from the team:
Hi everyone,
We’re happy to announce that we’ve now launched the Proton Mail macOS and Windows apps out of beta.
Thanks to your valuable feedback, we’ve added more than 20 new features and fixes from the release of the first beta versions of the apps.
The new Proton Mail desktop apps are here to make your private inbox faster and more productive with:
🌓 Desktop-optimized design that syncs with light & dark mode
📆 Integrated Proton Calendar in app switcher
🎭 Events and hide-my-email aliases in side-panel
🔔 Dedicated app notifications
♻️ Automatic updates for the latest features & security improvements
➕ And much more
🐧If you’re a Linux user, you can join the desktop app beta here:
https://proton.me/support/mail-desktop-app
With the release of the desktop apps, Proton Mail is now available on all major desktop and mobile platforms, offering over 100 million people worldwide a private alternative to Big Tech, regardless of their device.
➡️ Learn more and get the desktop apps here: https://proton.me/blog/proton-mail-desktop-app
Access to the desktop apps is included in all Proton premium plans. Free plans come with a 14-day trial.
As always, we welcome your feedback and we’re grateful for your continuous support.
Stay safe,
Proton team
Ah, looks like an Electron app. Disappointing, but unsurprising.
They could have at least used Tauri.
Not familiar with Tauri. Guess I’ll go google that, but what’s your reason for suggesting it as a preferable alternative?
Tauri uses the system’s native web rendering engine instead of shipping Chromium with the whole app. As a result you get much smaller app bundles (like 10 MB for a complex app), better startup times and less RAM usage. The downside is that you need to do slightly more testing but the end result is worth it.
And also ironic. Because they’re called Proton and they’re using Electron to make their app (it’s chemistry, ♀️🐶)
Opposites attract
Oh yeah
Could you explain for a layman why this is disappointing?
As others said, it’s basically chrome bundled with the website code so it looks like an app. And while Electron does offer devs the ability to do things a webapp can’t, it still brings the chrome browser engine along with all the inefficient ram usage and potential for security flaws that implies.
Electron app
Shame. I do my best to avoid the resource bloat of electron apps whenever possible.
I mean, when my own iron - dual 12-core 24-thread Xeon E5, 128Gb RAM - sees non-trivial impacts from just two or three Electron apps, I do my best to nip that in the bud by avoiding all that crap.
What’s so hard about building a traditional app? With DotNet you could build a single program for all three platforms, and you could bundle DotNet up into that app such that it doesn’t even need a separately-installed sandbox like Java does.
As a .net dev I agree this would be ideal, but I don’t do UI much these days so I don’t know what’s out there for frameworks right now.
I do know one thing that’s out there in spades tho, and that’s “full stack” JS devs. :P That’s probably what’s “so hard” about building a traditional app.
There aren’t any great cross platform UI frameworks for .net. There are a few out there, but they are not as robust as what you can do with stuffing a react app into electron.
From what I have seen, AvaloniaUI is getting really close to being the ideal framework for cross-platform desktop use. It has become very polished over the last two years.
MAUI on the other hand, has been falling flat on its face on desktop because it is geared much more towards mobile.
I’d agree that Avalonia has come a long way in a short time. It has a lot of potential, but there aren’t a lot of UI control libraries available yet.
I’m using it for a personal project and it’s very good for cross platform consistency. The trouble is that building a good looking UI is still difficult. Some of that is my lack of knowledge, but some is lack of available docs, examples, and community.
Here’s hoping they keep growing those things and become a viable alternative.
From the team:
Our team is currently working on resolving the connection issues experienced by our Linux users, so the app will be temporarily unavailable. We apologize for the inconvenience.
edit:
It should be fixed.
Linux clients are currently only available as .deb or .rpm packages. Just a heads up for folks.
Could someone extract them and rebuild it as a Flatpak?
Do we like this over bridge? That hasn’t been halve bad on Mac.
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Does proton drive app support file sync for Mac OS backups like windows does now?
Since it’s just an Electron app, any luck we’ll get that UI on tablets? The iPad app is just a larger iPhone app, it kinda sucks.
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I don’t understand who the email apps are for, installing the website as a PWA is a better experience.
Not a Firefox user, eh?
Don’t get me started on Firefox PWAs.
I use Firefox, but I have to use a different browser for PWAs, it sucks. If I’m lucky, Epiphany works with that website, otherwise I have to use some Chromium browser. Bleh.
I did that for a while but the links in the PWA kept opening in that browser instead of Firefox. That’s why I prefer to use Electron apps, because links open in FF.
Probably an electron app.
What’s the ETA of Windows and Mac public release?
You’re in the public release announcement post ;-)
Nvm. I’m on the free plan so won’t be able to use it.
When Drive on Linux ?
According to Andy the timeframe depends on the level of the integration they want to achieve. Andy said he could see an Ubuntu version arriving in the next probabably 24 months, longer to be at the point where the major linux distributions are supported and lets say 90% of Linux is supported.
TL;DR: No further info or ETA.
https://youtu.be/Dp7ght2fMR4?t=2584 (Interview is from December 2023)
Generally, as a Linux user, I’d suggest the interview above.
