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Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

plei.one

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Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#111

Post by satvikpendem »

maxloh wrote: post #107
satvikpendem wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've answered why Dart many times. It's a language that fits their needs, since it has JIT, AOT, compilation to JS and now WASM. Back then there weren't many languages that could do all that, and even today there aren't many. Kotlin (and other JVM languages) and TypeScript (and other compile-to-JS-only languages) are already out since they are not AOT, only JIT even now. More importantly, it was a Google language…

> Kotlin (and other JVM languages) and TypeScript (and other compile-to-JS-only languages) are already out since they are not AOT, only JIT even now. There is Kotlin Native now.

Sure, not ten years ago though when it was first starting. Doesn't Jetpack Compose work similarly to Flutter in that it draws every pixel? If so, Kotlin native could be used there to bring it to web and desktop perhaps.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#112

Post by dsabanin »

strongpigeon wrote: post #87
tekkk wrote: post #23

To me as someone who recently got into Flutter to make a side-project (mobile game) the most glaring problem isn't the lack of ecosystem or little UI issues the author mentions but the language itself. You had a green field to make the best programming language for creating UIs and you made Dart? Like what. I don't have particular issue with the heavy OOP paradigm but the fact you have to write so much boilerplate fe…

I’m not sure why the Dart hate honestly. It’s a pretty solid language in my opinion and I like the direction they’re taking (non-nullable, record, pattern matching). The ecosystem is weak for sure, but that’s not a gripe on the language itself. I’m curious what do you dislike about it apart from semi-colons and the constructor syntax (which seem fine to me?).

Exactly, after JVM world I'm especially loving reified generics. Being able to access type information on generics at runtime is very helpful. Plus developer experience for working with DartVM and Flutter is crazy good.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#113

Post by satvikpendem »

capableweb wrote: post #110
satvikpendem wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, it's all the same thing underneath, the Ads app is the same as AdWords on web. "Google's biggest money maker" isn't referring to either AdWords the website or the Ads mobile app, it's talking about the underlying ads product itself, ie what gets shown on websites, these are simply UIs over that.

> the Ads app is the same as AdWords on web Clearly not, the AdWords on the web is rendered using the DOM, while a Flutter application will be rendered via a canvas DOM element. You can try this yourself by opening up the inspector. Where the ads are mostly shown, is also built using normal (in the web sense) DOM elements, either images or text, rather than Flutter canvas elements.

By "same," I did not mean technologically; as I pointed out in my other comment, I know AdWords is made with AngularDart while the Ads app is made with Flutter.

By "same," I meant they are equivalent in functionality (or nearly so, based on the differences between larger and smaller UI sizes). Both AdWords the Website and Ads the Mobile App are all part of the same Google AdWords the Product.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#114

Post by loic-sharma »

dsabanin wrote: post #109
loic-sharma wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed! We will add support for window customization as part of the multi-window effort.

Do you have any pointers for someone who would love to contribute to Flutter and Dart as an open source contributor? Is there some guideline for what kind of contributions will be considered, areas where contributions are desired, etc?

Please check the contribution guide: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING....

We strive to be an open community. Anyone can become a Flutter team member if they contribute frequently :)

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#115

Post by timsneath »

dsabanin wrote: post #109
loic-sharma wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed! We will add support for window customization as part of the multi-window effort.

Do you have any pointers for someone who would love to contribute to Flutter and Dart as an open source contributor? Is there some guideline for what kind of contributions will be considered, areas where contributions are desired, etc?

We've got a guide here that covers some of these areas: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING....

For a lot of first-time contributors, improved documentation and added tests are a great way to dip toes into the water. We also have a 'good first contribution' tag on our issues log that might be a source of inspiration: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/issues?q=is%3Aopen+is%3Ai...

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#116

Post by kitsunesoba »

CharlesW wrote: post #6

For me, Flutter mobile isn't there yet either. I can see where it might be great for games with completely custom UIs, but I find the uncanny valley of pretend native controls a very uncomfortable place to be. Flutter could be a fantastic solution if it supported native controls and used JavaScript. I don't understand why Flutter's creators are so seemingly religious about Dart and reimplementing OS UI capabilities.

I don't think it's necessarily an error to reimplement widgets, with a caveat — the reimplementations need to be good. Really good, at least as good as native widgets and preferably better. An example of this is Sublime Text/Merge, which feel excellent despite being built with a bespoke UI framework.

This rarely happens though, and I wonder if it may have to do with the limitations of the technologies often chosen to do the implementing with, or if it's more of a philosophical thing with the projects in question not holding themselves to high enough of a bar.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#117

Post by satvikpendem »

themerone wrote: post #103
strongpigeon wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure why the Dart hate honestly. It’s a pretty solid language in my opinion and I like the direction they’re taking (non-nullable, record, pattern matching). The ecosystem is weak for sure, but that’s not a gripe on the language itself. I’m curious what do you dislike about it apart from semi-colons and the constructor syntax (which seem fine to me?).

It gets the hate because it comes from Google and it was originally marketed as a JavaScript replacement. Additionally, the first unoptimized compiler resulted in "hello world" having a gargantuan amount of JavaScript code. That left the language with a hard to shake stigma.

To be fair, around a decade ago, Chrome wanted to add a Dart VM (Dartium) to which many vehemently protested, and I agree it would have been a bad move to have a browser essentially have its own language rather than JS, forcing other browsers to adopt it. From there though, we got a much better cross browser standards-based solution in the form of WASM, which is even more powerful since languages other than Dart could be used. This controversy is where I first saw the Dart hate, but it has grown into a nice language since, especially with Dart 3+ which introduces, records, patterns, and exhaustive pattern matching.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#118

Post by strongpigeon »

themerone wrote: post #103
strongpigeon wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure why the Dart hate honestly. It’s a pretty solid language in my opinion and I like the direction they’re taking (non-nullable, record, pattern matching). The ecosystem is weak for sure, but that’s not a gripe on the language itself. I’m curious what do you dislike about it apart from semi-colons and the constructor syntax (which seem fine to me?).

It gets the hate because it comes from Google and it was originally marketed as a JavaScript replacement. Additionally, the first unoptimized compiler resulted in "hello world" having a gargantuan amount of JavaScript code. That left the language with a hard to shake stigma.

Oh yeah I do remember that. I can see how some of that stigma lingers.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#119

Post by satvikpendem »

sorokod wrote: post #101
satvikpendem wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No you're right, it's Flutter, they are misconstruing Dart and Flutter.

True, just have a look at Stack Overflow questions tagged Dart, very few (being extra cautious here) are not flutter question. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/dart

To be fair, looking at Kotlin would likely yield similar results, being mainly used for Android.

Re: Flutter desktop isn’t there yet

#120

Post by mdswanson »

timsneath wrote: post #115
dsabanin wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any pointers for someone who would love to contribute to Flutter and Dart as an open source contributor? Is there some guideline for what kind of contributions will be considered, areas where contributions are desired, etc?

We've got a guide here that covers some of these areas: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.... For a lot of first-time contributors, improved documentation and added tests are a great way to dip toes into the water. We also have a 'good first contribution' tag on our issues log that might be a source of inspiration: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/issues?q=is%3Aopen+is%3Ai...

I'll mark the "better tell Tim" about the HN article off my list. :)
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