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Comment by hamandcheese | Hacker News Reader

Is it just me, or does Crystal have a disproportionate amount of Windows demand? I feel like every time Crystal comes up, someone asks (or complains) about Windows support.

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Crystal Core developer speaking.

I don't think it's disproportionate. Windows is a huge platform with lots of developers. Also you don't hear anyone asking for other OS support because all other major operating systems are supported. So there's no real comparison.

Anecdotal, but I think this is just the case with all projects of this nature. People on Windows don't like not being able to use stuff.

The same thing was happening with Bun, and yet I've met lots of Windows developers who hate JavaScript.

Windows isn't popular on HN, but it's a major platform with a lot of devs. You gotta get out of the HN bubble.

It took me 2 decades to get out of the Windows bubble.

I'll enjoy my time here when I can get it.

Crystal is a nice language to write utilities with. Usually with utilities you want to distribute it to other people, many of them can't just install the whole toolchain to run the code. So naturally we want a fully portable windows exe file that can be run independently.

I sponsored a bunch of work on this years back; I wanted it so I didn't have to use Go for cross-platform binaries for a CLI client. I ended up having to use Go, but I hope one day it ships so I can avoid it a little more (I don't hate it, but prefer crystal).

I've noticed a lot more developers on Windows across the board, as more folks learn programming.

I asked because Crystal was notorious for not having it.

If a language doesn't have Windows support then it's inappropriate for commercial native application development.

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