Flutter Remote Meetup 2022 - FlutterBLR|GeekyAnts
Flutter started its 2021 with a bang! Flutter 2.0 was introduced in the beginning of the year with a stable version of Flutter Web, sound null safety, Flutter for desktop and so much more, which evidently cemented its position as one of the most used SDKs in the world.
As always, we covered Flutter at each and every step throughout the year. We held 4 major events throughout the year, dedicated to Flutter and everything that’s been happening in the community. Check them out on our YouTube channel if you get the chance!
2022 is no different.
We started off the year with the first edition of Flutter Remote meetup in 2022, powered by FlutterBLR & GeekyAnts, with the focus on everything that the amazing community of Flutter is up to. We talked about the past, the present, and the future of Flutter with some of the most notable names in the community.
The following is an account of the discussions that took place at the event:
Flutter Web Routing- Public and Protected Routes: Pushkar Kumar
The first session of the event by Pushkar Kumar, senior software engineer from GeekyAnts and a tech enthusiast about Flutter, consisted of a discussion revolving around developing a stable web framework and navigating through it using the best routing practices. One of his primary reasons for choosing this topic is the launch of navigator 2.0 by Flutter which now allows for managing web behavior by solving issues created by the existing navigator. He went on to elaborate more about this new feature and how it differs from its predecessor through the provision of a declaring style of parsing which allows for clear separation of code, better decision making and deep linking. These concepts were explained further through two examples: the first where he constructed a simple application which provides users with an operating system and a router delegate which helps in setting public and protected routes to guide the users through a secure web framework and in the second example he shows how this can function on a blockchain based gaming application.
Dart as a Backend : Aswin Gopinathan
The next talk on the agenda was given by Aswin Gopinathan, a software engineer at Accenture and an ambassador for Flutter Canada who has extensive experience with working with Dart applications which gave him the know-how for the next topic- Using Dart as the programming language for developing the Backend. While Flutter in tandem with Firebase has gained popularity for constructing Backends, the question here was how to integrate Firebase for a pure native Dart application. Aswin explained how to do this via an example where he created a new project on IntelliJ and initialised all APIs using DartFire and integrating them within the application real-time. He also spoke about the various use cases wherein Dart could be used like building custom APIs and specific kinds of bots while also explaining what firebase_dart could support during Dart implementation.
Flutter and DAPPS : Shrihriday Bhagwat
The following session was an intriguing one by Shrihriday Bhagwat, a Flutter consultant and editor who is also the founder of Codeaamy. As a Flutter trainer, he had been working with the software for quite some time now which brought him to explore more about decentralised apps which was the topic for this session. He started off my introducing the features of Web1 and Web2 in Flutter while explaining the benefits and drawbacks of each which included concerns like data-privacy and filtering of data because of which Flutter came up with the concept of Web3 which provided for the development of decentralised apps using blockchain technology. In this session, he spoke about the attributes of D-Apps and went to elucidate this through an example wherein he built a to-do app with Flutter as the Frontend where users could write Smart Contracts using Solidity. He also explained how to fast track the entire setup and reduce the time spent by integrating Truffle in the D-App.
Building PWA with Flutter by Majid Hajian
The last talk of the day was delivered by Majid Haijan, a passionate software engineer and Flutter community leader who has contributed quite a bit to the framework. During the session, Majid covered the topic of Progressive Web Apps and why Flutter web is the perfect tool for creating Single Page applications which can then be converted into PWAs. He also discussed the many characteristics of PWAs which set them apart from regular web apps and how Single Page Applications are pivotal to running them. In his demonstration, he exhibited how to create a PWA in Flutter and extend its software worker into Workbox.js. Some of the strategies that were discussed during the demonstration were server workers, fetching and caching along with an in-depth explanation of web app manifests.
The first Flutter meetup which also happens to be the first tech event of the year hosted by GeekyAnts is only a taster of what is yet in store. The end of the session was marked by a FAQ session with the panelists addressing the audience’s questions.
You can watch the entire event below: