Using Electron vs. Offline HTML5 for an offline application

Question

When looking up Electron and Offline HTML5, I have found it difficult to make a decision between which one to use for a project.

Assuming that a user will have to go to a certain website to download the Electron application, and would have to go to the same website to get the Offline HTML5 loaded, what are the pros and cons between using one over the other?

Some that I could think of:

• Offline HTML5 can be updated without the user consciously updating their application by just making the user go to the online page again.
• Electron would eliminate the need to code around multiple browser/browser version dependencies and quirks

Answer 1

It really depends on your exact requirements. The following is a list of everything that I came up with:

• electron supports module system (i.e. require) both in main and renderer processes.
• electron provides you access to OS APIs (e.g. fs). Without such many node modules will not work in the JS runtime of the browser (e.g. ip).
• updating your app with electron is as easy as sending an http request. (or even better as described here)
• an HTML 5 offline app requires a browser and the user might just give it IE6.
• electron integrates with native desktop environment (see dialog, power-save-blocker, shell or even app for some examples)
• electron enhances some of HTML5 APIs such as file API
• electron lets you modify the default behavior of underlying chromium. For example you could intercept all URLs with file scheme and modify them on the fly*.

In short if you want your app to have a good native integration and act deterministic (i.e. no browser quirks) I suggest choosing electron.

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*electron-jade for example takes use of protocol API to compile all files ending with .jade on the fly without the need to prior compilation.

DISCLAIMER: I am the developer of electron-jade.