Flutter 3 • Hacker News Board

Re: Flutter 3

#171

Post by hunterb123 » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:57 PM UTC

mhoad wrote: post #169

jonahx wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Despite many maturity issues in practice Flutter is the only realistic option for true cross platform UIs that run everywhere. What are your thoughts on flutter vs react native? (assuming you're only targeting phones)

One anecdote that I find compelling here is looking at how each of the parent companies think of them. The majority of Google’s revenue is directly tied to their Ads platform. Their mobile app is written in Flutter and the web interface is written in Dart (not flutter as flutter web support is like around a year old). Facebook uses React on the web and abandoned react native on mobile. Both are responsible for billio…

> Facebook uses React on the web and abandoned react native on mobile.

That's not true, FB very much still uses RN on mobile.

Re: Flutter 3

#172

Post by SemanticStrengh » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:57 PM UTC

mhoad wrote: post #146

the_duke wrote: post #42

Despite many maturity issues in practice Flutter is the only realistic option for true cross platform UIs that run everywhere. Apart from Qt , but the licensing issue is a hindrance. And yes, the web backend isn't ideal, but it will improve over time. I just wish Google had built Flutter on a low level core that isn't tied to Dart, so it would be usable from other languages. Dart isn't horrible and is getting better,…

For what it’s worth Dart is hands down the nicest OOP language I’ve ever used in my opinion. It’s like they took all the good things about JS and Java and cut out all the bad parts. What’s left is basically Dart.

People being pleased with Dart is only because they have not tasted better, everything is relative. Kotlin is miles ahead.

Re: Flutter 3

#173

Post by SemanticStrengh » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:58 PM UTC

Mertax wrote: post #151

mhoad wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what it’s worth Dart is hands down the nicest OOP language I’ve ever used in my opinion. It’s like they took all the good things about JS and Java and cut out all the bad parts. What’s left is basically Dart.

I think the decision of which cross platform technology to use mostly depends on a team's preferred tech stack. C++ -> QT C#/.NET -> MAUI/Blazor JS/Web -> React.Native/Electron Dart -> Flutter This is what I think is holding back Flutter -- that it wasn't built on an incumbent technology. Because Dart doesn't have quite the following, it has to evangelize itself a bit more than the other options.

note that many languages credibly interop with JS/TS nowadays

Re: Flutter 3

#174

Post by mhoad » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:58 PM UTC

hunterb123 wrote: post #171

mhoad wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One anecdote that I find compelling here is looking at how each of the parent companies think of them. The majority of Google’s revenue is directly tied to their Ads platform. Their mobile app is written in Flutter and the web interface is written in Dart (not flutter as flutter web support is like around a year old). Facebook uses React on the web and abandoned react native on mobile. Both are responsible for billio…

> Facebook uses React on the web and abandoned react native on mobile. That's not true, FB very much still uses RN on mobile.

The Facebook app is not written in React Native. They tried it and famously abandoned it no?

Re: Flutter 3

#175

Post by ClumsyPilot » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:58 PM UTC

the_duke wrote: post #42

Despite many maturity issues in practice Flutter is the only realistic option for true cross platform UIs that run everywhere. Apart from Qt , but the licensing issue is a hindrance. And yes, the web backend isn't ideal, but it will improve over time. I just wish Google had built Flutter on a low level core that isn't tied to Dart, so it would be usable from other languages. Dart isn't horrible and is getting better,…

> Dart isn't horrible and is getting better, but it is still a somewhat awkward mish mash of Java and JavaScript

Sounds like they should have used TypeScript?

Re: Flutter 3

#176

Post by mekkkkkk » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:59 PM UTC

LocalPCGuy wrote: post #152

mekkkkkk wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way it atleast used to be framed is that web is a fallback target. Meaning if the target device isn't running Linux, Windows, macOS, iOS or Android (unlikely), then hey, you can atleast build a passable version that will run in a browser. I don't know if this has changed, but I know only a mad man would try to build a proper website in Flutter. It's not the tool for the job.

No, it is 100% being framed as "You can build your app once and deploy it everywhere" with everywhere including web. It's sorta maddening, IMO. There are certain types of apps I could see using Flutter for (basically, ones that would lean heavily on canvas anyways, games, drawing, etc.)

It's hard to quantify exactly what "everywhere" means, but for the vast majority of end-user devices, you'll have a more efficient Flutter build target than web.

You're probably right in that they are pushing the "first class web target" narrative a bit far, though.

Re: Flutter 3

#177

Post by peterangular » Wed, May 11, 2022, 10:59 PM UTC

mhoad wrote: post #165

peterangular wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Dart isn't horrible and is getting better, but it is still a somewhat awkward mish mash of Java and JavaScript, and I don't enjoy using it. All anecdotal: I've only met one person who was excited to work with Dart, huge Google fanatic/fanboy. Otherwise it's sorta seen as a unique language choice that makes other devs go, "oh..." The Java/ECMA ergonomics are weird, it's hard to find devs who have experience with the…

Here’s one from Google https://pub.dev/packages/functions_framework

> Google Cloud Functions does not currently provide an officially supported Dart language runtime, but we're working to make running on Google Cloud Run as seamless and symmetric an experience as possible for your Dart Functions Framework projects.

It's not natively supported - runs on Google Cloud Run instead.

Re: Flutter 3

#178

Post by hunterb123 » Wed, May 11, 2022, 11:02 PM UTC

mhoad wrote: post #174

hunterb123 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook uses React on the web and abandoned react native on mobile. That's not true, FB very much still uses RN on mobile.

The Facebook app is not written in React Native. They tried it and famously abandoned it no?

The Marketplace tab in the FB app is written in React Native.

The Ads Manager app is written in React Native.

The Instagram app is written in React Native.

The entire FB app is not written in React Native yet, but overtime I'd expect more things to be.

The statement that FB "abandoned react native on mobile" is demonstrably false.

Re: Flutter 3

#179

Post by mhoad » Wed, May 11, 2022, 11:03 PM UTC

LocalPCGuy wrote: post #167

mhoad wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW I kind of agree and I’m a big fan of both Flutter and the web in general. There are a couple of web platform technologies that I think are going to take Flutter web from ok to great in the next year or two including. WASM Garbage Collection is going to allow them to move from compiling to JS to WASM. They have already built a WASM compiler ready to go when it lands. WebGPU is another obvious one. Flutter is by d…

Yah, this is a pretty solid list of things that, if they all hit and work as we hope they do, it could enable building things with tech like Flutter and having it work well. I think that's why I generally say FlutterWeb isn't production ready and not that it'll never be. I don't care for the path they took originally, it feels like a bandaid and has a lot of issues. They may get there eventually, and I'll be happy to…

I’m betting on Flutter web across a 2-3 year timeframe but none of the things I’ve listed there are conceptual ideas that are only going to land in the distant future.

WebGPU and WasmGC are both already implemented in most browsers and are currently just behind a flag as far as I know.

It doesn’t feel like magical thinking to me at all, it’s a pretty clear path forward IMO.

Re: Flutter 3

#180

Post by LocalPCGuy » Wed, May 11, 2022, 11:03 PM UTC

SemanticStrengh wrote: post #166

mhoad wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW I kind of agree and I’m a big fan of both Flutter and the web in general. There are a couple of web platform technologies that I think are going to take Flutter web from ok to great in the next year or two including. WASM Garbage Collection is going to allow them to move from compiling to JS to WASM. They have already built a WASM compiler ready to go when it lands. WebGPU is another obvious one. Flutter is by d…

> Flutter is by definition a canvas optimised framework Not really, flutter has not the resources to develop their own 2D renderer so they use the chromium renderer for drawing. (Skia). It is canvas-like, everything is canvas-like at low level. But flutter like browsers implement retained mode rendering which is necessary for being jank free and have low energy consumption. Flutter on web canvas cannot properly do re…

CanvasKit still renders to canvas (maybe that's what you meant by "canvas-like", but it is still directly drawing to an HTML canvas), it just enables Flutter to utilize a more advanced feature set than the DOM canvas API. It also comes with a 2MB or so download (which is why by default it's off on mobile last I checked).