Buried in this announcement about Windows 11 improvements is a fascinating admission: the Windows 11 Start menu has been built using React this entire time. Microsoft is now migrating it to their native WinUI3 framework to improve performance and reduce interaction latency.
This explains a lot about why the Start menu has felt sluggish compared to Windows 10.
The React → WinUI migration is the most technically interesting detail imo.
It has not been built with React, the article is false and it's a typical statement meant to make you outraged. The "recommended" section in the start menu was built using React Native and renders into XAML, so as natve as it can get. WinUI changes nothing about this. It's very tiresome having to constantly debunk this because "journalists" are chasing cheap clicks instead of doing their job.
Mostly because the C++/WinRT tooling is non existent, after killing the C++/CX Visual Studio XAML integration, C++ Builder like, thus most C++ teams reach out to React Native instead, as Microsoft's QML.
Did the headline get updated since this comment? At the time of writing this reply, the headlines is “windows 11’s start menu was built using React …”, which I agree is super interesting.
Not at all! This is great. I think at a minimum I need some kind of gui with an icon for each binary (something like a very basic app launcher I guess). But what I like about your solution is that it’s about as simple as I was hoping to be able to achieve!
How do I make sure only the electron app is displayed at boot? Also, one of the apps is a full screen unity game, will this be affected by not having a full desktop loaded?
As far as making the electron app display at boot, my best guess would be to use it instead of the shell script I suggested earlier.... or, use the shell script, with the other steps commented-out, and just launch the electron app from there.
In terms of not having a full desktop loaded, I don't know. My guess is that if you're running the libraries to launch the graphics system in the first place, it should work.
However, luckily, I've been asking ChatGPT so far, haha, so I'll just ask it again.
To display only the Electron app or Unity game at boot, you'd typically want to create a systemd service that starts the systemd-nspawn container. You would then configure your display manager to automatically log into a session that only runs that service.
Here is a step-by-step guide:
*Step 1: Create a systemd service*
Create a systemd service file at `/etc/systemd/system/myapp.service` with the following contents:
Replace `/path/to/container` with the path to your container, and `youruser` with your username.
Enable the service to run at boot with:
```bash
sudo systemctl enable myapp.service
```
*Step 2: Configure your display manager*
This step depends on which display manager you're using. If you're using LightDM, for example, you would create a new X session by creating a `.desktop` file at `/usr/share/xsessions/myapp.desktop` with the following contents:
This setup should start your systemd-nspawn container and display your Electron app or Unity game fullscreen at boot.
As for your question about running a Unity game without a full desktop environment: yes, it should be possible. Both Electron and Unity should be able to create their own windows without relying on a desktop environment. The one caveat is that there may be certain features that rely on the desktop environment (such as system notifications), which would not be available.
Note that this setup does not prevent the user from switching to other TTYs or sessions. If you want to restrict the user to your app, you'll need a more comprehensive "kiosk mode" setup that locks down the system at a lower level.
This explains a lot about why the Start menu has felt sluggish compared to Windows 10.
The React → WinUI migration is the most technically interesting detail imo.