As much as I dislike JS, my experiences with React Native (JS but largely native UI elements) and Electron (JS with some native elements, but largely HTML+CSS) has convinced me that that HTML+CSS is my real (performance and battery life) enemy, with JS a significant but distant second. I look forward to better UI kits that just draw to a Canvas-like surface or something, ideally without needing an HTML+CSS engine at all.
I'm not thrilled with that because I really like the old-school lightly-styled-HTML web, but I have to admit it's really really bad at "app" style layouts and interactivity, so if we must do that with the web (and apparently we must) it's gotta go, or it's gonna continue to suck.
What do you consider a better alternative? A lot of people love to hate on HTM+CSS, but it's actually fairly powerful. I've been trying out a lot of native UI toolkits, and they're all as quirky and confusing as web tech. I'd agree that there's tons of room for improvement, but any UI tookit will need to make certain tradeoffs and deal with complex layouts and compositions.
Flexbox and grid help a lot with app-style layout.
I'm not thrilled with that because I really like the old-school lightly-styled-HTML web, but I have to admit it's really really bad at "app" style layouts and interactivity, so if we must do that with the web (and apparently we must) it's gotta go, or it's gonna continue to suck.