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Discussion on: "Flutter is better than React Native". Thoughts?

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christiankozalla profile image
Christian Kozalla

Questions that come to my mind:

  1. How can a technology be simply "better" than another?
  2. Why compare only Flutter and React Native? What about Ionic for example?
  3. Is the outcome of this discussion going to have an impact on the title of the article that you are writing (i.e. you seem to be sure that Flutter IS better, but it seems you are seeking points in favor of Flutter..)
  4. I have not used either Flutter or React Native, but I am starting with Ionic. It is the best tool for me, because I can leverage my existing skills in web technologies (HTML, CSS, JS) without having to learn a new language and still have three outputs (web app, native android app, native iOS app) with one single codebase at the end of the day
  5. Here is an article from the developers of ionic comparing Ionic to Flutter ionic.io/resources/articles/ionic-...
  6. Why is OOP on its own not a good thing?
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mirhsquadri profile image
mirhsquadri

Thanks for sharing the resources on ionic. Will definitely look that up. There is a question that is being asked in the developer community a lot these days and that is, "Should I learn Flutter? Is it the next big thing?". I don't have my mind made up in anyway, nor is the article biased towards one angle. But the title of this article is meant for getting a debate going, so that I can learn from multiple differing perspectives the benefits/drawbacks of flutter, all of which will be accounted for in the article. As for technology being "better" than the other, my focus is to cross compare these technologies and see if overall Flutter offers a superior framework than the others. This in my mind is possible. For the whole OOP thing, I don't want to step on any shoes, but I personally hate OOP. It's an old, clunky way of doing things which if anything slows down the process. Now I know that a case can be made for encapsulation and polymorphism etc. But all of that can be implemented in other forms as well without binding your code to the stringent restrictions of OOP.

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christiankozalla profile image
Christian Kozalla

Thank you for your detailed answer.

I believe that comparison of such tools heavily depends on the context, use-case and related factors. For example, I believe, the preference and prior experience of the developer(s) play a crucial role when deciding which tool to choose.

Additionally, I notice that people are heavily fighting and advocating for the tools they use. Like comparing Vue, React and Angular... These are tools to develop single-page applications. If someone says, this one's better, it's mostly about personal preference.

For example, React is the most popular UI library for building SPAs. It's so popular, people are building things, for which React is not suited - like static sites. There are better tools for building static sites. So the question which is better might be misleading..

Concerning OOP, I also notice that it is not popular (among the JS community), though JS supports OOP. I am not very skilled in OOP, but that's not the point. In many languages like C++, Java, PHP object-oriented programming really shines. It's the bread and butter for many devs.

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mirhsquadri profile image
mirhsquadri

You make a really good point about how some technologies can get so overhyped that they start using it for things it was never meant to be used for. I kind of feel that way about Python too. Though it is a multipurpose language, I just feel like it is not the most optimal for web development and/or desktop applications. However, I see many web devs use frameworks like Django to make complex web applications. I guess it boils down to personal preferences like you said.

I actually have used OOP quite a bit. I started my career as a PHP developer and OOP was used in majority of the projects. However, as I slowly started to broaden my horizons with JS frameworks and even Python for web development, I began to see how tedious and ultimately unrewarding it was to implement OOP. Plus with the advent of JS frameworks, it's harder and harder to find devs to work in your team who are experienced with OOP. Most devs have a conceptual understanding of it.

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christiankozalla profile image
Christian Kozalla

What you say sounds reasonable to me =)

Your proposed title has sparked some healthy discussions, it seems.
Good luck with the article 👍

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mirhsquadri profile image
mirhsquadri

Thanks for sharing your insights. It certainly helps. I will share the article once published with the Dev community.