6 ms·

The rise of Flutter makes a lot of sense when you think about how mobile has evolved over the last 5 years. The days of Instapaper and the like where you could

by Touche 8y ago

The rise of Flutter makes a lot of sense when you think about how mobile has evolved over the last 5 years. The days of Instapaper and the like where you could build a really good app and sell it, are long since past. Nowadays I'm not sure it's really possible to make money as an app startup. Your best bet is probably releasing a game and being the one-in-a-million that goes viral. Other than that, apps are the purview of existing big companies, and those mostly are concerned with lowering costs (since margins on mobile are so thin). With that being the case, something like Flutter that gives you a fairly good cross-platform experience are going to thrive. It's sort of like Java in the enterprise. It doesn't matter if it's pleasant to use. There's a clearpath towards success, it's safe for cheaper developers to use and not screw things up to bad. It will never be the hot thing but it doesn't need to be; that's not its target demographic.

pjmlp 8y ago
Flutter is trying to be Dart's killer app, while playing political wars with the ChromeOS (PWA) and Android teams. Meanwhile Fuschia is showing signs to adopt a plugable UI support via the Scenic graphics composition engine.
tree_of_item 8y ago
I think one flaw in your analysis is that Flutter is not analogous to "Java in the enterprise": it's already very pleasant to use compared with modern web frameworks.
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Java 11 is pretty sweet, and the JEPs roadmap is enticing. Meanwhile Dart has adopted all the features I dislike in Java, like @Override instead of proper keyword, virtual methods by default, no value types and so forth.
  - the_trapper 8y ago
    Maybe by Android ZuchiniBread we'll be able to use Java 11 on Android. One of the major pain points of Android development is that the vast majority of the API is designed around limitations of Java 6. Yes, I know that you can use most of Java 8 for Android now, and Kotlin is pretty good. However, it took far too long for Google to deliver that to developers.
    - pjmlp 8y ago
      Google has played a J++ on Java developers, with Google wanabee employees always arguing for such action. However, Java 9 support is already ongoing on AOSP, so we might still get some good news by Google IO 2019. In any case, even if Kotlin turns out to be the future of Android, it is much more worthwhile language than Dart, in features, backends and CV value.
matchbok 8y ago
App Store revenue would seem to disagree with you on this.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- cageface 8y ago
  The vast majority of App Store revenue is games.
sandofsky 8y ago
> The days of Instapaper and the like where you could build a really good app and sell it, are long since past. We've had the opposite experience with Halide, which launched in 2017 in a crowded category.
Despegar 8y ago
This is all well and good until Apple bans these lowest common denominator cross platform frameworks. I hope they do this once Marzipan is shipping. It's also not true that app startups aren't making money. https://www.wsj.com/articles/headspace-vs-calm-the-meditation-battle-thats-anything-but-zen-11544889606 https://www.wsj.com/articles/headspace-vs-calm-the-meditatio...
- saagarjha 8y ago
  I doubt Apple would ever ban frameworks like these. There is a guideline against poorly designed apps, but it is almost never enforced.
  - username223 8y ago
    I would not be surprised if they did. After all, Apple put terrible things like desktop Java and Flash out of their (and our) misery. This sounds like yet another iteration of Swing, a technology to develop GUI programs that could, at best, look subtly wrong on every platform.
    - sebe 8y ago
      Like a game engine, Flutter draws every pixel, compiles to native arm code, so you can create a custom design across android and ios or use the supplied material design and ios widgets. Also they had an event in London last month, if you don't know much about flutter, there is this 11 minute recap of that event. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-o4BqJxmJE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-o4BqJxmJE
hota_mazi 8y ago
The... "rise" of Flutter? According to which metric? Flutter is nonexistent outside Google employees and a handful of Flutter advocates who write books or blog posts about it. The performance and tool chain penalty of flutter makes absolutely zero sense today, when so many better alternatives exist.
- timsneath 8y ago
  Disclosure: I'm one of those Google employees. I think it's a bit of a stretch to say it's non-existent outside of Google; curious to know what made you feel so negatively about it. Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you exclude non-software content); given that it wasn't even in the top 100 six months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly. And even though it's only been out of beta for three weeks, it's used by large companies from Alibaba to Square to Capital One. Examples like this [1] show that it's fully capable of delivering game-quality experiences even on older devices, since it compiles directly to ARM code and uses the Skia graphics engine. [1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimensions.showcaseapp&hl=en_US https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimens...
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    > it's fully capable of delivering game-quality experiences I find it interesting you mention this, rather than something like “well designed”. Seems appropriate for a framework that draws UI itself, much like a game would.
  - damian2000 8y ago
    I went to a Google Flutter meetup a few weeks ago and was impressed by it ... key advantage in my view is that its skinnable and builds its UI from scratch - a lot of apps will be ok with that and in fact its a bonus if they look exactly the same on both major platforms.
  - TeMPOraL 8y ago
    > Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you exclude non-software content); given that it wasn't even in the top 100 six months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly. Are Github stars a valid metric for use? Personally, I have ~280 repos starred, and all of those stars are bookmarks. "Cute, I might use it one day".

by Touche 8y ago

pjmlp 8y ago

Flutter is trying to be Dart's killer app, while playing political wars with the ChromeOS (PWA) and Android teams. Meanwhile Fuschia is showing signs to adopt a plugable UI support via the Scenic graphics composition engine.

tree_of_item 8y ago

I think one flaw in your analysis is that Flutter is not analogous to "Java in the enterprise": it's already very pleasant to use compared with modern web frameworks.

pjmlp 8y ago
Java 11 is pretty sweet, and the JEPs roadmap is enticing. Meanwhile Dart has adopted all the features I dislike in Java, like @Override instead of proper keyword, virtual methods by default, no value types and so forth.
- the_trapper 8y ago
  Maybe by Android ZuchiniBread we'll be able to use Java 11 on Android. One of the major pain points of Android development is that the vast majority of the API is designed around limitations of Java 6. Yes, I know that you can use most of Java 8 for Android now, and Kotlin is pretty good. However, it took far too long for Google to deliver that to developers.
  - pjmlp 8y ago
    Google has played a J++ on Java developers, with Google wanabee employees always arguing for such action. However, Java 9 support is already ongoing on AOSP, so we might still get some good news by Google IO 2019. In any case, even if Kotlin turns out to be the future of Android, it is much more worthwhile language than Dart, in features, backends and CV value.

matchbok 8y ago

App Store revenue would seem to disagree with you on this.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
cageface 8y ago
The vast majority of App Store revenue is games.

sandofsky 8y ago

> The days of Instapaper and the like where you could build a really good app and sell it, are long since past. We've had the opposite experience with Halide, which launched in 2017 in a crowded category.

Despegar 8y ago

This is all well and good until Apple bans these lowest common denominator cross platform frameworks. I hope they do this once Marzipan is shipping. It's also not true that app startups aren't making money. https://www.wsj.com/articles/headspace-vs-calm-the-meditation-battle-thats-anything-but-zen-11544889606 https://www.wsj.com/articles/headspace-vs-calm-the-meditatio...

saagarjha 8y ago
I doubt Apple would ever ban frameworks like these. There is a guideline against poorly designed apps, but it is almost never enforced.
- username223 8y ago
  I would not be surprised if they did. After all, Apple put terrible things like desktop Java and Flash out of their (and our) misery. This sounds like yet another iteration of Swing, a technology to develop GUI programs that could, at best, look subtly wrong on every platform.
  - sebe 8y ago
    Like a game engine, Flutter draws every pixel, compiles to native arm code, so you can create a custom design across android and ios or use the supplied material design and ios widgets. Also they had an event in London last month, if you don't know much about flutter, there is this 11 minute recap of that event. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-o4BqJxmJE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-o4BqJxmJE

hota_mazi 8y ago

The... "rise" of Flutter? According to which metric? Flutter is nonexistent outside Google employees and a handful of Flutter advocates who write books or blog posts about it. The performance and tool chain penalty of flutter makes absolutely zero sense today, when so many better alternatives exist.

timsneath 8y ago
Disclosure: I'm one of those Google employees. I think it's a bit of a stretch to say it's non-existent outside of Google; curious to know what made you feel so negatively about it. Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you exclude non-software content); given that it wasn't even in the top 100 six months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly. And even though it's only been out of beta for three weeks, it's used by large companies from Alibaba to Square to Capital One. Examples like this [1] show that it's fully capable of delivering game-quality experiences even on older devices, since it compiles directly to ARM code and uses the Skia graphics engine. [1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimensions.showcaseapp&hl=en_US https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.two_dimens...
- saagarjha 8y ago
  > it's fully capable of delivering game-quality experiences I find it interesting you mention this, rather than something like “well designed”. Seems appropriate for a framework that draws UI itself, much like a game would.
- damian2000 8y ago
  I went to a Google Flutter meetup a few weeks ago and was impressed by it ... key advantage in my view is that its skinnable and builds its UI from scratch - a lot of apps will be ok with that and in fact its a bonus if they look exactly the same on both major platforms.
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  > Flutter is one of the top 30 most starred repos on Github (top 20 if you exclude non-software content); given that it wasn't even in the top 100 six months ago, I think most would agree it's growing pretty quickly. Are Github stars a valid metric for use? Personally, I have ~280 repos starred, and all of those stars are bookmarks. "Cute, I might use it one day".