Introduction to Flutter

One of the issues of developing mobile apps, is much like the issues of developing desktop applications for different operating systems – they require different applications to be written. Not only do they require different applications, they require different languages. Initially Android required Java and iOS required objective C – however those languages have changed.

Because of this, there has been an issue with developing mobile apps. Either you develop for one mobile OS and not the others, or you use a mobile web application.

Over the years, there have been various forms to try to create some generic system which can be used. Each has come and gone with few staying.

Of those that have stayed, they tend to be JavaScript dependent – such as ReactJS and Native. The advantage of using a JS based system, is there are tons of JS libraries to help you develop and app. The downside is they may not work together, and your code tends to get vary large, very quickly.

Flutter is a newer tool to allow you to develop across multiple platforms. With Flutter 2, you can develop across more than just the two main mobile operating systems.

Advantages of Flutter

Support from Google

Let’s face it, getting support from Google, one of the behemoths in the industry is always a good thing. They developed this library and they can continue to fund development as needed.

New Code Base

With a new code base, you don’t have the technical debt that a lot of older systems might carry with it. It tends to be clean, and your are more likely to have libraries which work with one another.

External Libraries

For a young language and extension there is a lot of libraries out there on the flutter dev site, and they are starting to organize their libraries to make it easier to find.

Write Once Run…

In the “old days” Java had the tag line, write once, run anywhere… which is a noble idea. However, as anyone can tell you, there are always little differences can add up.

Flutter wants to be able to help you run between iOS, Android, Web Apps, Window and Mac desktop apps.

Community Support

While Flutter is new, it does seem to have a good and growing community, which is why it was chosen for this class.

Disadvantages of Flutter

Of course, not everything is an advantage – or some advantages, are also disadvantages as well.

Support from Google

Let’s face it, Google loves to drop support for products and create similar, but different, ones at a moments notice. If you look at the Google Graveyard, you’ll find tons of products that were well used and received by everyone – that no longer exist (Google Reader anyone).

Write Once…Test and Tweak Everywhere

Those who wrote Java have nightmares about how different libraries would sometimes behave differently on different machines. Write Once…Test Everywhere was the running mantra. Trying to develop a UI for both desktop and mobile devices will be difficult since they are different sizes, interacted with differently, etc.

Introduction to Flutter was originally found on Access 2 Learn