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What should we learn KOTLIN or Java or DART (Flutter) for Android development?

Hey Nice question. I am an android déveloper and i make app it's been more than 5 years. I used Java for a long time, i try flutter and now i stick with kotlin . I will tell you my opinion about them.

Java is a very good and mature language and is widly used by developers. The con of it, is in Java you write a lot. You really write a lot of code. Its ok for us developer until we meet kotlin. Those who stick with Java, for my case before switching to kotlin are because of habit. I fear the lost of detailled insight of my code and kotlin is new. More codes mean more detail, more details mean more control. Thats how i see Java.

Kotlin : is a language that make really easy to write code. No ‘;’ at the end of each instruction, a complete class with getters and setters can be writte in only one line. Function Calls are very easy. Strong null check error for less buggy code. To make it short , kotlin is really designed to help you reduce codes lenghth, work understandable and efficient code. To finish, kotlin and Java interact each other so you can call kotlin function inside Java code and vice-versa.

Dart of flutter: i abandonned when tried to understand the syntaxe of the language. Its simply not in my taste and i found it confusing.

If you are a web developer or feel yourself very easy with web languages , i will recommand you flutter to develop native android apps. If you are new in android and want to start native android development i will recommand you kotlin. If you come from Java world i will recommand you to do both kotlin and Java as you like. Kotlin and Java can interact each other so you can combine their power as you like.

Unlike other say, kotlin is not designing to work only for android. Kotlin is a multiplateform language design to work for web, android, Java ee and ios apps. Yes , it is also designing to build iphone apps too. There are a lot more from kotlin i dont mention.

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With the arrival of Flutter, should I learn Dart?

Straight and forward answer, If you want to start using flutter for application development, learning basis concepts of dart would be handy. Dart is also a Object oriented programing language so if you’ve ever done programing before it won’t take much time for you to learn the basic syntax of dart.Now, is it important to learn dart. Definitely no, if you don’t have any interest in application development and want to continue with logical programming or web development dart is not important.Flutter on the other hand will soon change the market of Application development. Flutter is fast, reliable and most important it’s easy. Most startups those who were struggling because of the different platform available in the market (IOS, ANDROID, LINUX, WINDOWS), now have a better option.So finally, if you wish for getting engaged in application market Flutter would be the best tool and dart is must. Otherwise it’s not that important

[codelance]

What is flutter written in?

Flutter is written in the Dart and C++ language. Flutter is an open-source cross-platform framework which is created by Google. It is used to develop cross-platform apps which work on Dart language. We all know that to develop an Application for Android we have to use Java or Kotlin language and for iOS, we have to use Swift language.

It provides us both platforms using one language. There are many cross-platform app development frameworks available, they create HTML-based Hybrid applications, HTML used for User Interface, and JavaScript used for logic in those frameworks, Performance of these hybrid apps is slow as compared to Native applications. Flutter is a framework that provides high-performance applications using Dart language. You can create iOS, Android, Web, Windows, Mac, and Fuchsia applications using a single codebase, which reduces the cost and time of development.

Features of Flutter

Open Source

Cross Platform App development

High Performance

Expressive and Flexible UI

Native Performance

Features Details

Open Source: It is an open-source app development framework.

Cross Platform : You can create iOS, Android, Web, Windows, Mac and Fuchsia apps using one single code.

High Performance : It provides high performance because it accesses native components of the OS directly, there is no bridge required as in hybrid applications.

Expressive and Flexible UI : Flutter has built-in Material Design and Cupertino widget, rich motion APIs, smooth natural scrolling which makes flutter application’s UI is expressive and flexible UI.

Native Performance : Flutter uses native components directly without any bridge, it’s widgets incorporate all platform differences like scrolling, icons, navigation and fonts for providing full native performance on iOS and Android.

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Will Flutter still be popular in 2022?

Yes, Flutter is fastest growing app development platform so today is most popular framework. Let’s know here why Flutter will be popular in 2021:

Flutter is a multi-platform and open-source SDK used for creating Android and iOS apps. Although it has been a long time since this SDK had been introduced on the market, it had become more well-known since Google I/O 2018, when the tech giant declared a preview release of Flutter.

Must Read: Is Flutter the Future of Hybrid App Development?

How is Flutter making an impact?

Android development companies are helped by Flutter for creating highly secure, unique, and optimized apps. Working around the Dart language, the good thing is that Flutter is an open-source and free framework.

From the perspective of app development, the most significant advantages are: Flutter accelerates the task of developing apps, minimizes the development cost, and creates an MVP along with an attractive app interface. Let us talk about this in detail right here.

1. Dynamic code

App developers can make use of Flutter for writing fast and dynamic code. It is possible to preview the code’s customization in the app. One can gain access to the hot reload technique, which will take only a few seconds for loading an app, and thus, it will help the developers to make the changes, detect bugs, plus implement features. Hot reload aids in creating the designer-developer cooperation once rework is needed on the look of the app.

2. Cross-platform code

It is possible to save lots of time in writing code because developers need to write just one code for a couple of application platforms. Flutter comes with its own set of designs and widgets, and this helps to make it independent. Apps can work without showing any problem. This helps to save the company’s expenses to a great extent, given that less investment is required while hiring an Android developer, and the process of development is quite fast. After writing just one code, the developer will be able to use it to create apps for several platforms according to the client’s requirements.

3. Minimum testing

Minimum testing will be needed in case you have an identical app for two operating systems. Automatic tests with only one codebase are performed just once. Apart from this, Quality Assurance professionals do not have many tasks to do since they have to verify only a single app. All these advantages help to reduce the overall development costs of the app.

4. Fast development procedure

The developers will need much less time to create a cross-platform app using Flutter. The SDK supports hot reload functionality, which makes it feasible to see the alterations in the app code on the screen. This helps to make the process of Android app development quite fast as well as smooth. Various teams of designers, quality experts, and developers will be able to work in collaboration for quick development using Flutter. The innovative hot reload feature allows the programmers to include new features plus fix glitches within a short period. The entire process becomes quite fast as only one code is used for creating various apps.

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Published on Medium, December 11, 2021 at 07:02PM

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Published on Medium, November 30, 2021 at 10:48AM

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Published on Medium, November 30, 2021 at 10:47AM

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Published on Medium, November 30, 2021 at 10:47AM

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How can I earn money as a student?

Besides the obvious solutions as getting a side job, such as Food delivery driver/rider or a barista, here’s a list of less recommended alternatives:

Freelance. Freelancing is a great way of getting paid & building your portfolio. If you speak multiple languages, edit pictures, write copy or have other skills, you should try Fiver or Upwork.

Get paid for your study material. This is a low effort - high reward solution. For example, StuDocu will reward you for every set of lecture notes, summary or other kind of study resource you’ve created over the years! And if you don’t have any, by referring your friends, you can earn 1$ for every document they upload!

Become a Tutor. Granted, this one requires a fair bit of time, but say you have a two hour session with two students once a week, you could charge $10-15 for each session. That’s an extra $40-60 a month!

Be a pet sitter. Pet sitting might seem like an easy job, but it does require attention and responsibility, you shouldn’t do it just for the money. You can’t just sit around and let them roam, they need feeding, walking and entertaining and that is what you’re being paid to do!

Get Cashback. Granted, you have to spend money to get money back when using Cashback sites and apps. You can earn around 6% cash back on every purchase you make, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but when you are saving all the time it definitely helps!

[codelance]

Is Tkinter easy for a programmer with a basic knowledge of Python?

TKInter is easier to use than the other GUIs available for Python. Its geometry system is very direct and flexible.

The geometry system is the one that allows you to distribute the widgets on the screen.

It is a very light library (in Windows it is not necessary to install it) and according to the tests that have been carried out, it allows loading up to 6 times faster than, for example, wxpython (wxwidgets).

Of course, the available widgets are much smaller than those available in pySide (QT) or wxPython.

But for example tkinter can be run in parallel together with wxPython.

To design screens you have pygubu or page, although the latter the code it generates is messy.

In my opinion, TKInter is easier to learn than other libraries, and can be useful for applications where complex desktop interfaces are not required.

Keep in mind that its Canvas and Text widgets have many features, not enviable with other environments.

In fact, the built-in Python editor is written with TKInter.

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Published on Medium, November 26, 2021 at 01:27PM

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Published on Medium, November 25, 2021 at 11:18PM

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Published on Medium, November 25, 2021 at 03:27PM

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Published on Medium, November 25, 2021 at 01:48PM

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Why is JavaScript the only client-side language available?

JavaScript isn’t, and never was “the only client-side language”. At most, for a certain period of time, JavaScript was the only programming language with built-in support in all major browsers. Given the popularity of the Web, that made JavaScript very successful.

JavaScript was created back in 1995 by Brendan Eich, who was recruited by Netscape specifically in order to embed a programming language into its eponymous browser. The reason for this was the realization, by Netscape management, that in order to successfully compete with Microsoft, they had to transform the browser from a document displaying tool into an applicative platform.

The original intent was to embed the Scheme programming language, but before Brendan Eich could start, Netscape began a collaboration with Sun to integrate the Java programming language into the browser. However, Java was seen as a “hardcore” programming language intended for “real programmers”. Consequently, Brendan Eich was now tasked with creating a simpler scripting language, which could be used by Web designers to automate browser components, including Java Applets. And it was decided that this simple scripting language should have a syntax similar to Java. Brendan Eich was able to design and implement such a language in ten days - thus JavaScript was born.

As you can see, even in the beginning, JavaScript wasn’t alone, but rather existing side-by-side with Java inside the browser. Moreover, Netscape management instructed Brendan Eich to intentionally limit JavaScript’s capabilities so that it remain simple, and wouldn’t compete directly with Java. For example, he was not allowed to implement classes in JavaScript. But instead of creating a crippled language, Brendan Eich actually did an end-run around these dictates, for example by implementing prototypal Inheritance in JavaScript - an arguably more flexible inheritance mechanism than classes. This is also why JavaScript lacked a module system for a long time.

JavaScript quickly became very popular, especially because Java, while also running inside the browser, had very limited access to the HTML. Instead Java got its own screen real-estate, where it had to render everything itself, like a plugin. And so, when Microsoft introduced Internet Explorer 3.0 (IE3), it included its own JavaScript implementation, called JScript (reverse-engineered from Netscape JavaScript). But, in addition to JScript, Microsoft provided another scripting language inside the browser: VBScript. VBScript was based on Microsoft’s Visual Basic language, and had the same access to the HTML as JScript. So now you actually had three languages running inside browsers.

For a while it even looked like VBScript might beat out JavaScript because:

You could use it for both client-side and server-side development, in Microsoft’s then popular ASP

Another Visual Basic derivative - VBA - was introduced into Microsoft Office

VBScript in IE3 and later IE4 was actually more powerful, initially, than JScript. For example, it had error handling, which JScript didn’t have at that time (no exception handling yet)

But JavaScript had the great advantage that it worked inside both Netscape and IE, but VBScript was only supported in IE. Also, JavaScript’s C/C++/Java style syntax was more attractive to many developers than BASIC-style syntax. Unfortunately, Microsoft and Netscape were locked in a “browser war”, and wouldn’t cooperate on proper standardization for JavaScript and for HTML (DOM). This almost killed the Web, and JavaScript along with it.

Luckily for JavaScript several things happened:

Due to a lawsuit by Sun in 2001, Microsoft dropped Java support in Windows, effectively killing client-side Java for years to come, including inside the browser

JavaScript standardization work began in Ecma International, which led Macromedia (later acquired by Adobe) to use it as a basis for their ActionScript language in Flash

Microsoft itself introduced XMLHttpRequest back in 1999, and the term Ajax was coined in 2005. These made it possible to use JavaScript and the browser DOM to create powerful Single Page Applications

The ActiveX mechanism, which Microsoft was promoting as a means for browser-side development died due to continuing security concerns, and lack of cross-platform support

The introduction of mobile devices, starting with the iPhone in 2007, and the end of the Windows client-side monopoly, prompted developers to seek out cross-platform solutions. And JavaScript in the browser was the best option, by far. Steve Jobs famous letter, written in 2010, and titled “Thoughts on Flash” is a major milestone in this regard

HTML5, CSS3, and ECMAScript 6 transformed the browsers and JavaScript into a powerful platform for front-end development. Especially when coupled with the highly capable development tools built into modern browsers, and with a new generation of front-end frameworks, such as Angular and React

As a result, JavaScript became the popular choice for front-end development. In 2007 this led Jeff Atwood to coin his Law:

Any application that can be written in JavaScript, will eventually be written in JavaScript.

But while it was the leading option, JavaScript wasn’t the only option. You had languages like CoffeeScript, introduced in 2009, and ClojureScript, introduced in 2011, and others. But debugging these languages in the browser was challenging, and JavaScript was considered to be Good Enough by the vast majority of Web developers.

Then, in 2013, asm.js was introduced as a means for compiling languages such as C/C++ into JavaScript, so that they could run in the browser. And starting in Firefox 22, asm.js optimizations were introduced, so that such code could run at speeds approaching native execution. This ultimately lead to the creation of WebAssmebly (wasm), which is a binary compilation target, supported by all modern browsers. There are still some limitations on WebAssmebly, such as lack of direct DOM access, which require the inclusion of at least a bit of JavaScript code. But frameworks are already appearing, which work around this limitation, such as Yew for Rust.

Also., let’s not forget that even while all this browser-based development was taking place, native client-side programming never went away. Microsoft kept introducing technologies such as .NET, C#, WinForms, WPF, and finally Universal Windows Platform apps. And as Windows client-side development began to wane, mobile native development rose to take its place, as is amply seen in the great success of the Apple Store, and Google Play Store. Modern mobile apps are written in a variety of programming languages, including Objective-C, Swift, C++, and now Kotlin. Even Java has made a comeback on the client-side, especially for Android.

Interestingly, JavaScript has also become popular for native mobile development, thanks to technologies such as PhoneGap and React Native. There are several reasons for this, such as the widespread availability of JavaScript developers, and the fact that in many cases, versions of the same app need to be developed both as native and as browser-based. Being able to reuse at least some of the code is very beneficial.

As you can see, JavaScript is not the only client-side programming language.

Indeed, as I have shown, it never really was.

[codelance]

What exactly is a "closure" in JavaScript?

Here Global context is the environment of the global entity. In C programming, this would be the ‘main’ function. In JavaScript it would be the Window object. ‘one’ is a function called from within the Global context. ‘two’ is a function called from within the context of ‘one’. ‘three’ is a function called from within the context of ‘two’. They are all placed on top of each other and hence isolated from each other.

Any local variables you declare within any of the contexts above, is isolated from all other contexts. Only a global variable is accessible within all contexts.

But with JavaScript the call stack works differently.

In JavaScript, when a function is called, its context is placed inside of the context, that it is called from. Something like a box - within - a - box:

Sorry, for the totally unrelated graphic ;), but I hope you get the idea. Each box represents a context. The largest box represents the Global context. The smaller box represents the context of a function called from within the Global context. The smallest box represents the context of a function called from within the context of the smaller box.

Now imagine these boxes being fully closed. You see that the smaller boxes have access to the contexts within which they were called from(larger boxes). But the calling functions(larger boxes) don’t have access to the contexts of the functions(smaller boxes) they call. This behaviour is called closure.

This is the reason the behaviour is called ‘Closure.’. The calling contexts (larger boxes)close over the called contexts (smaller boxes).

Now lets see an example:

<script>

var e = 5; // Global Variable due to Global Execution Context (Closure)

function outer(){

var a = 1; //Local Variable

b = 3; // Global Variable by definition

function print(){

c = 2; // Global Variable by definition

var d = 4; // Local Variable

function printInner(){

console.log(a); //Outputs Local Variable 'a' due to Closure - '1'

console.log(b); // Outputs Global Variable 'b' - '3'

console.log(c); // Outputs Global Variable 'c' - '2'

console.log(d); // Outputs Local Variable 'd' due to Closure - '4'

console.log(e); // Outputs Global Variable 'e' - '5' (Closure)

}

printInner();

}

print();

}

outer();

</script>

Now answer the following question:

Which of the above variables are local variables ?

If you included the variable ‘e’ in your answer, you’re wrong. It is a global variable.

‘e’ is not a global variable by definition. It is a global variable by Execution Context. Its execution context is the Window object, which closes over the execution contexts of any function called from within it. Hence it is accessible to any function called from within the Window object. This is an example of Closure.

Similarly the variables a and d while being local variables are also accessible within the function printInner. This is also due to Closure.

Reason for this Peculiar Behaviour?

The reason for this difference in behaviour of the JS execution context, could be that it was primarily designed for DOM manipulation. A DOM has a tree - like structure with nodes as its branches.

Any change in the state of a node might affect the change in the state of its parents. Perhaps the designers of JS wanted to capture this behaviour in the language and that is why they made child objects(remember functions are first-class objects in JS) have access to the state(execution context) of its parent objects

[codelance]

REMIX- A new React Framework from the creators of React Router

If you have been developing Single Page Applications (SPAs) using React you know that there are a couple of problems that creep into our application because of the way react basically works by default. For example, the most common problem, it is very difficult to have good SEO if you are using client-side rendering (CSR) in React.

This is because, in the case of CSR, the data you see on the page is generated by the JavaScript in the browser itself. It is also very difficult to have dynamic Metadata on such websites.

Single-page applications (SPAs) due to these reasons are commonly regarded as non-SEO friendly websites.

You can learn more about the pros and cons of SPAs here

To solve this problem (along with other problems with CSR), we use different technics like Server-side rendering (SSR), prerendering, etc.

Since it is a bit difficult to do React SSR manually, we have different React frameworks to make our job easy.

One of such React frameworks which is very popular is Next.js

Similar to frameworks like Next.js, the people who developed React Router (The most popular routing library for React) are working on a NEW React framework to solve all the problems we face while developing with React.

They have named it Remix.

Some of the highlighted features of Remix are as follow-

File system routes

Route layout nesting

Automatic code splitting

Data-driven meta tags

Built-in data loading

Location-based Suspense cache

Streaming server rendering

Zero-config build

React Refresh

Server rendering in dev

Deploy anywhere

...and more

Here is the first preview of Remix on YouTube. You'll get a preview on routing, layouts, data loading, meta tags, data caching, and scroll restoration etc.

You can subscribe to follow their progress and get early access here- https://remix.run/

Isn't it cool? Personally, I'm very excited about it. I know its gonna be a big thing because of the people behind it.

Hope you liked this post. You can follow me for more such interesting stories.