We are not the typical tech startup story of college dropouts or Ivy League whiz kids; ours began with humble beginnings and a simple product that served us well for years. Yet, there was a drive within us, a desire to not just participate in the market but to redefine it. The word 'unique,' much like 'innovation,' might be overused and overstretched, but in our journey, these aren’t just buzzwords—they are pillars of a quest to build something unparalleled.
Although it might sound fancy nowadays, we don't actually want to build a car—another tech company tried that, and let's just say, that particular Apple didn't taste too sweet. Instead, let’s embrace the metaphor of building a car to better understand the intricacies of software development. Contrary to the futuristic scenarios painted by sci-fi, it’s not AI alone doing all the heavy lifting; it’s people. Real, creative, problem-solving individuals who use technological tools to craft innovative solutions.
Our colleagues are the craftsmen of the digital age, who, like skilled mechanics, tweak and tune until everything runs smoothly. Together, they navigate through complexities and challenges, applying their expertise where technology alone cannot suffice. By focusing on this human element, we highlight the indispensable role of skilled professionals in turning abstract ideas into tangible, functioning software.
Just as building a car involves choosing the right engine, frame, and safety features, developing software requires selecting the right technologies to power, support, and secure the application. It’s about assembling these pieces in a way that they work seamlessly together, enhancing each other's strengths and compensating for weaknesses. And just like car building, every choice in software development from the programming language to the development framework can drastically influence both the process and the final product.
In our case, the choices to continue with Tauri, Svelte, and Rust were unconventional but calculated. Despite the initial steep learning curve and the need to rethink certain approaches, these tools together create a synergy that suits our unique needs perfectly. Let’s break down why each of these tools is crucial and how they contribute to our overall vision of building something truly innovative.
Rust: The High-Performance Engine
- First, we have Rust, which acts like the engine of our car. Just as a powerful engine is crucial for a car’s speed and reliability, Rust powers our software to run efficiently and smoothly. This programming language is designed with a focus on performance, type safety, and concurrency, ensuring rapid execution and robust handling of simultaneous tasks. Rust enforces memory safety, meaning all references point to valid memory. Impressively, it accomplishes this without a garbage collector, thus eliminating the overhead that can slow down systems at runtime. This aspect of Rust is particularly crucial in preventing software crashes and ensuring that everything under the hood works harmoniously, much like a well-oiled, high-performance engine in a car. This results in software that doesn’t just perform well— it excels in reliability and efficiency, ensuring a smooth and safe user experience.
Svelte: The Streamlined Chassis
- Next, consider Svelte, which can be likened to the car's chassis. The chassis not only shapes how the car looks and feels but also fundamentally supports and integrates all its parts. Svelte is incredibly lightweight and efficient, allowing our software to perform seamlessly like a well-designed car that cuts through the air with minimal resistance. With Svelte, the parts of our software that you interact with —like buttons, images, and animations—are not just visually appealing but also optimized for speed and fluidity, ensuring our application is not only good-looking but also highly responsive and aerodynamic in navigating the vast internet space.
Tauri: The Lightweight Framework
- Lastly, there’s Tauri, which might be compared to a car’s advanced, lightweight framework rather than just its security system. In automotive design, a lightweight framework not only enhances the vehicle’s efficiency but also improves its overall performance without adding unnecessary bulk. Similarly, Tauri offers a toolkit that helps developers create applications for all major desktop platforms, using virtually any front-end framework. (The beta version for Tauri 2.0 was launched a little more about a month ago)
By using these three components together, we're able to create software that's fast (thanks to Rust), user-friendly (thanks to Svelte), and secure and efficient (thanks to Tauri). This combination might not be what you'd find in every software development garage, but it's what helps us build a high-performance, custom vehicle in the form of the applications you use and love. In essence, just as the right combination of engine, chassis, and framework makes a car efficient, safe, and a joy to drive, the right combination of technologies makes our software robust, efficient, and a pleasure to use. But just like in real life, without a talented and top-notch team at the top of their game, none of this would be possible. Having a vision is one thing, but bringing it to life is a completely different ball game.
We are not jumping on the bandwagon — like most companies do with electric vehicles — for Artificial Intelligence. Instead, we invest even more in human interactions, to build our team and our core capabilities further. What we ultimately aim for isn’t rocket science — it's simply to build products that people like to use. It’s about creating software that fits seamlessly into daily life, enhancing experiences without complicating them.
This dedication to simplicity, driven by a highly skilled team using cutting-edge technology, is what sets us apart. It’s not just about being different for the sake of being different; it’s about being better in ways that matter most to those who use what we build.
