), and it is currently “idle”, the cooling fans are working overtime because the damn OS is always busy doing some random shit when “idle”. This is AFTER I ran a debloat script. It was near impossible to use before then.
EDIT: I found the cause of the fanning issue and different behavior between Win 11 and Linux (Pop!_OS). Even though the laptop comes with an Nvidia RTX 4000 series GPU, Windows 11 set the global default GPU to be the integrated graphics (Intel UHD). The same laptop under Pop!_OS automatically set the default GPU to Nvidia. As soon as I dug this up and switched the settings to Nvidia, the laptop stopped fanning full speed nonstop.
Unticking “alow this drive and its contents to be indexed” and terminating the indexing service helps.
And might as well, not like the fucking search works anyway, even with web search disabled. At least on W10.
And it’s a terrible app, at that. No organization, just either some random application links, or one giant list with no categories or organization past alphabetical.
Oops I pit my mouse in the bottom left now its loading 50 web pages filled with ads under the guise of being a widget
Is it really? Does microsoft have no faith in its own user32 UI API?
Yeah, windows apps, even official ones are just a mix of react native apps.
Switched to Linux at the beginning of the year. Still have a lobotomized local windows 11 boot for gaming/VR still though. Can’t wait for the day I can finally get rid of it totally.
I’m no programmer nor coder or such, I call myself advanced user only.
If having part of an app (I refer app as OS here, and start menu as part of an OS) to spike CPU/memory usage, does that means that part is not being used without being called? and leaves resources fully free? Sure big spike happen when the sub-part is called, but without being called?
IF part of an app is not even loaded while not used, isn’t that actually good? I mean, depends how often that app part is called and have to load from the void.
I imagine that could be better than having unused part loaded all the time, wasting the resources?
Also, I totally skip part of poorly coded compared to old smooth and optimized code.
Well, yes, in some cases, but the start menu is something you interact with very often. The average user (and I mean office worker in their 40s)doesn’t even pin items to the taskbar. As such, the main way to open apps is through the start menu. Think about this way. In this situation on a laptop, you either save ram or battery. Constant cpu spikes aren’t good for energy efficiency. This also means hogging your ssd, which might be an issue in specific situations. On the other side, keeping the start menu fully in ram could be perceived as a waste, it really depends on how often you use the start menu and how much you value energy efficiency.
It’s also pretty common to type Win + NameOfProgram + Enter, which necessarily opens the start menu and spikes the darn CPU. This has been a very common way to interact with the OS since Vista, and, as with so many other things in Microsoft land, has gotten worse.
WindowsKey -> “fire” -> Enter ==> Firefox is now open!
Question for those who know more than me: how much is different 11 from 10, obviously excluding the desktop theme? I imagine very little but I’m curious.
The main difference is that it requires TPM 2.0, which allows applications to run in a fully encrypted mode and prevent user tampering.
Oh no! Not the user tampering! 😱
Ostensibly it’s to protect things like credit card information. In reality it’s to make sure Microsoft has more control over your computer than you do.
Don’t they have like 9 graphics libraries and frameworks accross 4 languages already?
It’s actually at least 13.
They need to scrap all this shit and take a massive step back and start over. Absolute bollocks.
reminds me of this story: “Temporary” disk formatting UI from 1994 still lives on in Windows 11 - Ars Technica
I don’t understand what this means, but try and find a single Windows user who cares (assuming everyone here is on Linux).
Basically. The start menu on windows 11 is really poorly implemented so that whenever you open it your CPU has to kick into overdrive for a split second.
Fun fact: Even windows users hate shitty performance of really basic software.
