Technologies are evolving at a fanatic pace and flutter is no different. The app development technology is highly preferred for developing cross-platform applications. There was a time when flutter was simply considered as a buzzing term, fortunately, that’s not the case anymore. The following post focuses merely on what flutter is, how it is beneficial and what are its disadvantages.
Now with the severe increase in web versions and mobile applications skyrocketing, I am sure you must be thinking about launching your strong online presence. Well, that’s it then. Here you will find some of the most amazing development technologies which will never let you feel strapped for cash and time. Yes, I am talking about Flutter, the game-changing app development framework.
With time passing by, the market seems to be pretty much flooded with numerous cross-platform frameworks such as React Native, PhoneGap, Ionic, Xamarin, and a lot more. Despite these amazing, unique, and intimidating frameworks, let us discuss why Flutter should be taken into account for your upcoming app development project.
Introducing Flutter
Created and successfully backed by Google, Flutter turns out to be one of the most amazing technologies used in the field of development. In fact, it may quite interest you to know that over the span of a few years, it seems to be considered one of the hottest repositories with 151K stars on GitHub.
Here creating mobile apps, desktop apps, and web apps is quite possible and in a pretty seamless manner as Flutter turns out to be an open-source technology. And do you know what is the best part here, all these types of applications can be developed using the same code. Now some of you techies believe that Flutter is just a framework whereas some of you guys believe that it is a core library. Well, I say Flutter is a complete SDK (software development kit). In other words, developing frontend and backend applications is possible with amazing flexibility. Here you will find various programming languages such as Dart, Java, C++, and a lot more.
If you go back in the past you will find that Objective C/Swift and Java/Kotlin were considered as primary languages for conducting any and every mobile application development project. This means developers were compelled to build two separate applications. In other words, they had to work twice for the same app development but for different platforms.
If you are looking for one of the best solutions for developing different applications for Android and iOS then look no further than Flutter. Here the codebase turns out to be the same. Also, take any operating system into account, windows, Linux, and macOS, flutter definitely works wonders.
Some of the well-known advocates of Flutter include eBay, Groupon, and Alibaba Group and who knows you might be the next one on the list.
Flutter Architecture
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The Framework Layer – Dart programming language is the core aspect here. So here developers get a chance to go through a rich set of libraries to develop and design rich user interfaces like never before. Here you may also find foundational classes, widgets, and rendering layers.
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The Engine Layer – As mentioned earlier Flutter is written in C++/C, resulting in amazing graphics, accessibility support, text layout, and plugin architecture.
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The Embedded Layer – The embedded layer ensures that the overall launch of the flutter engine is seamless and makes sure that all the necessary resources can be easily rendered to the user interface. Basically, here you find a platform-specific interface where developers can have seamless interaction with native platform APIs.
Benefits of Considering Flutter for Your App Development Project
#1 Great in Performance
One of the obvious benefits of considering Flutter for your application development project is that it turns out to be great in terms of performance. Wondering how? Well, there are a plethora of ways such as the CPU usage or how many frame numbers per second or request number per second. Also, do focus on the average response time, 60 fps, and a lot more!
60 fps is the rate at which any human can identify bugs or any issues. When compared with other frameworks such as React Native and Xamarin, you can have a competitive edge with 220 millisecond launch time and 58fps. In addition to all this, Flutter comprises an amazing graphics engine named Skia, which enables app developers to come up with quick and well-optimized development. Not to mention, the technology turns out to be way more responsive than others.
#2 Fast, Simple, and Seamless Procedures
It seems to be quite hot-reloaded. In other words, any changes made by the developer in the code on emulators, simulators and hardware can be viewed right then and there. It takes a second or even less to see the reloaded changes. So there is no need to restart the entire app every now and then. As a result, using Flutter is highly recommendable as it ensures seamless creation of UIs or adding features, and even fixing potential bugs is possible here. It may quite interest you to know that not just techies but even non-techies have come up with the development of flutter apps. And they are pretty happy with the end results. As mentioned earlier, both Flutter and Dart are open source, which means both are pretty free to use and offer extensive documentation, and immense community support to assist with relevant issues encountered.
Have you ever played with Lego bricks? Flutter is much like that, all you have to do is join piece by piece and that’s all you will end up creating an app like never before. The only difference is that the application will be developed the way you want it to be including your pre-determined features and functionalities.
#3 APIs UI
Now this aspect or advantage offered by Flutter turns out to be quite revolutionary. It successfully assists in developing user interfaces with read-made widgets. You see what used to happen was, developers find it extremely difficult to create the same look and feel especially for conducting app development for Android and iOS platforms. With flutter all these circumstances can be seamlessly eliminated. You see here developing beautiful UI is feasible, all thanks to design-centric widgets, Cupertino widgets, material design widgets, and a lot more. Each one of these widgets tends to offer a natural look, is extensible, and fast.
In addition to all this, easy scrolling, innovative APIs, and navigation features can be found here.
#4 Enhances Developer’s Experience
As mentioned earlier, Flutter comprises only one programming language which is Dart. Now what happens is when a developer codes for a certain platform, it is written in more than one programming language. For instance, if you are coding for frontend web, you need to keep shifting between HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files. Moreover, with Flutter the coding becomes extremely easy as here you are supposed to work on one specific programming language, i.e. Dart. Here you are less likely to have headaches.
#5 Community and Support
Another interesting benefit of using Flutter is that it comprises high-end community and support. You see there are numerous professionals, and developers who contribute day and night to make Flutter better and better. Over the years 100,000 apps have been launched and the number somehow keeps on increasing. The community of Flutter is pretty large, consisting of active as well as veteran programmers who are ready to provide quick assistance whenever and wherever in need. Today, nearly half a million developers use Flutter to create mobile applications. So in case the developer gets stocks somewhere, the community is right here to assist. This surely results in increased efficiency and productivity leading to less time taken to accomplish the project.
So on and all, native-like app performance, easy use of custom widgets, developing apps for mobile, desktop, and web at the same time, easy and quick development, simplified procedures, dynamic code writing, low code development time, easy and quick time to market, great for MVP development, you ask why one must use flutter, I say why the heck not.
Now much like any other development technology even flutter has its fair share of controversies. Further, I would like to get you acquainted with a few cons or disadvantages of using Flutter for your app development project so that you get a proper gist of the revolutionary technology.
Cons or Disadvantages of using Flutter
#1 Large file size
One of the major disadvantages of using Flutter is the large file size. Due to several widgets and tools, the apps developed using the flutter technology are pretty large in size and eventually occupy lots and lots of space and take hours to download and even update.
#2 Limited sets of tools
Another con or disadvantage here is Flutter comprises quite limited sets of tools and technologies. So creating desired interfaces or functions can be pretty much a tricky venture.
Final Words
Overall benefits are way more powerful or should I say far outweigh the cons, and if you want to develop applications, especially native mobile apps. Apps that offer instant amazing results in regards to the look and performance irrespective of the development platforms be it Android or iOS devices, then look no further than Flutter. Also, getting started with the framework is pretty easy and a doable job.
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