Working on a mobile "Hello World." with Flutter. 🤩
Discussion
This is so much harder than building a web or desktop app. 20000 lines of code, later, and it manages to show a blank landing page.
Okay, I've been building the other stuff for 30 years and mobile stuff for 30 hours, but still.
Supposedly, I should be able to compile for Android and for iOS, which would be cool.
I am hoping that the future is native, platform-specific code and AI just translates your reference implementation.
this is the sad part about AI. clearly kotlin-multiplatform is the superior cross platform dev environment to flutter, but it's too new and good for AI to have leeched enough examples from yet.
devs are still gonna have to 'build the roads' and in an environment where competing with one shot versions of 10 year old tech stacks and rabid marketoor rugpulls. 😅 will they keep building new with the only reason being to feed the AI and have their work monetized by everyone but themselves? yes probably, because they already proved that with opensource.
maybe give it a try tho, if you get frustrated w flutter.
I looked at Kotlin and decided to go with Flutter.
I've mostly done Android development with Kotlin.
What were some of the things that made you choose Flutter instead?
I'm planning on going back to Android development and want to know if it's worth my while to learn Flutter.
Multiplatform.
Nostr app dev momentum around it.
Fine-grained control over UI custom painting (I build design packages).
Resources about it.
Yeah, I started out with the dart library, but had to fall "out" to Flutter because I had so much weird stuff that he wasn't covering.
I looked into Kotlin, as that's normally the one I heard about, but I'm rolling with the dart.
this one? yeah, we may need ser nostr:nprofile1qqsyvrp9u6p0mfur9dfdru3d853tx9mdjuhkphxuxgfwmryja7zsvhqpz9mhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejj7qgswaehxw309ahx7um5wghx6mmd9uq3wamnwvaz7tmkd96x7u3wdehhxarjxyhxxmmd9ukfdvuv to feed us some libraries .. i really like the idea of it being able to run on desktop (dont care about the ios)
I'm testing the Flutter on Chrome Desktop and Android Mobile Phone, and there's a lot of overlap, but some mobile design decisions don't make sense on a larger screen.
And I had to scratch my initial database choice, so that it works well on all platforms.
im always surprised when i go to do some mobile dev and realize there is nothing but sqlite or similar crap dbs.. me thinking it is linux, and could run a proper database, but, it doesn't exist for some reason. 😅
Hard to break out of the browser sandbox. That's why we're going to add the Tauri on GRW and I'm doing Flutter on Alex. Need native support for this stuff.
But browser is always the first step, IMO.
I predict open source is going to have a day of reckoning. Devs are already asking "why should I put code on GitHub for free?" and they're right to. Microsoft owns it and other big corporations have essentially built giant projects off of code stolen from there (AWS is an example). Equally, they are starting to ask "why should I do uncompensated work on open source projects if megacorps will be the main beneficiaries?". Given the abuses of devs by the corporations of late, loyalty to employers is shot. I think we are looking at a major change in the software world over the next 10-15 years.
i think its the opposite, its time to doubledown on opensource hardware and firmwares.. not being able to even run a pre-trained llm without begging some proprietary api to let you.. or make a phone call without begging for a spyware device.. thats the end of times.
For practical reasons, yes, I'm just saying I think there will be more reluctance from devs to help big corporations for no compensation.
Should have made that clearer.
The opensource I look up to, is the source that enabled the takedown of Microsoft. Back in the day, Microsoft was on the same track as Apple, and OpenAI is now. To dominate the entire server market. I hated them, took every opportunity to replace them. It felt like paying a tax just to exist, just to run a website or a file share. Opensource was what got us into position to run our own servers, with Linux, Apache, Mysql, Php, Samba, and be paid (jobs created) to contribute to and run opensource at companies.
I think those projects did well for themselves, and for their users/contributors.. What really scares me now is not just that we let google and apple dominate mobile and wall the garden, but that AI is the new battleground and quickly heading toward dystopia where we again, aren't able to run our own computers.
Interestingly, without china releasing these opensource models, it would appear the battle was already lost.. Zuck will/would cave to closed source eventually, but not if china keeps releasing. Sadly, the gathering of all the data from the internet and running it through billion dollar data center training, isn't something a startup or small operation can do and therefor, we are at the mercy of the big corporations like never before.. We can only hope that the models themselves will remain useful and available.
With AI, closed source doesn't work, anymore, unless you only offer code as webservices and keep the family jewels hidden in the servers.
We do half/half, with some of our code on GitHub and public, but the cooler stuff on a private git server. It doesn't really matter, in the end, as we're pretty much the only people who can read and understand the code, so it being open or closed is largely irrelevant.
There's now so much open-source code, out there, that we've run out of humans to examine it, so code gets rated by the WoT of the developer. As if it were closed-source.
Ain't nobody got time to read all that. 😂
Okay, it's actually a gigantic Alexandria Native prototype e-reader, with highlights and kind 1111 comments and zaps and emoji reactions and a kind 11 discussion board.
But I'll use it to write "hello world" In the discussion board and that also counts.
Best I can do is the search bar. 😂
Gm
Welcome to the crew!
Okay, inching forward. Have to intervene and rewrite stuff all the time, which is extremely annoying because I have written Java in years, but oh well.
This is actually kind of fun, but it's slow-going because I'm working the chrome and the Android apps, in parallel, and they need slightly different Interfaces. Always have to develop and test both.
It doesn't look like much, but it took all evening. 😂
Well, first I made a completely different prototype, installed about a gazillion components and libraries, and then wrote a book-long Gherkin spec.
The first pass whiz-banged out a full app, where nothing really worked and I had zero idea what the code did.
But that was causing me to have a full autistic meltdown a la OMG WHAT DOES IT DO?! 😱 vibe-coded panic, so I really deleted the whole thing and am 👣 baby-setting forward, so that I can actually figure out what is doing what and learn to read the syntax and understand the file arrangement.
I have no idea how y'all can stand building things you don't understand. Had me like
I can't, reading the code in this repo made me have to get up and step away from my desk XD
I can actually read most of it, now, sort of vaguely, but the first pass might as well have been Greek.
That literally upset me. 😂 Bad vibes, man.
XD yeah. My issue is unknown-unknowns introduced, just the perfectionist in me tho.
My most effective AI-assisted coding sessions are in baby steps. Otherwise it's like trying to review a PR with thousands of lines.
You mean, all of the TODOs?
Yeah, I have everything plotted out in the Gherkin, so it already knows what is missing and puts in placeholders.
After every round, it gives me an update on how far along it is, for each one, but it will take weeks, to get them all done.
Dammit, I can see bugs. 🤦🏻♀️
I've always been intrigued by Flutter, but never wrote much in it.
The app is looking good.