Earlier quoted context omitted.
May want to also look at MS/Xamarin development, I know a few people that really like it. Though, RN seems a bit more popular. For that matter, in what ways is JS unpredictable? Generally combined with Redux or something similar, I've found it to be fairly consistent and predicatble.
About five years ago i have a dream, that i can abandon all this peasant C/C++ development and jump into mono/xamarin train. As a main product we have Linux ARM/MIPS karaoke machine with optional remote control via desktop/mobile apps. The idea was to use same code every where. - Tooling for Linux was horrible, like really! - Alien mobile UI look and feel - One can not simple build mobile app for desktop. - New shiny…
.Net doesn't force Azure/Cloud at all. I know all the MS demos tend in that direction, but you can absolutely use it all internally. I've worked on several backends targeting docker and linux with .Net core at this point. Even ARM as a target is decent. GUI, no idea on that, I tend to prefer react+redux+material-ui there.