Web Views in System Preferences
Jim Nielsen (via Old Unix Geek, Hacker News):
I’m intrigued by the ability to use system colors in CSS and these web views in macOS show how engineers at Apple are leveraging non-standard CSS keywords in Webkit to mimic UIs in macOS which are otherwise built with native system APIs.
It’s kind of like opening the developer tools in an Electron app, except these are native macOS apps with web views parading as system UI.
I’ve poked around in the “Apple ID” and “Family Sharing” panes in the macOS System Preferences where I’ve spotted a few intriguing details.
I ran into one of these Web views in the Music app when trying to manage my Apple News+ subscription.
Previously:
- Mac Software Stagnation
- Micro.blog Moving iOS App to React Native
- System Preferences Reimagined
- Music.app and TV.app Use JET in macOS 12.2 Beta
3 Comments RSS · Twitter
I wonder how this technology (JET?) fits in with Apple's plans for application development on macOS. It's a bit weird that rather than choosing AppKit, Catalyst or SwiftUI, Apple created their own React Native framework instead. I guess it has the advantage of allowing the UI to be changed without having to go through the App Store/system software updater, but has that ever been a problem for Apple in the first place when they don't have to deal with app review?
Lovely that these appear to use deprecated WebViews and not WKWebViews. Maybe Apple should not deprecate for others frameworks that they continue to rely on?
