Thinking about a Desktop App

[elijah-potter]

Related Pages

#1878

Brainstorming

I've been working on our Chrome extension quite intensely for the past few months. I would love to extend our reach to desktop eventually (as Grammarly and co does) and want to think about how to do that.

At a bare minimum, any desktop app we have should bundle the editor you can find on our homepage, plus filesystem access. Ideally, we would use platform-specific accessibility APIs to do linting on any application open on a user's desktop. I believe @lukasmwerner has does some research in this area.

I'd love to do some kind of end-to-end encrypted cloud sync between the various consumer-facing clients (the Chrome extension included), but that's a wish-list item.

I'm posting this as a discussion because I would like your thoughts. Would something like this be useful? Is it worth exploring?

Pinging @jlarmstrongiv and @KraXen72 for visibility.

Possible Tools

Tauri. We could use all our existing JS frontend code, plus we could run our Rust code natively.

I've used Firebase in the past for apps that require real-time sync, but it definitely does not fulfill the end-to-end encryption requirement.

Technical Details

If we chose to do this, I'd first want to take each of the existing reusable Svelte components in the Chrome extension and on the website and move them to a component library.

[jlarmstrongiv]

I wonder if there’s a world in which having both a PWA and a desktop app would make sense.

A PWA is nice for locked-down computers like student chromebooks and company-provided computers, with no installation access.

A PWA is straightforward, using the standalone editor as the base and vite-plugin-pwa. It can also have limited filesystem access with Chrome and Edge (Firefox and Safari oppose local filesystem access)

My only other comment on filesystem access is that it should not be designed like ProWritingAid, where it’s impossible to just have an untitled document open.

Building and publishing a PWA is a lot quicker and easier than a native desktop app and can be completed in the short term. That way, users can have a limited desktop experience, rather than no desktop experience, while a fully-featured native app is being built.

There are some quality-of-life improvements that could be added to the standalone editor #1878 (comment)

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For a full and complete desktop app, the only answer is a native app. For example, using platform-specific accessibility APIs to do linting on any application open on a user's desktop requires a native app. I think using Tauri so that you can run the rust code natively sounds like the best approach.

[grantlemons]

One issue I see with this is matching the experiences of using the PWA and native app. It'd be weird to have them completely different, so our native app would probably end up being close to a clone of whatever editor the PWA is based on, which gives us less flexibility for tailoring the experience.

Also, providing support for two different desktop applications could get difficult. Do we expect all users to know the difference between a PWA and native app and not mix up the two when looking for documentation or filing an issue? I'd expect not.

[jlarmstrongiv]

I expect the PWA and the standalone website editor to be the same. The PWA installation method is directly in the browser ( https://web.dev/articles/install-criteria ). I expect the website to promote the desktop installation, and only offer the built-in browser PWA installation from the standalone website editor.

The desktop app would be completely different. The desktop app can open local files, have a list of recent files, multiple tabbed windows, integrations with other applications, syncing, and more. The PWA can only partially support some of those features in some browsers, so PWA feature parity is only possible with the standalone website editor, not the desktop app.

[elijah-potter]

I think both of your concerns are valid, but I don't see them as major barriers to building either a PWA or a desktop app.

One issue I see with this is matching the experiences of using the PWA and native app. It'd be weird to have them completely different, so our native app would probably end up being close to a clone of whatever editor the PWA is based on, which gives us less flexibility for tailoring the experience.

This is the main reason I'm leaning toward Tauri. We could build components or even entire pages inside a Svelte component library, and simply import them into the website and the desktop app. Even client-side routing could be carried over.

Also, providing support for two different desktop applications could get difficult. Do we expect all users to know the difference between a PWA and native app and not mix up the two when looking for documentation or filing an issue? I'd expect not.

As for this, I don't think this is practically a huge concern. We say "PWA", but we really mean "website with enough caching it can run offline". The maintenance overhead is not much higher than the site on its own. We already direct people to different installations (Firefox plugin vs. Chrome plugin) based on what browser they're using. We could just direct people who visit our site on a Chromebook to install the PWA, with everyone else installing the desktop app.

[lukasmwerner]

The PWA would practically just be the https://writewithharper.com/editor page correct?

[jlarmstrongiv]

Yep! Pretty much

[jarredAwesome]

Yes! A thousand times yes!

my biggest problem with tbe spell checkers on the market is they are all clearly made for academia. Grammerly is the only one really made for
Everyday writing, and it is clearly sending what I write elsewhere.

I would love a version of this that can take advantage of the built in apis of MacOS and IOS the way Grammerly does, but doesn’t send everything I write elsewhere

[KraXen72]

I've hacked together this: https://github.com/KraXen72/local-harper - deployed to: https://kraxen72.github.io/local-harper/
@elijah-potter If you want to, please check it out. It'a solid-js app.

It was initially vibe-coded, to see if i could even get harper working nicely through wasm, but I have since cleaned it up significantly.
The app works pretty well right now, and I use it myself as a primary way to grammar-check my writing.
Elijah, or anyone else here, I can give you push perms on the repo, so you can add PWA support or an electron/tauri wrapper.

[vnikkio]

Please work on a desktop app, or at the very least a version for LibreOffice! That would make my life so much easier. I would like to use it locally while offline as a dedicated program or something similar

[elijah-potter]

@KraXen72 and I discussed this recently. Over the course of the next month, I will be shifting most of my focus towards building a desktop app. I'll be initially targeting Windows and Linux, due to the sheer size of the former's market and my preference for the latter. We will get to MacOS eventually.

Please chime in here or create tickets for feature requests if you have them. It would be nice to have a survey of what people want before I start building it out.

More details to come.

[Delowi-MW]

Consider a paid version, I would be more than happy to support this project, especially if it gets me out from under the thumb of Grammarly. A one-time license fee (10-20 USD, maybe?) would (I think) be acceptable for people and provide long-term support for this project.

[1my0ur9uy]

Hi there,

I'm interested in getting involved with the development of a desktop app. If there is anything I can do to beta test a Mac or Windows version, I'd love to. I second being willing to support the project with a one-time license fee to get access.

[hippietrail]

Hi there,

I'm interested in getting involved with the development of a desktop app. If there is anything I can do to beta test a Mac or Windows version, I'd love to. I second being willing to support the project with a one-time license fee to get access.

Elijah's plan is to pursue Linux and Windows versions. If you're an experienced macOS application programmer that might be enough to get Mac added to the plan, but it sounds like you're not a coder?

[1my0ur9uy]

Unfortunately, I am not a MacOS programmer. However, many macOS users, such as myself, are very interested in using a privacy-focused spelling and grammar-checking app as an alternative to apps such as Grammarly. Even if it required a paid license. A small financial contribution is also something I am willing to consider towards a macOS application. Please let me know if you or Elijah are interested. Thank you. Kyle Warner

…

On Thu, Apr 23, 2026 at 10:31 PM Andrew Dunbar ***@***.***> wrote: Hi there, I'm interested in getting involved with the development of a desktop app. If there is anything I can do to beta test a Mac or Windows version, I'd love to. I second being willing to support the project with a one-time license fee to get access. Elijah's plan is to pursue Linux and Windows versions. If you're an experienced macOS application programmer that might be enough to get Mac added to the plan, but it sounds like you're not a coder? — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1907?email_source=notifications&email_token=ABV4P4FY2FNHXWSJJNYRAH34XLUYZA5CNFSNUABIM5UWIORPF5TWS5BNNB2WEL2ENFZWG5LTONUW63SDN5WW2ZLOOQXTCNRWHE3DKOJYUZZGKYLTN5XKOY3PNVWWK3TUUVSXMZLOOSWGM33PORSXEX3DNRUWG2Y#discussioncomment-16696598>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ABV4P4HKYQ6DQK7WPKQS2DL4XLUYZAVCNFSM6AAAAACGII3FFOVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTMNRZGY2TSOA> . Triage notifications, keep track of coding agent tasks and review pull requests on the go with GitHub Mobile for iOS <https://github.com/notifications/mobile/ios/ABV4P4FK3EFJTCCOMCJAIIL4XLUYZA5CNFSNUABIM5UWIORPF5TWS5BNNB2WEL2ENFZWG5LTONUW63SDN5WW2ZLOOQXTCNRWHE3DKOJYUZZGKYLTN5XKOY3PNVWWK3TUUVSXMZLOOSVGM33PORSXEX3JN5ZQ> and Android <https://github.com/notifications/mobile/android/ABV4P4EWCI4ZTWCYPDNJ55D4XLUYZA5CNFSNUABIM5UWIORPF5TWS5BNNB2WEL2ENFZWG5LTONUW63SDN5WW2ZLOOQXTCNRWHE3DKOJYUZZGKYLTN5XKOY3PNVWWK3TUUVSXMZLOOSXGM33PORSXEX3BNZSHE33JMQ>. Download it today! You are receiving this because you commented.Message ID: ***@***.***>

[hippietrail]

Unfortunately, I am not a MacOS programmer. However, many macOS users, such as myself, are very interested in using a privacy-focused spelling and grammar-checking app as an alternative to apps such as Grammarly. Even if it required a paid license. A small financial contribution is also something I am willing to consider towards a macOS application. Please let me know if you or Elijah are interested. Thank you. Kyle Warner

Good news! Either I got it wrong in my previous reply or the plan has changed.:

[1my0ur9uy]

That’s great!!! I’d love to help test when the time comes. Kyle Warner

…

On Fri, Apr 24, 2026 at 11:10 Andrew Dunbar ***@***.***> wrote: Unfortunately, I am not a MacOS programmer. However, many macOS users, such as myself, are very interested in using a privacy-focused spelling and grammar-checking app as an alternative to apps such as Grammarly. Even if it required a paid license. A small financial contribution is also something I am willing to consider towards a macOS application. Please let me know if you or Elijah are interested. Thank you. Kyle Warner Good news! Either I got it wrong in my previous reply or the plan has changed.: image.png (view on web) <https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/725a8a53-c3f8-46ad-b52d-d83da47a758d> — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1907 (reply in thread)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ABV4P4CXJELR4JFJK7XDZWT4XONZHAVCNFSM6AAAAACGII3FFOVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTMNZQGQ3DGNY> . Triage notifications, keep track of coding agent tasks and review pull requests on the go with GitHub Mobile for iOS <https://github.com/notifications/mobile/ios/ABV4P4GNUM45PXIRUZMGLRD4XONZHA5CNFSNUABIM5UWIORPF5TWS5BNNB2WEL2ENFZWG5LTONUW63SDN5WW2ZLOOQXTCNRXGA2DMMZXUZZGKYLTN5XKOY3PNVWWK3TUUVSXMZLOOSVGM33PORSXEX3JN5ZQ> and Android <https://github.com/notifications/mobile/android/ABV4P4ESTAPMZRQQS5WX7234XONZHA5CNFSNUABIM5UWIORPF5TWS5BNNB2WEL2ENFZWG5LTONUW63SDN5WW2ZLOOQXTCNRXGA2DMMZXUZZGKYLTN5XKOY3PNVWWK3TUUVSXMZLOOSXGM33PORSXEX3BNZSHE33JMQ>. Download it today! You are receiving this because you commented.Message ID: ***@***.***>